It’s time for the awards!  Our biggest congratulations go to the winner of the 2014 e-Systems College Football Pool:

AUBrian

AUBrian finished the season with 2,212 points.  For the first time since I’ve been keeping records, there was a tie for overall second place between JagRag and maestro; each finished with 2,206 points.  Congratulations to all three for their great performances!  All three will receive special prizes for their accomplishment.

AUBrian won by scoring consistently high throughout the year; he only finished below tenth in a week four times.  Starting week nine, he never finished below tenth in an individual week.  AUBrian also has the distinction of becoming a back-to-back overall champion, having also won last year, and dare I say has established a dynasty, having won three times since 2010. Congratulations to AUBrian!

In the “number of games picked correctly” category, gatorbamalover finished first, with 213 games correct.  Liquid Heat and maestro tied for second, with 212, and JG Bama had 210 games picked correctly.  Great job!

The first half of the game (weeks 1-8) was won by JagRag (1,296 points), and the second half (9-15) by AUBrian (928 points). Nicely done!

There were three multiple-week winners this year: GODAWGS (weeks 3, 11, and 12); JHutto (weeks 8 and 9); and Liquid Heat (weeks 13 and 15).  Good job!  Other weekly winners were Mayhalls picks (1), Rudy Ruettiger (2), LPosey (4), gatorbamalover (5), The Tradition (6), Allison (7), bamaken (10), and Crimson Gator (14).  Congratulations to all of the weekly winners!

You might remember that I mentioned new categories that I would be keeping track of this year, and so here are the winners!

The first is the tiebreaker award.  You know how every week we have to pick the total score of the last game as a tiebreaker?  We kept track of who was closest overall in all of the tiebreaker choices, and the winner (with only 162 points in 15 weeks) is The Tradition!

The next award is the “against the grain” award.  This title goes to the picker who amassed the most points by picking games correctly that a vast majority of the pickers that week missed.  An example from this past week was Ohio State over Wisconsin; only 2 of the 20 pickers chose Ohio State; each put one point on the game, so each added one point to their total for getting that game right.  The winner of this title is TheAUone, who scored 21 points in four correct “against the grain” picks!

Everyone will receive a prize for participating this year! If you aren’t sure that we have your current mailing address for shipping, please respond to my e-mail that was sent today and we will update our records.

How Did We All Do?

Picks: 5,188 / 6,605 (78.547%)
Points: 54,623 / 63,945 (85.422%)
Best Week as a Group: week 1 (619 / 660 picks – 93.788%; 7,390 / 7,590 points – 97.365%)
Six weeks with over 80% of picks correct
Five weeks with over 90% of possible points gained
No “Perfect” weeks; thanks a lot, South Carolina! They were the sole blemishes in 27 otherwise-perfect weeks thanks to their losses in week 1 (21) and in week 5 (6)!
“All but 1 game right” weeks: 33

On behalf of all of us at e-Systems, thank you again for participating in our 11^th annual College Football Pool. College football season is always a great time of the year, and we hope that this pool makes keeping up with the teams and the games even more fun and exciting!  I hope that all of you will join us again in 2015, when we’ll do it all again! In the meantime, we hope you will think of e-Systems for all your custom application and system needs.  We’re just as much fun to work with!

“Who’s In?” That’s the question that ESPN has been hammering into our minds all season regarding the entrants for the first College Football Playoff. Now we know. Alabama, Oregon, Florida State, and Ohio State will be the title contenders this year. Let’s take a closer look at each team.

#1 Alabama is the SEC champion, and perhaps even more impressive, the SEC West champion, as that division had every single member reach bowl eligibility this year. Overcoming a loss to Ole Miss (the only team of the four to have a loss on the road), the Crimson Tide made its way through the rest of the SEC schedule unscathed, including beating four straight top-20 SEC opponents at one point. The defense was its usual self, finishing 11th in overall defense, 2nd in rushing defense, and 4th in scoring defense. Offensively, however, Alabama was also potent, finishing 16th in total offense and scoring offense. This gives Alabama the distinction of being the only one of the four with a top-20 scoring offense and defense. One other factor: Alabama finished 2nd in the country in net punting, so in a field position battle, the Crimson Tide likes its chances.

#2 Oregon comes into the playoff as the Pac-12 champion. The Ducks achieved a measure of revenge against Arizona in the Pac-12 title game, avenging an early home loss with a 51-13 win. As usual, offense is the Ducks’ specialty. Led by Heisman Trophy favorite Marcus Mariota, the Quack Attack finished 3rd overall in scoring offense and total offense, 20th in rushing offense, and 11th in passing offense. Their defense finished 80th overall in total defense, which isn’t particularly great, but a respectable 29th overall in scoring defense. Considering the wide open offenses in the Pac-12, that’s not too bad; the Ducks make stops when they need to. Also, the Ducks finished tied for 1st in passes intercepted against, with just 2 all season. When Mariota puts the ball in the air, it’s safe.

