LSU Tigers – RIVALS RUNDOWN

College Football Top 25 Week 6

October 1, 2013 benchwarmer42Leave a comment

Welcome everyone to our week 6 Rivals Rundown Top 25 rankings! As you’ll see below we’ll really rank the Top 30 with those that are on the radar here at the Rundown. Normally, here we write this big rant about what happened the previous weekend in College Football, so… Here is our Rivals Rundown Rant! First Oklahoma State, what happened to our Top 10 team!?! Not to mention one of our preseason favorites in the Big 12! Urgh, the sad part is that game had upset written all over it, coaching buddies, an underperforming West Virginia team that no one was talking about, and an Oklahoma State team that clearly was looking past their early Saturday opponent. The pay the ultimate price, dropping from the Top 10 out of the Top 25!!! They will have to fight their way back, there are too many teams, too many teams playing good football for us to give them respect after that loss. Next, South Carolina and UCF, neither team really moved and UCF had their chances but as we often see in upset games, the team that has been tested already in the season finds a way to close (See Fresno State). Moving to our favorite game of the weekend, Arizona State and USC. Now, this was a good game until Arizona State realized that they could out play USC on both sides of the ball, took the energy from the home crowd and stomped on a team that over the last 10 years had crushed Arizona States dreams over rising to the top of the PAC. We will mention, that USC acted way too early to fire Lane, the program doesn’t want to realize or admit that the NCAA sanctions are affecting them. We welcome back the Sun Devils and the Hokies to the Top 25, why? They both proved that they are Top 25 teams, the Sun Devils for Offense and the Hokies for Defense. The only new team to the Top 25 is the Maryland Terrapins. The Game of the week last weekend was Georgia and LSU, both of which moved a little but we still see each of these teams as outside bet for the National Title. Maryland will get their big test this week to see if they belong or if they are pretenders. Other teams to keep your eye on, Iowa, East Carolina and Northern Illinois, we’re still not sure how the stack up next to the rest of our Top teams. So here is our Rivals Rundown Top 25 for Week 6 of the College Football Season! Enjoy, Share and Comment.


Current Rank	Previous Week	Team
1	1	Alabama Crimson Tide,	4-0
2	2	Oregon Ducks,	4-0
3	3	Clemson Tigers	4-0
4	4	Ohio State Buckeyes	5-0
5	5	Louisville Cardinals	4-0
6	9	Georgia Bulldogs	3-1
7	10	Stanford Cardinal	4-0
8	6	Florida State Seminoles	4-0
9	8	LSU Tigers	4-1
10	13	Texas A&M Aggies	4-1
11	15	Baylor Bears	3-0
12	13	UCLA Bruins	3-0
13	14	Miami Hurricanes	4-0
14	17	Oklahoma Sooners	4-0
15	16	Washington Huskies	4-0
16	21	Ole Miss Rebels	3-1
17	18	Fresno State Bulldogs	4-0
18	19	Florida Gators	3-1
19	20	South Carolina	3-1
20	21	Northwestern	4-0
21	Unranked	Arizona State Sun Devils	3-1
22	23	Michigan Wolverines	4-0
23	29	Maryland Terrapins	4-0
24	22	Wisconsin Badgers	2-2
25	Unranked	Virginia Tech Hockies	4-1
Next 5-
26	26	Texas Tech Red Raiders	4-0
27	Unranked	UCF Knights	3-1
28	28	Boise State Broncos	3-2
29	29	Northern Ill Huskies	4-0
30	27	Nebraska Cornhuskers	3-1

Just Outside
	7	Oklahoma State Cowboys	3-1
	Unranked	Iowa Hawkeyes	4-1
	Unranked	East Carolina	3-1
	Unranked	Missouri Tigers	4-0
	26	Michigan State Spartans	3-1
	Unranked	Notre Dame	3-2

Week 5 College Football Games to Watch

September 27, 2013September 26, 2013 benchwarmer42Leave a comment

Thank you Baby Jesus that we made it to Week 5 of the College Football Season! With no major match-ups and with the best game of the weekend over with on Friday night between Fresno State and Boise State, we have made it back to a weekend of real games, most importantly, Conference Games! For the most part this weekend marks the beginning of Conference play, which marks the beginning of “who’s real and who’s faking it!”

As we found out last week, Arizona State is questionable Top 30 material, while Stanford proved they are Top 5 material. Look Wisconsin the week before, while the ran for 200+ yards on the Devils, if you subtract one home-run run of 70, ASU held Wisconsin to 130ish yards, statistically they are the best rushing team in the whole country. Stanford had no problems running, passing or causing disruption all over the field, this brings us to Week 5, so who this week will prove to be the Stanford and who will be the Sun Devils?

