Football Tuesday (I know, just a little late): The Crazy Big Ten

I wanted to get one more post done before I get super involved with NaNoWriMo (which I’ve started, yay!).  I hope to keep updating the blog, but we’ll see how this month goes with all the other writing I’ll be doing.

So the last time I talked about college football I hyped up Wisconsin. Since then, they’ve lost two games in a row...yeah...so apparently my hype is the kiss of death, awesome.  For a while it looked like Wisconsin was going to run away with the big ten, win their division and totally out play the other team in the championship game.  Well, that might not happen now that they’ve lost two games. 

There are all kinds of different scenarios that would play out, causing lots of possible combinations of teams playing for the Big Ten Championship.  The teams left in the race on the Legends side are Michigan (yay!), Michigan State, Nebraska and Iowa (although after losing to Minnesota I can’t see them making it). And on the Leaders side are Penn State, Wisconsin, and Ohio State. 

kinda what it feels like...

I’ll only get into how Michigan can get there.  Mostly, they have to win out and hope Michigan State loses one more conference game.  There are some crazy scenarios if Michigan loses another game it would have to be cross division (Illinois or OSU) and hope that Michigan state loses a division game.  Michigan can’t lose to Iowa or Nebraska if they want a shot at the championship game.

All of these weird losses in the Big Ten just show that it isn’t the strongest conference out there.  This makes me sad, because the Big Ten is my favorite conference (obviously!) and its hard for others to give them respect when they can’t earn it. 

As for the rest of the country.  The big showdown is this weekend between LSU and Bama, should be a good game the only downside of it is that its on CBS.  Not sure what it is about college football on CBS but its just not as good as ESPN or ABC, I don’t feel like they capture all the greatness that is college football. 

As for the other unbeatens, it would be fun to see Stanford go undefeated and get the chance to play for a national championship (since I live close to their campus).  I think Oklahoma State will lose a game and I don’t see Boise State dropping one but if there are already two unbeatens then I don’t see them getting a shot at the title game.  However, if the only two unbeaten teams left are an SEC champ and Boise State I think Boise should definitely get the chance to play for a national championship over a one loss team.

Hopefully I’ll get a post out this Friday but no promises (that whole NaNoWriMo thing might be taking up all my free time).

Football Friday: Bye Week

Well last weekend was a bust.  From the ugly uniforms, to the poor playing (on Michigan's part), and the dirty playing (on msu's part) it all just sucked.  And now it's behind us, onto the future!  We (Michigan) can still make it to the big ten championship game if we win out (be positive!) and MSU loses to Wisconsin (which will happen, have you seen how good Wisconsin is?) and any other big ten team (also very likely because sparty will be sparty).  Although the big ten championship game might be a lopsided one since Wisconsin seriously looks good (they really should be getting more love in the polls).



There was a collective WTF when these uniforms showed up on the field


This week, we have a bye, which seems kinda like a let down, I get sad when i can't watch my team play :(  But its probably a good week for a bye, let some players get healthy and let the staff figure out all the things that went wrong against msu (starting with the uniforms, please, Dave Brandon, never again).  We will be ready to take on Purdue next weekend, I have a good feeling about it!  No worries though, there should be plenty of games to keep me interested this Saturday.

The most exciting games will be on in the evening.  That's when (the previously mentioned) Wisconsin vs MSU game is on, and I'm really hoping for Wisconsin to put MSU back in their place.  An interesting west coast match up is Stanford vs Washington.  Stanford hasn't play anyone worth anything, and they do look good, but this will be the first time they play a team that is worth anything.  Even though Washington isn't great (they lost pretty bad to Nebraska) they should give us a chance to see if Stanford is worthy of  being in the discussion for first place.  A good game of unranked teams is the notre dame vs usc game.  I have a hard time with this one because I hate both teams.  A notre dame win would help us, but if they win the rest of their games (since they have a cupcake schedule, except Stanford) they would be BCS eligible which is ridiculous, the aren't good enough for the BCS and really don't deserve it (again, always overrated).  The Auburn, LSU match up earlier in the day should be good, but I don't really see LSU stumbling in this game so it will just be LSU winning, again.  That's it for the week, enjoy all the football!

Michigan plays other sports, too!

To recap, we spent a week in Michigan (Part 1 about the football game is here, and Rob's permanent souvenir is here).  When I was a student at Michigan I went to all the football games but rarely ventured out to see all the other sports the school had, this is one of my biggest regrets.  Now, I subscribe to to a special sports package on my cable so I can get the Big Ten Network and take in as many Michigan sports as possible.  So while we were in Michigan I thought I'd take advantage and try to attend some other fall sports!

I really wanted to go to the women's volleyball game against Nebraska.  Our volleyball team has recently gotten very strong and the big ten has become a competitive conference, even more so now with Nebraska.  Sadly, the game was sold out by the time I got there so I wouldn't get to see them play.  I had actually attended quite a few volleyball games while I was a student and it is a very fun atmosphere in their arena.  They play in a smaller arena than basketball and it makes it very loud and exciting in there.  I'd never been much of a volleyball person (I suck at playing it) but I now understand it better and have since become a big fan and love watching it!

We did make it to a men's lacrosse game.  On Sunday, after the football game, they were playing in some exhibition games in Michigan Stadium.  Our lacrosse team just got promoted to varsity level (they were very successful at the club level) so I thought it was a good time to check out the sport.  We had a great time watching it (even though we still don't understand all the rules) but its a fun, fast paced, scrappy game.  Sadly, Michigan lost in OT but we still had a good time and I am now very interested in the sport, hopefully they'll be showing some games on TV this spring!

Go Blue!


And finally, we went to a men's soccer game. I LOVE soccer, I've loved the sport for much longer then I've loved football.  Michigan men's soccer went the the semi-finals of the college cup last year, so they are coming off their best season ever.  Unfortunately, they've had quite a let down year (so far).  I really wanted to go to one of their games because they just built a new soccer complex.  The new field was really nice and the student section (which was nearby where we sat) is right on the field!  Sadly, we lost the game but it was a really great game to watch.  The student section has a lot of good chants and although there weren't a lot of students that night I could see it being a fun group to cheer with. (side note: the men's basketball team sat right next to us, I was a little star struck when I realized I was so close to Stu Douglass and Tim Hardaway Jr!!)

UPDATE: The men's soccer team just (well two days ago) beat #4 ranked Akron in OT!!  It's one of the biggest wins for this team, ever. Maybe this will turn their season around, keep it up boys and Go Blue!