#3 Florida State is a statistical anomaly. The ACC champions are the only undefeated team left in the country, at 13-0. Yet their margin of victory (11.8 points) is by far the smallest of the four schools. Their offense and defense are good, not great (29th overall in scoring offense, 30th overall in scoring defense); they don’t rank in the top five in any major team statistical category. Their opponents, however, may have something to do with that; Florida State’s 13 opponents have the most wins between them (83) of any of the four schools’ opposition. Florida State also played what might be considered the most daunting of the nonconference schedules, at least in name: how’s Oklahoma State, Notre Dame, and Florida sound? None of the other three playoff teams currently owns three nonconference wins over bowl-eligible opponents (although Ohio State will also be able to claim this if Navy beats Army on Saturday).

#4 Ohio State used a win over Wisconsin that was as surprising as it was dominant to vault into the final spot in the top 4. The Big Ten champions lost in their second game to Virginia Tech (the only loss between the four teams to a school with less than nine wins on the season), but swept through the conference schedule unbeaten, with just two of the games decided by single digits. The Buckeyes have the widest margin of victory of the four (24 points per game), rank 4th overall in scoring offense, 8th in total offense, 11th in rushing offense, and 2nd in team passing efficiency. Their defense is ranked 15th overall in total defense and 23rd in scoring defense, so the Buckeyes aren’t exactly bad on the other side of the ball, either. They also have the distinction of being the only team of the four to have beaten another conference champion; Cincinnati earned a share of the American Athletic Conference title this year.

One final note of interest: one of the four teams has been a championship game participant in every year but one since 2006 (Ohio State ’06, ’07; Alabama ’09, ’11, ’12; Oregon ’10; Florida State ’13). Suffice to say it will be a compelling set of games.

Congratulations to Liquid Heat, who wins week 15 in a tiebreaker with 32 points! Also finishing with 32 points on the week were The Tradition and pachyderm. With 30 points, gatorbamalover was next, and JHutto, War Ralphie, and maestro finished one point back with 29 points.

Stay tuned for the season wrap-up and the announcement of the awards!

Rivalry week is always among the strangest weekends in college football. This week we had:

• Two teams combine for three fumbles on the one-yard line, one of which was returned for a touchdown (Georgia Tech-Georgia);
• Two teams combine for fifteen touchdown passes (a I-A record), 74 first downs, and over 1,400 yards of total offense (with both teams going over 700!), and with 133 points, tie the record for the most points in a game involving a ranked team (Western Kentucky-Marshall);
• A team that gave up 456 yards passing, a school record 628 yards, and 44 points, and somehow still won by double figures (Alabama, against Auburn);
• A team with a 25-point lead with 2:18 left in the third quarter need a 2-point conversion stop to avoid overtime (Baylor, against Texas Tech);
• The first I-A team to throw four interceptions in a game and yet still win (Florida State, against Florida);
• A team score 41 unanswered points in just over 17 minutes of game time (Louisiana Tech, against Rice in a 76-31 win);
• A game finish 42-35 in which neither team had more than a seven-point lead at any point (BYU-California);
• A team give up two defensive touchdowns and still win (Louisville, against Kentucky)

I’m sure that if I looked a little more, I’d find other news of the weird. You just never know what you’ll see in this game.

The classic example of “all dressed up, with no place to go” this year has to be Georgia Southern. The Eagles, in their first year in I-A, have won the Sun Belt Conference outright with an 8-0 record, capped with a 22-16 win over Louisiana-Monroe. However, due to the NCAA regulations about transferring divisions, Georgia Southern cannot represent the conference in a bowl game unless there are not enough qualifying teams to fill all the bowl games (and there are already 80 such teams to fill 76 slots). Their only hope at this point is in an appeal to the NCAA. One would think that the outright conference champion should have the right to go to a bowl, but given the NCAA’s track record…

One of the longest tenures in coaching ended last week. Larry Blakeney wrapped up his 24^th and final season at Troy on Saturday with a 42-23 loss to Louisiana-Lafayette. Blakeney was the second-longest tenured coach in I-A behind only Frank Beamer of Virginia Tech. He won 178 games (all at Troy), won or shared eight conference championships, made two I-AA semifinal games, and is one of only two coaches to oversee a program transition from Division II to I-A. His name is already on the field at Troy’s Veterans Memorial Stadium.

