PICKIN’ ON THE BIG TEN, WEEK 3

TO: M. Hasty
FROM: Mgmt
RE: Non-conference games

Please cease picking the non-conference Big Ten games, as you are clearly no good at it.

–mh

Point taken, but come on, 8-3 is not bad. How was I to know Oregon’s backfield just washed their hands before the game and couldn’t do a thing with them? How was I to know that Akron was a pretty bad football team?

How was I to know Notre Dame wasn’t quite dead yet?

Ahh, who cares? Just one more week of these games and it’s back into the predictable phase of the season. Though this week I promise to have at least one prohibitive favorite getting fishgutted by a soft, pasty bobo. The picks are anon:

WESTERN MICHIGAN @ ILLINOIS

In other words, Indiana.

Western, a perennial MAC semi-dominator, is off to a queasy start with an easy flattening of something called “Tennessee-Martin”, which, based on the score of that game, must just be some guy named Marty from Tennessee. Then last week the Broncs experienced the other side of that equation as one of Virginia Tech’s home-game victims. Illinois, meantime, came crashing down to earth with a tough loss to UCLA, which isn’t a dazzlingly-excellent football team itself. WMU has no run game, which is sad, since Illinois has no run defense. The Illini may be without their 38-year-old QB Jon Beutjer for this game. That doesn’t bode well for them. If a Big Ten team’s going to lose an easy home game this week, this will be it. But I think the Illini can pull it off. Of course, there’s more than one way to take that statement . . .

UNIS AS UGLY AS WYOMING’S 24
LAST CHANCE FOR ROMANCE 27

INDIANA @ KENTUCKY

I feel sorry for Kentucky head coach Rich Brooks, who probably counted this game in the “automatic win” column back in spring ball. But let’s get one thing straight: I am not sold on this Hoosier team yet. Oregon turned the ball over seven times last week to IU’s two. Normally, when you’re minus-five on turnovers, you lose by a lot more than six points. So let’s not go all TCU on the Hoosiers just yet, OK? Beating a MAC pain receptacle in a new coach’s first game, and then being the beneficiary of one of the greatest cases of fumblefingers in college football history doesn’t make you a great team; it makes you an improved team that got really, really lucky.

On the other hand, Kentucky is terrible.

NO LONGER LOOKING FORWARD TO HOOPS SEASON 31
STARTING TO, WE MUST ADMIT 21

IOWA @ ARIZONA STATE

Last year, everybody called this a “trap game” for the Hawkeyes. This year, nobody’s expectations are that high, and with good reason. Iowa’s offense just doesn’t have that blow-you-off-the-field quality it had the past two seasons. The defense, though, is a brick wall. ASU isn’t a threat to run the ball, so this game will give Andrew Walter a chance to prove he’s not all hat and no cattle. Or something like that. I don’t think this year’s Hawkeye team has what it takes to win a game like this.

COLD FEET 13
HOT-BLOODED 24

SAN DIEGO STATE @ MICHIGAN

Ten days ago, this was a hanging curveball for UM. Last week, in what will go down as one of the worst-coached games in Lloyd Carr’s tenure, UM did everything but forfeit the game to NBC . . . err, Notre Dame. Now everybody’s talking about how good SDSU’s defense is, and how this could be another case of a WAC team getting a win over a BCS conference.

Michigan doesn’t lose these games, folks; that’s why they’re Michigan.

UGLY PONTIACS 10
DESIGNERS OF UGLY PONTIACS 44

NATIONAL BROADCASTING COMPANY @ MICHIGAN STATE

The best thing about last week’s shocker in South Bend is that now this game only features one clueless, underperforming football team. The locus of odor on the MSU campus is gradually moving to the northwest, and you know what? I think the smell gets a little stronger this week.

MUST-SEE TV 27
MUST SEEK COUNSELING 19

MINNESOTA @ COLORADO STATE

Everybody says CSU is one of the best winless football teams in the country. That’s nice symmetry, since UM is one of the worst undefeated teams. The Toledo game looked great until Kansas went out and did the same thing to UT, and last week, the Gophers failed to put away a bad Gateway team until the fourth quarter. CSU’s played two tough games; for their home opener, I say they get it done against the Gilded Garden Pests.

THE ONLY PLACE THE NHL WILL BE MISSED 28
.333 IN BASEBALL ISN’T SO BAD 36

KANSAS @ NORTHWESTERN

So who woulda figured that, in week 3 of the season, Indiana would be looking great, and Kansas would be one of only two undefeated teams in the Big XII North? I’d love to take the Wildcats in this one, because there’s no quit in that team, but has everybody forgotten that Mark Mangino was the offensive coordinator at Oklahoma back in the days when they could run up the score against anybody? Well, the locus of that particular talent has moved from just south of I-40 to just south of I-70.

DR. NAISMITH’S PLAYGROUND 45
MR. ROGERS’ NEIGHBORHOOD 20

OHIO STATE @ NC STATE

If you missed NBC’s 49.3 hours of water polo coverage from Athens, tune in Saturday for 3.5 hours of bonus coverage on ABC.

WE MISS COLUMBUS 17
WE MISS DRY GROUND 13

UCF @ PENN STATE

Oh boy. I really don’t know what to do about this game. I thought Paterno had his team back, until that heartbreaker last week in Chestnut Hill. Now I’m not so sure. The Knights have had a chance to study what went wrong last week against West Virginia, a team that’s a few orders of magnitude better than the Nits. PSU’s lack of a consistent rushing attack is going to be a problem against UCF’s squishy front seven. But UCF’s passing game won’t get much done against a powerful PSU secondary. This is one of those games that could pivot on big special-teams plays. Or home-field advantage. Yeah, that’s what I’ll go with, but this one could easily go the other way.

BARON VON MUNCHHAUSEN 17
ALDUS DUMBLEDORE 24

WISCONSIN @ ARIZONA

Can we all agree that Zona is a much better team than they were last year?

Can we all admit they’d pretty much have to be?

Bucky got flustered by UNLoVable last week, needing big special teams plays to get over on the Cheatin’ Colonels. Zona got bottled and throttled by Utah, but that’s going to happen to a lot of teams this season. I don’t think the Wildcats have enough on either side of the ball to contain the Badgers, but that could mushroom, you never know. After all, Mike Stoops led the defenses that helped Mark Mangino’s offenses run up the score on everybody. Wisconsin is not quite there yet, but they will hang on and win this game, one of seven home tilts for UA this year–did they have to sell the team plane to pay off John Mackovic?

CHEESEHEADS 20
RELOCATED CHEESEHEADS, MOSTLY 12