First, one note on the Fresno State vs Boise State Match-up: These two teams are Top 25 teams, no questions asked, Boise State might be the best two loss team in the Country, right in-front of Utah State. Derek Carr is a legit Heisman Candidate, he has proven himself as an NFL passer and clutch in two prime time games on ESPN. Fresno and Colorado have to make up their missed game and let’s hope the two (Boise, Fresno) teams win out the season and play for the Mountain West Title and a possible BCS birth. Think of it, Fresno State could finish with a better strength of schedule over Louisville, one big problem, they don’t have the ranking yet but we’ll see. Anyways, on to week 5 games!

We stay in the Mountain West!

Utah State at San Jose State

Normally we like home dogs on Thursday or Friday nights, something about the upset and national tv just works! Look up the numbers! This time, we think Utah State is finally licking their chops after losing very close games to Utah and USC, we think that the Aggies are going to come into Spartan Stadium ready to unload what some are calling, “The Poor Man’s Manziel” in QB Chuckie Keeton all over the field on an over-matched Spartans Defense. In a rare one, we are taking Utah State to Cover on a Friday Night!

Moving East

East Carolina at North Carolina

This is a must win for the North Carolina Tar Heels. After losing by 8 to a very tricking and tough to read Georgia Tech team, North Carolina enters this match-up at 1-2 and still the Tar Heels have to get through the heart of their ACC schedule before things get easier. For East Carolina, it’s not a must win as they still have to get into the depth of conference play but we like the Pirates to keep things close. Let’s take East Carolina and the points. Also the over deserves a second look.

Now for some Big Boys!

LSU at Georgia

These two teams are National Champions in the waiting, the stakes couldn’t be higher, blah blah, yada yada yada. Look, we know what’s going on here, this game is to take claim for a solid top 5 spot and for Georgia, it’s a must win to keep their outside shot of being the only one loss team with National Championship hopes alive. The main factors that we are all going to be watching fall to Georgia’s defense and LSU’s offense. The major difference we feel is that Georgia’s defense has been tested and has gained quick and important experience by already playing two top ten teams. They have the help of playing at home, which strengthens the defense and they have an offense that can keep up with anyone in the country. For LSU this is their first major test, yes we all felt going into the TCU game that that would provide the test but comparing TCU and Georgia isn’t fair, TCU has fallen short of our preseason hype, while Georgia is fitting into the mold we expected. We’re not buying the Tigers yet over the Bulldogs so we’re taking Georgia to cover.

And our Final Game:

Ball State vs Toledo

Bet you didn’t see that one coming! Look there are great games this weekend, Wisconsin vs Ohio State, Oklahoma vs Notre Dame and Ole Miss vs Alabama but everyone is talking about those. We want to talk about a game between two rising programs in the MAC that need some love. The importance of this game? The winner has a fast-tracked chance at competing against Northern Illinois for the MAC West Title. The key is that both of these teams can do it! We recommend that if you want to watch two teams put everything on the line in week 5, check this one out. We like Ball State in this one!

Side notes:

We like Alabama, Oklahoma and Ohio State. We think that all three teams are going to come out with something to prove, all for different reasons. Look for Ohio State to expose the weak secondary of Wisconsin with a balanced run, option, throw attack. Look for Oklahoma to do the same actually to Notre Dame. Alabama and Ole Miss might be close at halftime but we see the Tide pulling away in the 4th Quarter.

Final Note-

Because we were late with this post, we had a chance to watch the Virginia Tech and Georgia Tech game. Virginia Tech’s defense is getting better every week and is going to give this Hokies team a chance in every football game from here til the end of the season. We’re standing by our prediction for Virginia Tech, for now, although we need that QB to step up the way that he should be in this season.

Rivals Rundown College Football Top 25 Week 4

September 17, 2013September 17, 2013 benchwarmer42Leave a comment

Week 4 of College Football is now upon us and here at the Rundown we’re feeling pretty good. Not only did our team steal a W and stay in the Top 25. Our Top 25 had little movement, which any week that happens, means we’re doing something right over here. The biggest Loser of Week 3 was Nebraska and that hurts, not only did we post a blog just about how “bullish” we were on the Huskers a couple of weeks back but we had them in our Top 10! Sitting watching the beginning of that game, we were waiting to see what Nebraska’s Defense would do and man did those black uniforms look good! So good that UCLA thought the jersey’s were freshly laid pavement and left tire treads all over ‘em. So Nebraska quickly became our Most Overrated pick, let’s see if they can fight back into our Top 25 or if they falter…Back to the rankings, So Texas A&M might be the first team ever to move up in rankings based off of a loss but the way they played against Alabama, the deserve to be higher, the other big movers are UCLA and Ole Miss. We would like to point out that Arizona State and Wisconsin didn’t move, we had them in and they will both stay in… until this coming Saturday when the Sun Devils square off with our #11 team Stanford Cardinal then they might be the biggest mover. No big match-ups other then that PAC-12 North vs South. Look later this week for a preview of a couple of our favorite games. Also, if you missed our story on CJ Brown go check it out, his stat-line: Passing 15 of 28 for 277 1TD 1INT Rushing 16 for 122 1 TD and put Maryland on our Rivals Rundown Top 25 Radar, still the best player no one is talking about.