In small school news, Wisconsin-Whitewater will be losing their coach after this year. This is a fairly big deal, seeing as Lance Leipold isn’t your average Division III coach. In his eight years at the school, Leipold has a 106-6 record, good for a 94.6% winning percentage. He reached 100 wins in fewer games than any coach in NCAA history. In his seven full years of coaching, he’s won five national championships, and is still alive to win a sixth this year. Leipold will be heading to Buffalo, making it a rare circumstance of a Division III coach taking over a Division I-A program, but as has already been stated, he’s not an average Division III coach.

Congratulations to Crimson Gator, who wins week 14 with 172 points! The Tradition and SicEmFrogs tied for second with 165 points, and maestro and JagRag were one point back with 164.

Overall standings after 14 weeks:

1st	AUBrian	2184
2nd	Allison	2180
3rd	JagRag	2178
4th	maestro	2177
5th	pachyderm	2167
6th	SicEmFrogs	2163
7th	GODAWGS	2147
8th	Crimson Gator	2146
9th	gatorbamalover	2137
10th	The Tradition	2136

This is the final week of picks, and there are only eight games to pick. But it is such a tight race at the top that one game might make all of the difference! And remember, there are other titles to win, so make sure to pick to be eligible for those! The first game this week is the Pac-12 Championship Game, Arizona versus Oregon. It is December 5^th at 9 PM ET, so make sure to get your picks in by then!

I love college football rivalry games. There is nothing in the world quite like them. Oh, there are rivals in other sports, but they generally play each other multiple times in a year. In college football, if you don’t beat your rival, you have to wait a full year to get another chance. The history behind each series is unique. And no other sport has the eclectic set of trophies that are contested; everything from buckets to “eggs” to wagon wheels are on the line. As we draw close to the end of the regular season, let’s take a look at three of these storied series.

Minnesota and Wisconsin have played each other 123 times in football, the most times a major college rivalry game has been played. The Gophers and Badgers have met every year but one since 1890 (1906, when Teddy Roosevelt suspended football games due to safety concerns; yes, politics and college sports mixed even then). Paul Bunyan’s Axe is the trophy for this game. A six-foot tall chopper worthy of the mythical woodsman, it is painted red on one side and gold on the other, and has been given to the winner annually since 1948. However, this year even more is at stake. Minnesota and Wisconsin play for the Big Ten West title, the first time a championship is at stake for the winner since 1962. Minnesota leads the overall series 59-56-8, and has never trailed in the series in the long history of the game, but Wisconsin currently holds a ten-game winning streak.

Georgia and Georgia Tech have what is perhaps one of the most interesting names for their rivalry: “Clean, Old-Fashioned Hate”. The Bullldogs and Yellow Jackets have met 106 times, with the current record standing in Georgia’s favor, 64-37-5 – if you’re a Georgia fan. If you root for the Yellow Jackets, you also count two wins in 1943 and 1944 that Georgia disputes by saying that their teams were unofficial those years due to World War II. Georgia Tech owns the longest streak in the series, having won eight straight between 1949 and 1956, but Georgia is on a current five-game streak. The winner of the game receives the Governor’s Cup. The dislike between the two teams even extends to school colors – at one time, Georgia’s school colors included old gold, but they removed it after their first meeting with Georgia Tech in 1893!

In 1899, the University of Arizona played the Normal School of Arizona (which would eventually become Arizona State University) in football for the first time. The winner of this game (Arizona State) was awarded the Territorial Cup as overall champion of a series of games between the two schools and two other teams. After the tournament, the cup was lost until 1980, when it was found in a church close to the ASU campus. It was verified by the NCAA as the trophy awarded in 1899, giving it the distinction of the oldest college football rivalry trophy. The 2001 season marked the first year since 1899 that it was used as the traveling trophy for the game. Before then, the schools played for other trophies, including the Saguaro Trophy, which now has its own somewhat unique distinction; the winning coach has kept this trophy in his office since the 1997 game. The two teams have played each other 87 times, with Arizona holding a 47-39-1 edge.

In small-school news, the I-AA playoff bracket is now out. As in the Division II bracket, there are 24 teams, with the top eight receiving first-round byes. Much like the NCAA basketball tournament, conference champions receive automatic bids to the tournament, with the rest filled in with at-large selections. There are 13 conferences, but the Ivy and the SWAC generally tend to decline their automatic bids, so there are 11 conference champions in the field. The Division II and III playoffs are underway, with second-round matchups this weekend. I didn’t realize this until doing my research, but the Division III tournament is now up to 32 teams! There are 244 Division III football teams, meaning roughly one in every eight schools makes the playoffs. If that were the case in I-A, there would be a 16-team playoff. Will it eventually happen?

