Week one was quite interesting. Nebraska beat Nevada handily as expected, but Texas struggled to win against Arkansas State. Cal beat Tennessee.
Notre Dame lost to Georgia Tech, 31-3. They are back to rebuilding the team (this year’s excuse for poor performance) after losing Brady Quinn and some other star players from last year.
The highlight of the day were the two major upsets. #5 Michigan lost to NCAA-Div-IAA team Appalachian State. It was a very close game with a nail-biting finish that made history. This was the first ever IAA team beating a IA team ranked in top 25. #19 Florida State lost to unranked Clemson. Head coach at Clemson, Tommy Bowden beat his dad, Bobby Bowden, legendary head coach at Florida State for the fourth time in a row, I think. I am sure Bobby was sad to see his team lose, but proud of his son at the same time.
After the loss, both Michigan and Florida State dropped out of top 25. Nebraska moved up from #20 to #15 (or #16 depending on the poll). Right next to them is Rutgers. That program has undergone such a major turn around. I remember from 1997 when I moved from Nebraska to Rutgers, their ranking were 1 and 110 respectively, out of 115 NCAA Div-IA teams.
In the second week, Nebraska plays Wake Forest. It could be a tough game. Wake Forest plays well sometimes. Texas will play TCU and Penn State will get to trounce Notre Dame. Highest ranked teams each other will be #2 LSU against #9 Virginia Tech.
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College football season already began on Thursday. We had such a busy Summer that we hardly had any time to pine for football. Rutgers won their season opener against Buffalo and there were no surprises in any of the other 3 games last night. On the first full day of the season, Nebraska(#20) plays Nevada. It should be an easy win. Texas is ranked #4 and will play another one-sided game against Arkansas State.
Don’t miss the biggest game of the day between two ranked teams: Tennessee (#15) at Cal (#12)
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It was such an interesting game with lots of ups and downs. I wish I was able to watch it live. Nebraska lost to Texas Tech by just 3 points 34-31. The score at halftime was 21-0 Texas Tech. Nebaska came back in the second half and were leading 31-27 till the last minute. Texas Tech converted two 4th and 1 plays within Nebraska 20 yard line, scored a touchdown to win the game. Nebraska definitely deserved to lose after such terrible defensive performance in the last minute of the game, when it counts. But, I am glad Nebraska put up a tough fight. This team has a future. Huskers travel to Baylor next week. This should be an easy game to win.
Texas-Oklahoma showdown was a big letdown. Texas easily beat the Sooners 45-12. They looked unstoppable. Next week it is time for Colorado to come to Austin and get beaten up.
In the big10, Michigan lost the Brown Jug to Minnesota at home. Quite disgraceful. Ohio State lost in the Happy Valley to the Nittany Lions of Penn State. Joe Paterno is basking in the 6-0 record for the season, the only unbeaten team in Big10. He is in his 70’s and was jumping up and down in the pre-game pep rally. He is just an amazing coach. Northwestern beat Wisconsin in an upset. My favorite Big10 team MSU had the week off.
No other big upsets in the rest of top 25 teams.
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Both Nebraska and Texas were off last week and I was away on vacation, hence skipped week #4.
Yesterday, Nebraska won in overtime against Iowa State in a nail-bitting finish. I was following the game on the internet and was nice to see both offense and defense coming out to play. Bill Calahan’s passing offense is finding its place in Nebraska. If this continues, the Huskers should be back in top 25 by next year. Next week, Red Raiders of Texas Tech come knocking. Hope that Huskers will be able to stand their ground and win another home game.
Texas easily beat Missouri and are itching to welcome Oklahoma to Austin next week. A win against Sooners will definitely justify their #2 ranking. Eventhough, OU is unranked and not doing so great this year, they possess a certain upset potential. Longhorn QB Vince Young looks good. Hope he stays through his senior year next season and not leave for NFL.
Michigan won against Michigan State in overtime. It was a good lift for Wolverines after two miserable losses against Notre Dame and Wisconsin. I was sorry to see MSU lose. They are my Big10 team for this year. MSU offense looked so good but, wasn’t enough to win the game in the end.
Rutgers beat Pittsburgh on a Friday night game. Rutgers must be the most improved team in the last few years. When I was at Rutgers from 97-99, they were always ranked almost at the bottom of NCAA-divIA teams. They looked very sharp againast Pittsburgh and have lost only one game against Illinois and that too very narrowly.
Florida lost to Alabama in a big upset, 31-3. USC and Arizona State game was very tight, but, in the end, USC offense came out on top. Reggie Bush must be the best running back in NCAA currently. It is just a pleasure to watch him run. #18 ranked Minnesota lost to unranked Penn State and the Nitanny Lions are back in top 25 after the weekend’s polls.
