Week 5 Precap

Things have been hotting up in college football and they are only getting spicier this weekend, with several matchups that we were looking forward to before the teams in them lost unexpectedly. However, that should not dissuade us from getting excited about them, because the winners will be right back into mix in the national title race... though they will still have to wait in line for everyone else. The losers, however, are not #1 material and will have a lot of work left to do if they even want to be BCS material.

This is a weekend when a lot of excess gets cleaned out of the national and conference races, while other teams get a shot from the turbo boosters. This will be a decisive weekend for a lot of teams.

Colorado vs. West Virginia

Colorado is barely holding together. West Virginia is damaged, but is at least proud. I'll go with the Mountaineers in this one, thanks to the fact that they are not constantly waiting for word that their coach was fired.

Oklahoma vs. Miami

Despite the losses both teams have suffered, both are still well within spitting distance of the national title race. If Oklahoma wins this game, they could find themselves in the top 5. If Miami wins, it will probably be top 10—sorry 'Canes, the best you can do is win your own marbles back after losing them all last weekend.

There is talk that Sam Bradford could be back for this game, but he is not nearly as important as the Oklahoma offensive line. Miami's speed-based defense is designed for attacking quarterbacks, while Oklahoma's offensive line was victimized by BYU's defensive front. Which, incidentally, is why they ended up losing Sam Bradford in the first place. I think Oklahoma's defense is good enough to keep Miami largely contained, but you have to figure they aren't going to hold them off on every drive. I'm going with Miami, because I doubt that Oklahoma's offensive line figured everything out in four weeks.

Georgia vs. LSU

Do you get the feeling that the voters are just waiting for LSU to finally lose so that they can drop them? I sure do. Whichever team loses this game will find themselves around #18-21 come Sunday afternoon, which is probably about right for both teams right now. LSU has failed to impress, but has at least won. Georgia has not quite entirely won, though they did go on the road in the season opener with a team that had new starters in a whole lot of important positions. And they have won a couple of decent games in the meantime, so they actually have a better body of work than most other teams in the country right now.

LSU may have been looking ahead to Georgia this week, which could explain their difficulties against Mississippi State. But even if that was the case, LSU has Florida next week, which is one heck of a lot more to look ahead to, if they are the ahead-looking types. No matter how you look at it, LSU looks worse than Georgia. Georgia wins another close one.

USC vs. Cal

You know, one of the problems with the Pac-10 is not so much the fact that USC is dominating it, as much as USC always ends up losing to some team that plays like crap the rest of the season, which makes USC look bad because they lost to that turd sandwich, yet managed to dominate the rest of the league. So when people look at the Pac-10, they wonder why nobody can even keep it close against a USC team that has a loss to a team with 3 wins.

Anyway, things are pretty scary right now for USC. When one of your teammates drops a barbell on his neck during bench presses... that would freak me right the @%$^ out. I'm still not sure how that happened, but thank the heavens that Stafon was using a spotter at the time.

Anyway, in related news regarding the game on the field, USC is without one of its top two tailbacks for the big game against the team that everyone was expecting to challenge them for conference supremacy this year. But since this is a big game on paper and Cal probably isn't all that good in reality, USC will be fired up and will cruise to a win by an ugly number.

Michigan vs. Michigan State

I don't know how Michigan keeps performed these hair's-breadth escapes, but they do. And they keep churning out the points in bunches. Michigan State, on the other hand, is having trouble getting traction on this season and is, once again, inventing fascinating new ways to not quite win games.

To my eyes, everything sensible points to Michigan State winning this game. They are anxious to get their season going after a lot of frustration, they are going to be fired up to play their rivals, they are going to be playing at home, Michigan's quarterback is playing hurt, and Michigan doesn't seem likely to slow down a power running game of the sort that Mark Dantonio prefers. But considering that Michigan keeps finding ways to win and Michigan State keeps finding ways to lose... sorry Sparty, I'm picking Michigan.

Washington vs. Notre Dame

For one glorious week, Washington stood tall in its return to the polls. And with their return to the polls, we got the chance to find out what Washington is really made of. And it seems that, as much as they have stiffened, they are still just meringue. I'll take Notre Dame, fine thanks.

Florida State vs. Boston College

Oh God, an ACC game. Ummmmmmmmmmmm... hrm, uh..... yeah, let's see.... it's.... um.... Florida State? Because they are..... very good at..... Oh, who the hell knows how this game it going to turn out. If you want to know how it's going to turn out, watch it yourself.

Penn State vs. Illinois

This game fascinates me; let me tell you why. Both teams turned in disastrous performances last weekend and both teams are going to be desperate to turn things around quickly. Penn State dropped a home game against an unranked team, Illinois got shut out on the road. Both teams were dominated on the line of scrimmage by teams that should not have been able to do such a thing so easily. Both teams have some talented players at quarterback and tailback, but seemed incapable of translating that to points last weekend. I'm not sure if Penn State has a dominator and gamebreaker at wide receiver, but I know Illinois does in Arrelius Benn. Now can they get the ball to him? I wanted to pick Penn State when I started this preview, but the more it spins through my brain, the more I have to go with Illinois.