Congratulations to Liquid Heat, who wins week 13 with 223 points! Coming in second was TheAUone with 222, and JG Bama was third with 217.

Overall standings after 13 weeks:

1st	AUBrian	2024
2nd	Allison	2023
3rd	JagRag	2014
4th	maestro	2013
5th	pachyderm	2006
T-6th	GODAWGS	1998
T-6th	SicEmFrogs	1998
8th	JHutto	1989
9th	TheAUone	1983
10th	gatorbamalover	1977

Rivalry week is traditionally one of the most difficult weeks to pick, and this week has 20 big games! The first game is TCU at Texas, Thursday, November 27 @ 7:30 ET, so make sure to get your picks in by then!

What a week! This week featured Alabama giving former #1 Mississippi State its first loss of the year, Virginia Tech going into Duke and knocking off the Blue Devils, Nebraska getting humbled by Wisconsin and Melvin Gordon (more on that in a second), and Arizona State becoming the latest highly-ranked team to come into Corvallis, Oregon, and leave a loser against an underdog Oregon State. As a result, there is now only one unbeaten team in the Power 5, and only six one-loss teams. The closest analog to this year that I could find is 2007, where after week 12, there was only one major conference undefeated and seven one-loss teams. Can you name the team that was undefeated? The answer is at the end of the column!

Melvin Gordon is a running back from Wisconsin. On Saturday, he played in the first three quarters of a football game against Nebraska. He gained 408 yards rushing. That is a new major college record, breaking the previous mark of 406 by LaDanian Tomlinson of TCU. Three amazing stats that I’ve seen as a result of this incredible performance:

• In three quarters, Melvin Gordon gained more rushing yards than Wake Forest has all year (341).
• Gordon ran the ball 25 times…and gained 16.3 yards per carry. Not surprisingly, it’s the most yards per carry for a back who rushes at least 25 times in I-A history.
• Wisconsin running backs now hold the record for most rushing yards in a game, most rushing yards in a career, and most touchdowns. The three records are held by three different players: Gordon, Ron Dayne, and Montee Ball respectively.

ESPN introduced the concept of QBR (Total Quarterback Rating) to illustrate more in-depth how effective a quarterback’s performance is for a season or a game. It breaks down each play for a quarterback, taking into account the down, distance, score, time remaining, and the quality of the opposing defense, among other factors. Eventually, a score from 0 to 100 is assigned for the quarterback’s performance, where 50 is an “average” game. The rating can extend to a season or career as well. The leader this season is Marcus Mariota from Oregon, with a QBR of 90.9. That’s not much of a surprise; Mariota is a top Heisman Trophy candidate. But there are some interesting facts hiding in the ratings:

• Who’s currently second on the list? Alabama’s Blake Sims. The Crimson Tide’s starting quarterback wasn’t even expected to be the starter at the beginning of the year; so far, he’s compiled an 88.5 QBR.
• Georgia Tech runs the triple-option, but the threat of the vertical passing game is crucial to its success. (Calvin Johnson, the NFL superstar wide receiver, came from that offense.) This year, the Yellow Jackets’ Justin Thomas has been very effective, with an 83.9 rating, good for 6^th in the country.
• Texas A&M’s Kenny Hill is still 9^th on the list with an 81.3 rating, and he isn’t even the starter for the Aggies now.
• Quarterbacks are penalized for sacks in this rating. Who has the lowest sack penalty in the country? Mariota? Sims? Ohio State’s J.T. Barrett? Auburn’s Nick Marshall? All good guesses, but all wrong. The answer is actually Syracuse’s Terrel Hunt.

In small-school news, you think that Baylor is being treated unfairly by being ranked outside the top four? Try being the University of Sioux Falls. The South Dakota Division II school had a 10-1 record this season. Their single loss was a 27-14 to the number one team in Division II, Minnesota State – Mankato, on the road. After a 63-28 win over Wayne State three days ago, the Cougars waited for a call from the Division II playoff committee. It never came. The Division II playoff format consists of 24 teams, but there are four regions, and only the top six from each region advance to the playoffs. USF’s region includes the aforementioned Minnesota State – Mankato and fellow undefeated teams Minnesota – Duluth and Ouachita Baptist, as well as Pittsburg State and Northwest Missouri State, two of the most historic powers in Division II. Unfortunately, the 16^th-ranked Cougars were left out. It makes one wonder if the format for the Division II playoff really does the best job of inviting the best teams in the country. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?