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What a boring game!!! Nebraska eeked out a win against Pitt. Final score 7:6. I am glad that I wasn’t watching. They have the next week off and then the first conference matchup against Iowa State. Ever since I have been following Nebraska football, this year is the first time when Nebraska will be underdogs against #24 ranked Iowa State that pulled an upset win against Iowa last week.
Texas easily beat up Rice and TAMU just kept scoring and scoring against SMU. Longhorns will take the next week off too and then play Missouri. Should be an eventless win for Texas.
Michigan took out its frustrations from last week on poor EMU at home. It was expected after that embarassing loss against Notre Dame last week. Finally, Michigan State came through and beat Notre Dame in overtime this week. That was nice. It should stop all the Notre Dame media hype that was going on for the last week or two. This game should have gotten over in regulation with the same result but, MSU made some really bad mistakes. I love MSU. I am going to be a Spartan fan for at least the rest of this season.
Got to watch part of USC game and it is very clear why they are ranked #1. The offense is just unbelievable. They will easily beat many of the NFL teams.
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Nebraska defense won another game. They beat Wake Forest easily 31:3. The offense is still sputtering. Hope they get their act together. After two easy weeks, next Saturday, they will face a challenge from Pittsburgh, who lost to Ohio today. Interestingly, former coach of Nebraska, Frank Solich is the new head coach at Ohio.
Texas won against Ohio State in Columbus, OH and fully justified their #2 ranking. QB Vince Young looked good. Next week Longhorns get a breather against Rice.
Michgan was upset by Notre Dame. This game along with Ohio State’s loss is going to change the rankings a lot. Another big unexpected upset was Iowa State beating Iowa 23:3.
Steve Spurrier is back to coaching a college team after dismal 2-3 years with Washington Redskins. Now Steve coaches the Gamecocks of South Carolina, taking over Lou Holtz’s place. They lost to Georgia today.
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College football season started with a bang before I even thought about it.
Nebraska won the first game as expected. If they had lost to Maine, it would have been a really really bad. Wake Forest comes to Lincoln next week. It should be an easy game.
Texas won big time against Loiusiana at Lafayette by the score of 60:3. Again as expected. They are ranked #2. Hope they survive their meeting with Ohio State next week.
Big upsets of the week: Oklahoma lost to TCU. Yay! Maybe they lost all the goo players in the graduating class last year. Pittsburgh lost to Notre Dame. Argh! As I type this, looks like unranked Georgia Tech is going to beat #17 Auburn.
I am so happy that football season has begun. Now, 4 months will go so fast with busy weekends.
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The final schedule for BCS bowls is out. Texas will play Michigan in the Rose Bowl. Texas got ranked higher in BCS rankings in the last week over California. It seems that coach Mac Brown did a lot of lobbying with voters to get more votes for Texas giving them the edge over Cal. We’ll be rooting for the Longhorns, but don’t know if we’ll get to watch any of the games in India.
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Last week of regular season college football brought on more heartache for Nebraska. They got beat by Colorado. I was hoping for a win. But, this loss translates into first losing season after 43 years and breaking the longest running bowl game streak in the country. Nebrska played in a bowl game for 35 years consecutively. They will sit at home and watch others play around New Year’s time. This is absolutely the bottom. The only good thing about it is that the only way from here is up. Hopefully, Bill Callahan will get the team in better game shape next year with his west coast offense and we’ll at least have a winning season next year.
Texas beat Texas A&M but, they will most likely be left out of the BCS bowls. The chances of Cal losing to Southern Miss are close to nil.
There were no big surprises during this last week. USC and Oklahoma kept their 1 and 2 BCS rankings and that will make them eligible to play for the championship unless Oklahoma loses in the Big12 championship game to Colorado. That is quite unlikely. Auburn got left out of the National Championship game eventhough they played better football caompared to Oklahoma and had an unbeaten season.
Michigan will play in the Rose Bowl. All of the bowl schedule will come out soon. All the best to the teams playing in bowl games. This is the first time that College football season is over for me in November.
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Nebraska and Texas were both resting on Saturday to prepare for their respective matchups against Colorado and Texas A&M on Friday after Thanksgiving.
Looks like hopes are fading for Texas to get into one of the BCS bowl games. They get in only if California loses to Southern Miss which is not very likely. Mayuresh explained the ‘at-large’ births in BCS, etc in a comment to my last football post. Check it out if interested.
One of the biggest matches last week was Florida at Florida State. Gators beat the Seminoles on their home field for the first time and ironically, this was the last game for Ron Zook as the coach of Florida Gators because he was fired earlier in the year.
Wisconsin lost second game in a row after being unbeaten for the first 9 games. That puts Michigan in the slot for Rose Bowl as Big10 champions even after losing their last game against Ohio State. I thought Michigan would win that game easily but, I was wrong.
Steve Spurrier accepted the head coach position at South Carolina after Lou Holtz retired from there. He will be coaching the Game Cocks for the next 7 years.
Notre Dame faces USC next Saturday. I hope they get their butt kicked really bad. 
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