Hey, guess what? It turns it to be much easier to rank teams now that we've actually seen them play a real, live, meaningful football game. Who'da thunk it?
Kidding aside, Week 1's games brought some much needed clarity to my BlogPoll. There seem to be a clear cut top four teams -- Ohio State, Alabama, Boise St. and TCU -- with Oregon standing just outside knocking on the door.
A lot of people are moving the Broncos up to the top spot, but I'm not ready to do that quite yet. The Buckeyes and Tide did exactly what they were supposed to do, and shouldn't be penalized for opening with a patsy -- they both get their chance to shine next week, against Miami and Penn State, respectively.
My thinking with Boise State is that any team can get up for one big game. Playing multiple bowl-worthy teams in a row is where it starts to get draining. Even if the Broncos or TCU keep winning, I just can't move them up to the top two unless tOSU or 'Bama slip up.
Ed's Note: Welcome to a new weekly MMQB-esque column by Jonathan Adams recapping all things Ducks and college football from the past weekend. Enjoy.
That Just Happened: No need to rehash the numbers, but two things stood out from the 72-0 drubbing of New Mexico: First, Oregon played fast. Crazy fast. New Mexico is god-awful, but Oregon showed no signs of rust and the offense looked like it was in mid-season form. Second, this defense might be very good. A shutout is impressive no matter who you play, and the D had enough pride to make sure it stood up in the second half. Look, on a weekend where Florida struggled against Miami (Ohio) and Oklahoma nearly lost to Utah State, Oregon was outstanding in all phases of the game.
So, What's Next?: If you play NCAA '11 on the Xbox or PS3 you'll get this: New Mexico was Freshman level, and Tennessee, while maybe not quite Heisman level, is at least All-American. They're an SEC team, so they're going to be much faster, they're playing at home, and since they're double-digit underdogs, they get to play the "no one respects us" card. Plus, their defensive coordinator is Justin Wilcox, who was at Boise State last year, and I don't think I need to tell you how that worked out for the Ducks.
ESPN's Ted Miller touched on this already, but this game really does feel like a referendum on what's better: Pac-10 offenses or SEC defenses. Granted, Tennessee isn't an elite SEC team (at least on paper) but if they can stifle the Ducks, we'll have our answer.
Sure, Kenjon Barner's 207 yards and five touchdowns on Saturday were remarkable, but what about Puddles' 506 pushups? That might be the most impressive stat from the entire weekend!
ESPN took notice, inviting the Duck and the (very cute) UO Cheer Advisor Dana Guthrie, as his interpreter, on ESPNEWS this morning.
It's a fun little interview, definitely worth a quick watch.
Oh and at the end, there's a Sports Nation poll for best mascot in the Pac-10? Yeah, Puddles got 58 percent of the vote. That stupid tree? 5 percent.
Over a month ago, our very own Jeff Spiegel wrote a piece making the case that backup Kenjon Barner could, in fact, be better than super-stud LaMichael James.
James got most of the carries, stats and thus, the glory last season, but Barner quietly put up numbers equal to LMJ, and even averaged more yards per carry over the final eight games -- 7.2 to 7.0, respectively.
Spiegel noted that while James had the luxury of learning the system for an entire season during his redshirt year, Barner spent that time playing defensive back for the scout team. It wasn't until LeGarrette Blount's suspension that Barner moved back into the backfield, picking up the offense on the fly, in addition to tearing it up on special teams.
On Saturday, Barner proved Jeff's point, going off for 207 yards and five touchdowns, all in 18 touches in just a quarter in a half.
With LMJ returning from suspension for Tennessee, this brings up a dilemma, albeit a good one, for Chip Kelly.
Two days ago I predicted the Oregon-New Mexico score to be 38-6.
I thought Chip Kelly would keep the playcalling as conservative as possible, pounding the ball up the middle with Kenjon Barner and Remene Alston while Darron Thomas's biggest challenge would be hitting Jeff Maehl in the numbers on bubble screens. I thought the offensive line would be strong enough to open up hole after hole for Thomas and Barner to methodically march their way down the field, chewing up clock while putting up a decent scoring total. I thought the defense would be suffocating but the Lobos would luck their way into a measly pair of field goals.
Well, that's basically what happened. The game plan just worked out a lot better than I thought.
It's been over nine months since the Oregon Ducks last stepped onto the field for a real actual, counts-in-the-standings football game. That's nine months too long. Nine months waaaaay too long.
Sure, there are already plenty of reasons to not like our opponents, mainly because they stand in the way of Oregon winning a national championship. But why stop there?
Each week, we'll give you a couple bonus reasons to get fired up the upcoming game.
It's here. It's finally freaking here. College football season. AH!
And what better way to enjoy the opening night than stuck in the beautiful Oakland airport waiting for a delayed flight to Eugene?
Complaints aside, sure, I might have missed USC giving up 36 points and 558 yards to a school who has a pizza delivery guy as their quarterback (yeah, seriously), but I'm in Eugene. The sun's out. And I'll be at Autzen tomorrow.
Can't ask for anything better than that.
To get your expectations set for the weekend, here are our picks for each Pac-10 game, and since I didn't get around to posting this yesterday, I'll throw in the USC picks just for fun.
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The Bloguin Network allows advertisers to promote their products and services to our ever-growing number of visitors. We offer both site-specific ad placements as well as the ability to run a network-wide campaign. If you're interested in working with Bloguin to meet your advertising needs, please contact us.
The Bloguin Network is always looking to expand. We're specifically looking for blogs in the sports, entertainment, and video games field, but are open to adding any type of quality site. If you're a blogger and interested in joining our network, please fill out our application form.
The Bloguin Login gives you full access to everything our network has to offer. Your name and password will work for each and every one of our sites. Signing up is simple, and will allow you to post in all our forums, create member blogs, and access other cool features! What are you waiting for? Create an Account! 