Okay, now the answer to the trivia question. Would you believe that the answer is Kansas? The Jayhawks were 10-0 at the time. In fact, the Jayhawks would finish the season as the only major conference school with a single loss, at 12-1.

Congratulations to GODAWGS, who wins week 12 (their second win in a row!) with 87 points in a tough week overall. JagRag was second with 86 points, and pachyderm was third with 83.

Overall standings after twelve weeks:

1st	Allison	1818
2nd	JagRag	1811
3rd	AUBrian	1810
4th	maestro	1802
5th	pachyderm	1794
T-6th	GODAWGS	1784
T-6th	SicEmFrogs	1784
8th	JHutto	1780
9th	Crimson Gator	1765
10th	The Tradition	1764

This week features a strange set of games. Juxtaposed between tune-up games such as Western Carolina – Alabama and Charleston Southern – Georgia, there are actual rivalry games such as North Carolina – Duke and USC – UCLA. There are 21 total games this week, so loads of points are available! Note that there are two Thursday games, but the first game is Kansas State at West Virginia, Thursday, November 20 @ 7 PM ET, so make sure to get your picks in by then!

I thought it might be interesting to write one of these after the College Football Playoff poll of the week had come out, to give some thoughts on the process.  This week is a prime example that the committee does things differently than the “old school” way of thinking.  How so? How about a one-loss team (Oregon) leapfrogging an undefeated, defending national champion (Florida State) for the #2 spot?  The AP and coaches polls almost never do such a thing.  Speaking of Frogs, how about TCU using an impressive win over what was then the #7 team to jump a perennial contender in Alabama (fresh off a hard-fought overtime win over the then-#16 team) for the 4^th position?  By the way, Baylor, the team TCU lost to, is 7^th in the poll; that represents another unusual circumstance of two teams with the same number of losses and the head-to-head winner ranked lower.  Of course, there is still time for everything to change, so it really isn’t worth losing sleep over at this point, but it just goes to show you that the way things were done in the past doesn’t mean a thing to the 12 people deciding the fate of the college football world.

The fastest game in college football this year may very well be played on Saturday.  When Georgia Southern takes on Navy in Annapolis, it will be a matchup of the #1 and #2 rushing attacks in the country.  GSU leads the nation with 386.5 rushing yards per game; the Midshipmen average 350.4 per game.  The teams have only attempted 223 passes between them all year, so there won’t be a lot of those pesky incompletions to slow the game down, either.  For comparison, Washington State has thrown the ball 646 times this year – almost three times both GSU and Navy combined!

In small-school news, Harvard isn’t just an academically elite school; they can play some ball as well!  The Crimson currently stands at 8-0 and can wrap up its first undefeated season since 2004 (Ivy League schools do not participate in the postseason) with wins over Pennsylvania on Saturday and Yale in the 131^st edition of “The Game” next week.  Harvard has won the last seven meetings against Yale, and twelve of the last thirteen, but this year’s game will be no simple matter; Yale is currently 7-1.  Yale and Harvard are the two winningest programs in Division I-AA, with 877 and 838 wins, respectively.

Congratulations to GODAWGS, who wins week 11 via tie-breaker over AUBrian!  Both finished with 150 points.  Rudy Ruettiger and Allison each had 147 points, and War Ralphie and JG Bama finished two points farther back at 145 points.

Overall standings after 11 weeks:

1st	Allison	1736
2nd	AUBrian	1731
3rd	maestro	1726
4th	JagRag	1725
5th	JHutto	1719
6th	pachyderm	1711
7th	SicEmFrogs	1703
8th	GODAWGS	1697
9th	gatorbamalover	1688
T-10th	The Tradition	1685
T-10th	Crimson Gator	1685

As we get deeper into November, the points become more and more crucial, so pick this week’s 15 games wisely and well!  The first games begin on Saturday, November 15 @ Noon ET, so make sure to get your picks in by then!

Football is a funny game. Sometimes you never see the outcome of a game coming. Take two top-25 upsets from this past week. Florida, coming off of a 29-point loss to Missouri on Homecoming, proceeded to beat former #11 Georgia 38-20 behind the fifth-best rushing performance in school history (418 yards) while throwing the fewest passes in a win (six) since 1977.  The Gators had only gained 201 rushing yards in their previous three games against Georgia combined.  Meanwhile, Temple was outgained by almost 300 yards (428-135) by former #23 East Carolina, but forced 5 turnovers and blocked a field goal in a 20-10 victory.  It was the Owls’ first win since 1998 against a ranked opponent, and their first win ever against a ranked opponent at home.  The 293 yards marks the second-largest yardage deficit a team has overcome to win a game in the past ten years.