Current Rank	Previous Week	Team
1	1	Alabama Crimson Tide	2-0
2	2	Oregon Ducks	3-0
3	3	Clemson Tigers	2-0
4	4	Ohio State Buckeyes	3-0
5	5	Louisville Cardinals	3-0
6	6	Florida State Seminoles	2-0
7	7	Oklahoma State Cowboys	3-0
8	8	LSU Tigers	3-0
9	9	Georgia Bulldogs	1-1
10	13	Texas A&M Aggies	2-1
11	11	Stanford Cardinal	2-0
12	12	Michigan Wolverines	3-0
13	17	UCLA Bruins	2-0
14	14	Miami Hurricanes	2-0
15	15	Baylor Bears	2-0
16	16	Washington Huskies	2-0
18	18	Oklahoma Sooners	3-0
19	19	Fresno State Bulldogs	2-0
20	20	Florida Gators	1-1
21	21	South Carolina	2-1
22	27	Ole Miss Rebels	3-0
23	23	Arizona State Sun Devils	2-0
24	24	Wisconsin Badgers	2-1
25	25	Northwestern	3-0

Next 5-
26	28	Michigan State Spartans	3-0
27	10	Nebraska Cornhuskers	2-1
28	30	Boise State Broncos	2-1
29	27	Northern Ill Huskies	2-0
30	Unranked	Texas Tech Red Raiders	3-0

Out-
		TCU Horned Frogs	1-2

(image latimes.com, stats ESPN.com)

Rivals Rundown Top 25 – Week 3

September 9, 2013September 9, 2013 benchwarmer42Leave a comment

Week 2 of the College Football Season is now in the books and with it a couple of our 25 teams, well for now. It’s hard to imagine that one loss could end your season or at least your ranking in our Top 25 but in the cases of USC, Texas, and Cincinnati, that’s exactly what we think happened. The worst of the three by far is USC, there is no way a team with that much talent should have such a bad offense, they could pathetic not being able to move the ball against what will prove to be a week Washington State team. Anyways, here we go with our Week 3 Top 25 teams of College Football. Come back later in the week when we will do our rewind and see how this Top 25 came together.

Current Rank	Previous Week	Team
1	1	Alabama Crimson Tide
2	2	Oregon Ducks
3	3	Clemson Tigers
4	4	Ohio State Buckeyes
5	5	Louisville Cardinals
6	6	Florida State Seminoles
7	7	Oklahoma State Cowboys
8	9	LSU Tigers
9	12	Georgia Bulldogs
10	11	Nebraska Cornhuskers
11	13	Stanford Cardinal
12	20	Michigan Wolverines
13	18	Texas A&M Aggies
14	29	Miami Hurricanes
15	16	Baylor Bears
16	17	Washington Huskies
17	26	UCLA Bruins
18	15	Oklahoma Sooners
19	19	Fresno State Bulldogs
20	14	Florida Gators
21	8	South Carolina
22	22	TCU Horned Frogs
23	23	Arizona State Sun Devils
24	30	Wisconsin Badgers
25	21	Northwestern
NEXT 5-
26	27	Northern Ill Huskies
27	Unranked	Ole Miss Rebels
28	Unranked	Michigan State Spartans
29	Unranked	BYU Cougars
30	Unranked	Boise State Broncos

2013 @SECSportsUpdate Football Preseason Top 5* Rundown!