Don’t look now, but Duke is at it again!  The Blue Devils, coming off of last year’s conference championship game appearance, find themselves 7-1 and in somewhat familiar territory: leading the ACC Coastal Division with four games to go.  David Cutcliffe’s team doesn’t beat itself: Duke is in the top five in the nation in fewest turnovers and fewest offensive negative plays, and is tops in the country in fewest sacks allowed.  And they have a great chance to finish 11-1; their last four games are against teams with a current combined 4-15 conference record.

Those who have read my write-ups in the past know that I have a fondness for service academy football. These young men are truly inspiring: at West Point, Annapolis, and Colorado Springs, they receive world-class educations, perform long hours of military training, and on top of that, play football at the highest collegiate level.  This year, the Air Force Falcons are the cream of the crop.  The Falcons, due to their earlier 30-21 win over Navy and this past week’s 23-6 win over Army, captured the Commander-in-Chief’s Trophy for the 19^th time, the most between the three academies.  The Falcons are 6-2 this year, already making them bowl-eligible as well.

In small-school news, there are two undefeated teams left in I-AA.  One is North Dakota State, whom I’ve mentioned in this space before.  The other is 9-0 Coastal Carolina.  The Chanticleers are obviously a good team, but it’s their coach on which I want to focus.  Joe Moglia has to have one of the most unique backstories in all of college football. Do you recognize that name for some reason?  Here’s why:  prior to this job, he had a different leadership role: CEO of TD Ameritrade.  He still serves as Chairman of the Board of the company.  In his two-plus years at Coastal so far, he’s compiled an aggregate 29-8 record; the team had gone 29-28 over the previous five years.  Safe to say this guy knows a few things about leadership.

Congratulations to bamaken, who wins week 10 with 119 points! In second was AUBrian with 117 points, and Allison and maestro finished tied for third with 116 points.

Overall standings after ten weeks:

1st	Allison	1589
2nd	maestro	1584
T-3rd	JagRag	1582
T-3rd	JHutto	1582
5th	AUBrian	1581
6th	pachyderm	1569
7th	SicEmFrogs	1563
T-8th	The Tradition	1549
T-8th	gatorbamalover	1549
10th	Crimson Gator	1548

It’s still really tight at the top, so every point counts!  And, look what we have this week!  Eighteen games, including six between top-25 teams.  It might just be the toughest week yet!  The first game is Clemson at Wake Forest, Thursday, November 6 @ 7:30 ET, so make sure to get your picks in by then!

And then there were two. With Ole Miss’ loss to LSU, only Mississippi State and Florida State remain unbeaten in the Power 5 conferences.  Assuming that these two could stay undefeated and meet in the championship game, how would these two compare?

Stat / Team	MSU	FSU
Total Offense	9th	44th
Rushing Offense	13th	104th
Passing Offense	43rd	14th
Points For	10th	19th
Points Against	29th	29th
Total Defense	91st	53rd
Rushing Defense	23rd	48th
Passing Defense	122nd	62nd

One thing that stands out immediately is the Florida State passing attack versus Mississippi State’s pass defense. It would seem to be a distinct advantage for Florida State.  However, one thing to keep in mind is that Mississippi State has had at least a two-touchdown lead in every game they have played this year.  They have seen more than their fair share of passes from teams trying to catch up.

Whenever a team sets a school record for points scored in a game, you have to take a closer look. TCU rang up 82 points in their win over Texas Tech. They amassed 785 total yards, 305 on the ground and 480 through the air.  Their quarterback, Trevone Boykin, threw seven touchdown passes.  Two running backs had over 100 yards rushing. Four touchdowns went for over 50 yards.  They scored 24 points in the first quarter and 31 in the third. They even kicked three field goals from over 40 yards out.  The 82 points set a record for the most by a Big XII opponent against another Big XII team.

How about Ameer Abdullah?  Abdullah, originally from Birmingham suburb Homewood, has turned into an all-time great at Nebraska, and that’s saying something. He set a school record with 341 all-purpose yards in the Cornhuskers’ 42-24 win over Rutgers. With 6,604 career all-purpose yards, he is now second on the all-time Big Ten all-purpose yards list, behind only former Wisconsin Heisman winner Ron Dayne.

In small-school news, Jacksonville State is having a great season. After a season-opening loss at Michigan State, the Gamecocks have not lost another game and are currently leading the Ohio Valley Conference.  Their game against Eastern Kentucky in two weeks would seem to be the de facto OVC championship game.  After last year’s national quarterfinal appearance, it would appear that JSU, currently seventh in the FCS poll, are looking for even bigger and better things this year…

Congratulations to JHutto, who wins week 9 with 187 points, only missing one game! JG Bama, Rudy Ruettiger, and Rocky Tide each had 181 points to finish tied for second, and Crimson Gator, bamaken, and AUBrian each finished one point farther back with 180 points.

Standings after 9 weeks:

1st	JagRag	1475
2nd	Allison	1473
3rd	JHutto	1470
4th	maestro	1468
5th	AUBrian	1464
6th	pachyderm	1455
7th	SicEmFrogs	1452
8th	Crimson Gator	1446
T-9th	gatorbamalover	1441
T-9th	GODAWGS	1441

We begin week 10 with the Florida State Seminoles traveling to take on the Louisville Cardinals, THURSDAY evening at 6:30 PM.  Be sure to get your picks in on time!!!

Have fun and good luck!!

At one point in the second quarter, Indiana led Michigan State 17-14. I turned to my brother-in-law, with whom I was watching the Alabama-Texas A&M game, and said, “If Indiana ends up winning this, I’m giving up trying to pick college football games this year.” Consider that this had already occurred:

• Kansas State had gone into Norman and upended Oklahoma for the second straight time on the road, 31-30. Just three weeks ago, the Sooners were considered by some to be the nation’s most complete football team. The Oklahoma kicker missed a 19-yard field goal attempt in the fourth quarter.
• West Virginia had knocked off #4 Baylor 41-27 in a game in which the Bears had almost as many penalty yards (215 on 18 penalties) as they did passing yards (223).

And in addition to the completely unexpected outcome of the aforementioned Alabama-A&M game, the following would transpire:

• Florida would give up 119 yards of total offense to Missouri and still lose 42-13. In the last ten seasons, teams that have given up 120 yards or less are 147-2.  The other time besides this one? Florida again, in 2011, when they gave up 95 total yards to Florida State and still lost 21-7.
• Arizona State would look more like Stanford than Stanford, holding the Cardinal to 76 rushing yards and holding the ball for almost 35 minutes in a 26-10 win.

I could go on and on.  But you get the point. College football is a strange world this year.

Another unusual circumstance from this year is that at the end of week 8, there are only four undefeated teams left (Mississippi State, Florida State, Ole Miss, and Marshall). Last year at this time, there were ten! There can be at most three at the end of the year, as Ole Miss and Mississippi State play each other. However, there are currently eighteen 1-loss teams, many of which have impressive resumes of their own.  The playoff committee is going to have a lot to think about.

Since all of the teams are at least halfway through the season, looking at some individual statistics is actually meaningful, and reveals some interesting notes:

• The top four players nationally in rushing yards all hail from Big Ten schools (Tevin Coleman, Indiana; Melvin Gordon, Wisconsin; Ameer Abdullah, Nebraska; and David Cobb, Minnesota).
• The national leader in passing yards is Connor Halliday of Washington State, and it’s not even close. He’s just under 700 yards ahead of second-place Kenny Hill of Texas A&M, and he’s played in one less game.
• Quarterback Tyler Murphy of Boston College has 766 yards rushing, most by any quarterback in the nation. It’s just over 100 yards less than his 869 yards passing.
• Kevin White of West Virginia is first nationally in receiving yards and receiving yards per game, and second in receptions per game.
• Two players have averaged one interception per game: Ole Miss’ Senquez Golson, and Louisville’s Gerod Holliman.
• Austin Rehkow of Idaho is averaging almost half the field per punt this year (48.0 yards).

In small-school news, congratulations go out to Ken Sparks, the coach of Carson-Newman.  In his 35^th year, Sparks earned the 323^rd win of his career Saturday, as Carson-Newman beat Tusculum 55-35.  It ties him with Bear Bryant for sixth place on the all-time all-division NCAA coaching victories list.  Perhaps the best thing about it was his quote afterward: “I told (my players) if anybody wanted to talk about the number of victories that I had, you tell them that I didn’t play a play.”

Congratulations go out to JHutto, who with 124 points, wins week eight by a single point over four other players!  Finishing with 123 points were JagRag, Bamagirl25, War Ralphie, and bevo.

Overall standings after eight weeks:

1st	JagRag	1296
2nd	Allison	1295
3rd	maestro	1291
4th	AUBrian	1284
5th	JHutto	1283
T-6th	pachyderm	1277
T-6th	SicEmFrogs	1277
8th	Bamagirl25	1275
9th	bevo	1272
10th	Crimson Gator	1266

This week features nineteen games, including three classic mid-season rivalry games: Michigan at Michigan State, Ole Miss at LSU, and Alabama at Tennessee.  Big points are available, so a good week can send your rank skyward!  The first game this week is Connecticut at East Carolina, Thursday, October 23 @ 7 PM ET, so make sure to get your picks in by then!