August 29, 2013August 28, 2013 benchwarmer42Leave a comment

2013 SEC Football Top 5* Teams Preview

So the saying goes that you save the best for last, so here we are on our last preview of the 2013 college football preseason and we find ourselves in the SouthEastern Conference where the BCS Trophy has now reigned for the past seven seasons. It’s a streak that has been over-talked about but not and can’t be overstated. In the modern era of college athletics it’s difficult to believe that one conference could completely dominate the landscape and it seems that 2013 will continue the streak and even more impressive, Alabama is on the verge of four titles in six years…yeah, let that soak in…Alabama with Nick Saban is setting the standard for modern day college football champions. Sometimes it’s hard to recognize when we are living during the greatest era of something and right now, if Alabama wins it’s forth title in six season and if Saban gets to 100 wins before he gets to 20 losses, that is domination and that is something that others will have a hard time to replicate. Now to clarify that last point, Saban is currently 68-13, over the last five years he is 66-6! On that current pace he could hit 100 before 20 but that is still a couple of years away. So here is our 2013 SEC Top5(maybe6 or7) Rundown:

1. Alabama Crimson Tide 11-1 (West Champions) (Conference Champions)

So after that whole rant about how dominant the SEC has has been and how impressive Alabama’s streak has been, here’s the problem: last year Alabama schedule was less then impressive. If you take out the three toughest games of the regular season, Michigan, LSU and Texas A&M, the combine record of the Crimson Tide’s opponents was 43-67, that’s nine teams…let that sink in for a moment. This year the schedule doesn’t change much, they have an opening day game against Virginia Tech, then like last year they have A&M and LSU, if Bama survives those three games they will play in the SEC title game again with an appearance in the final BCS game on the line. We like LSU to upset Alabama or a trap game on the road to Mississippi State as the only chances for a loss on the schedule. If LSU had Alabama’s schedule we would be picking them to play for the National Championship but they don’t and so we are taking the Tide to appear once again an in the SEC TItle game but we aren’t ready yet to say they’ll play for a National Title, that prediction is still to come…

2. Georgia Bulldogs 11-1 (East Champions)

Georgia will return with what we believe will be the best offense in the SEC, the question of if they can run the table or overcome Alabama in the title game will be if a young but talented defense can overcome an early and very tough schedule to help Georgia go into the Worlds Largest Cocktail party with only one loss. If that happens, which we think it will, Georgia will return to the SEC Title game and this time they will be ready to dethrone Alabama. Disclaimer: We will say this, we picked Alabama to win the conference again, but if this part of the prediction comes true and it’s Georgia vs Alabama we will take Georgia this time. Which should mean that we should have Georgia as the number one team…but we can’t unseat Alabama, Georgia will have to do it.

3. South Carolina Gamecocks 10-2

This is going to be a repeat of last year for the Gamecocks, meaning if South Carolina can get past two teams that could also find themselves in this position in Georgia and Florida they could be undefeated going into a season finally against Clemson. Last year, they fell pretty hard against Florida after coming off of a loss to LSU this year we like them against Florida but think Georgia will take a win away from the Gamecocks, also if Clemson can be in a position to play for a National Championship when they meet, we like Clemson. The schedule is easy enough and with a little luck South Carolina could be playing in the SEC Title game but this year we think it’s Georgia’s game to play in.

4. LSU Tigers 9-3

This is why the SEC is still the best conference is the nation, no other number four team in our conference Rundowns compare to the talent of LSU. LSU was seconds and a couple of scores away from playing in the SEC title game and maybe a National Championship. This year LSU has the toughest schedule of our top 4 teams in the SEC, they have a tough opening day road game against TCU, they also face Georgia, Florida, Alabama and Texas A&M. This is the only reason we don’t have LSU higher, we like everything about the team and think that they have what it takes to win a SEC title but the offense and defense will have to improve with losing some key pieces thus leading us to think that LSU will be in the National Championship talk next year after these players have another year of experience under their belt.

5. Texas A&M Aggies 9-3

Before all of the distractions that came in the offseason and before the half-game suspension imposed on Manziel we would’ve taken Texas A&M at 10-2 but now with all of that behind us we are looking at A&M not only to lose to Alabama and LSU but we think they might have a mental “loss” in there too and drop them to this position. On the field with Manziel leading the offense, the Aggies will have a chance to win any game, other the Alabama (they want blood). On the other side of the ball, the Aggies have some big holes to fill and that is not a good thing in the SEC. Look for the Aggies to take a step back in their second year of SEC play but it will be a small step and if Manziel returns next year look for A&M to be in the hunt for a National Championship

6. Florida Gators 9-3

We can’t say enough about the depth of the top 6 teams in the SEC, having Florida ranked as the sixth team in a conference is unreal. This team at one point last year was thought as the number one team in the country. For the 2013 campaign, like Texas A&M, (without the off field distractions) Florida will take a small step back as they gain some experience on both sides of the ball. The defense in Florida was one of the best, top 10 in both points allowed and rushing yards allowed, that’s impressive when playing in the SEC. This season the defense will need to catch up and while that’s occurring they will need to rely on the offense that ranked last year as on of the more average in the country. All the top teams in the SEC can beat each other on any given Saturday, Florida in 2013 will be in it but we don’t see them playing for a conference title.