The town of Calhoun City, Mississippi, is an unassuming blip on the map.  Mississippi Highways 8 and 9 junction in the center of the town, which had a population of 1,774 in the 2010 census.  It is perhaps best known for being the birthplace of Dave Parker, the 1978 National League MVP and a two-time batting champion.  However, it has another distinction this week.  It’s the closest city the writer can find to the midpoint between the towns of Starkville and Oxford, which gives it the unofficial honor of being the current epicenter of the college football universe.

I wonder if Bruce Dickinson’s fever has subsided yet.  There is plenty of cowbell in Starkville these days, as Mississippi State is on an historic run.  With their wins over LSU, Texas A&M, and Auburn, it’s the first time in MSU history that they’ve beaten three straight top-ten teams.  The Bulldogs completed the quickest rise from unranked to #1 in the 78-year history of the AP poll, doing so in five weeks.  It is also the first time that Mississippi State has been ranked #1 in the AP poll.  But don’t overlook their neighbors to the south!  Ole Miss is only two poll points behind Florida State for the #2 ranking.  The Rebels are riding the second-best scoring defense in the country (11.8 points per game) to their first 6-0 start since 1962.  The Egg Bowl, the annual rivalry matchup between the two teams, is looking to be the biggest in the series history, and certainly one of the most expensive: the current lowest-priced ticket for the game that I found? $295.

In other, non-Mississippi news, you might have heard of this little game that’s going to be played in Tallahassee this week.  Florida State and Notre Dame enter the week as #2 and #5 in the polls respectively, making it the second straight week we’ll get a top-five showdown.  This will be the eighth game between the Seminoles and the Irish; Florida State holds a 5-2 advantage.  This gives the Seminoles the distinction of being only one of four teams currently playing football to own a winning record against Notre Dame in a series with more than five games. (Michigan, Nebraska, and Ohio State are the others; LSU, Penn State, Syracuse, and Tennessee have .500 records against the Irish.)  This will be only the second matchup in Tallahassee (the other was in 2002), but the fifth in the state of Florida.  The buildup for this one is almost as big as the famous 1993 game, which Notre Dame won 31-24.  Florida State got the last laugh, however, as Notre Dame lost their next game to Boston College and the Seminoles ended up regaining the #1 spot and the national championship.

The Marshall Thundering Herd (still one of my favorite nicknames in college football) have a proud tradition.   They’ve won two I-AA national championships and won five out of six MAC conference championships once making the leap to I-A.  But things had slowed down considerably for several years until last year, when Marshall had their first 10-win season since 2002.  But that pales in comparison to what they’re accomplishing this year.  While their strength of schedule will not be winning any awards, the Herd is currently 6-0 and outscoring opponents by an average of 48-17.  They have the second-best offense in terms of yards and points in the country (second to Baylor in both categories), and the eighth-best scoring defense.  They are ranked for the first time this week.  Looking at their schedule, it would not be surprising to see the Herd thundering along to a perfect 12-0, and only East Carolina stands ahead of them in the race to the “best Group of 5 Conference” major bowl bid…

In small school news, it’s about that time of year for me to include my annual “Mount Union is a *really* good Division III team” paragraph.  This year’s version of the Purple Raiders currently stands at 5-0.  Their closest game was their first, a 58-7 win over Bethany (WV).  The average score of their games thus far this year? 64-4.  As it seems to be every year, it will probably come down to a one-game season for Mount Union: the Division III championship game in recent years has tended to feature Mount Union versus Wisconsin-Whitewater.  (This year, UWW is also currently 5-0, with an average margin of victory of 48-5).  Other amazing records: Mount Union has not failed to win their conference championship since 1992.  Their record (counting this season) since the start of 1992? 303-13, a .959 winning percentage.

Congratulations to Allison, who wins week 7 with 128 points!  JagRag was second with 127 points, and there was a three-way tie for third between JG Bama, maestro, and JHutto, each with 126 points.

Overall standings after seven weeks:

1st	Allison	1175
2nd	maestro	1174
3rd	JagRag	1173
4th	AUBrian	1165
T-5th	pachyderm	1159
T-5th	JHutto	1159
7th	SicEmFrogs	1157
8th	The Tradition	1156
9th	GODAWGS	1155
10th	Bamagirl25	1152

It’s been a couple of tough weeks to pick, and this week doesn’t get much easier: four top-25 matchups highlight the slate of games.  Pick wisely and well!  The first game this week is Utah at Oregon State, Thursday, October 16 @ 10 PM ET, so make sure to get your picks in by then!