Fourth and Dumb

The 2009 college football is drawing to a close and conclusions are sliding into place.  With two weeks to go in the regular season, Week 12 told us the following:

1.  Whether postseason possibilities fall into place in the ACC.

2.  Who gets the upper hand during Rivalry Week in the Big Ten.

3.  Whether the Pac 10 Conference race tends toward sanity or chaos.

4.  Who will compete in the Big XII Championship Game.

5.  Who are set to emerge as the contestants in the Conference USA Championship Game.

1.  Whether postseason possibilities fall into place in the ACC. Unlike last season, the ACC is all wrapped up with a week left.  Thanks to North Carolina’s win over Boston College, Clemson clinched its ACC Championship Game spot opposite Georgia Tech without needing to lift a finger against Virginia.  Fortunately for the Tigers’ reputation, they went on to slap around the Wahoos 34-21.  Aside from possibly Paul Johnson and David Cutcliffe, there may be no more deserving Coach of the Year candidate than Dabo Swinney, who appears to be reversing the culture of falling short that plagued the Tommy Bowden administration.  At the other end of the spectrum, Al Groh’s team is freefalling.  His fate should already be sealed, with the envelope to open the day after they close out their year against Virginia Tech.

Meanwhile, the cut zone has closed for business for 2009, with the bowl bubble gone.  Florida State ended up on the right side of the bubble and got their sixth win courtesy of a late touchdown drive to deepen Maryland’s misery.  There is now much less pressure on the Seminoles to knock off Florida, and some of the pressure on Bobby Bowden has lifted.  This is his worst season since the early 1980s, but his team will play a 13th game.  On the other side of the bubble was Duke, which saw its bowl hopes die at Landshark Stadium.  The Blue Devils played the Hurricanes even until the storm surge came in, a 21-0 fourth quarter for the Canes, and knocked them out by the score of 34-16.

Thus, there are seven bowl bids set to come the ACC’s way.  While there is a small chance of a BCS at-large spot for Georgia Tech should they finish 11-2, it is more likely that only the Clemson-Tech winner is going to the big time.  The top six bowl picks will almost certainly include 8-3 Miami, Virginia Tech, and North Carolina, with either Boston College or Florida State shipped west to the Emerald Bowl.

2.  Who gets the upper hand during Rivalry Week in the Big Ten. The Big Ten’s bubble shrunk to infinitesemality this week as completion of conference play brought almost final clarity to the bowl picture.  Ohio State finished its season with its sixth consecutive win over Michigan.  This loss burst the bowl eligibility of the Wolverines.  Other action also went to plan, as Iowa shut out Minnesota behind four field goals and Penn State put on a show against Michigan State.  Purdue defeated Indiana in a game with zero postseason effects.  The only upset was Northwestern over Wisconsin, a result that improves Northwestern’s bowl position while removing Wisconsin as a viable at-large BCS candidate.

The Big Ten has seven bowl affiliations, and seven teams are eligible.  Ohio State is going to Pasadena.  Iowa and Penn State are both in the top 14 of the BCS standings and both are 10-2, but only one can be selected as an at-large to the BCS party.  It will be interesting to hear the thought process in two weeks on why one was picked over the other, or perhaps both were snubbed in favor of candidates elsewhere.  There are likely spots in the Capital One and Outback bowls for one or both of them, with Northwestern and Wisconsin next in the pecking order.  Minnesota and Michigan State, both 6-6 teams, will get the scraps, one of which could be the Pizza Bowl in Detroit.

3.  Whether the Pac 10 Conference race tends toward sanity or chaos. The usual assortment of games elsewhere took a backseat Saturday night as the Pac 10 took center stage.  Stanford came into the weekend the hottest team on the west coast, but any hopes of the Cardinal sniffing the BCS were snuffed out by California in the Big Game.  The USC Follow-up Curse lives!  Meanwhile, Oregon and Arizona met in the desert for conference supremecy.  The result was a match that went two overtimes, ended only when Jeremiah Masoli rushed for the winning touchdown.  The loss eliminates Arizona from Rose Bowl contention.  The other game involving contenders was much less suspenseful: Oregon State smacked around hapless Washington State.  The Beavers remained in the chase and, somehow, mathematically eliminated USC.  With these results, Oregon and Oregon State are the only teams with fewer than three conference losses.  The Pac 10’s Rose Bowl participant will be the victor of the Civil War on December 3rd in perhaps the biggest game in the history of the rivalry.

The lone game that did not impact the championship picture was Arizona State’s visit to UCLA in a bowl elimination game.  The Bruins guaranteed the Sun Devils a losing season and earned the first bowl bid of the Rick Neuheisel administration with a 23-13 win.  With that action in the books, the Pac 10 bowl bubble is gone; seven teams will go to the postseason, with the order determined strictly by conference record.  It will be interesting to see what happens with the glut of three-conference-loss teams, especially Arizona, which has two more opportunities to lose and tumble down the bowl pecking order.  In addition, since the Pac 10 only has six bowl affiliations, whichever team ends up bottom of the totem pole will be at the mercy of the at-large market, although that should not keep team number seven home.

4.  Who will compete in the Big XII Championship Game. In a case of “why is this game in primetime?”, Texas took Kansas behind the woodshed.  With the result, Kansas fell to 5-6.  He could not be reached for comment, but Mark Mangino is probably angry about the Jayhawks’ sixth straight loss.  I, for one, welcome our new Big XII South overlords.

The rest of the Big XII South is sorting itself nicely.  Oklahoma headed to Texas Tech to do honorable battle for third place in the division, but Cap’n Leach and the Red Raiders delivered what may be Bob Stoops’s worst loss as the Sooner Grand Poobah.  The Sooners are now 6-5, with a chance to fall to 0.500 when second place Oklahoma State aims to end Oklahoma’s lengthy home winning streak.  In College Station, Texas A&M welcomed Baylor the only hospitable way possible: a beatdown that sent the Bears home in last place in the division.  The Aggies also clinched bowl eligibility ahead of their showdown with Texas on Thanksgiving night.

The Longhorns now have an opponent for the Big XII Championship Game: Nebraska.  The Cornhuskers took care of business 17-3 against Kansas State, whose first season under the second coming of Bill Snyder came to an end, another example of the dangers of eating too many cupcakes.  Add in Missouri and Iowa State (the former beat the latter to gain a seventh win), and the Big XII now has eight bowl eligible teams, with Kansas a possible ninth if they emerge victorious from Arrowhead next week.  If Oklahoma State beats up OU to finish 10-2, they may get an at-large BCS bid.  Otherwise, as the Big XII only has eight bowl affiliations, one team may not have a chair to sit in when the music stops.  Kansas, Texas A&M, or Iowa State may be fishing in the at-large pool for their postseason entertainment.

5.  Who are set to emerge as the contestants in the Conference USA Championship Game. Over in the west, not to diminish a great bounceback season, but the Mustangs blew their chance to win the division by coming up short at Marshall.  Southern Methodist now needs Houston to drop its game with 2-9 Rice if they are to earn a Week 14 game.  The Cougars, clearly the class of the conference all season in the eyes of the national media, would only be grounded if they somehow lose to Rice and SMU defeats Tulane next week.

Over in the east, a field of four or five was thinned to two.  Any possible chance Marshall had was ended by East Carolina’s smackdown of UAB, a 37-21 final that required a Blazer rally to look respectable.  Central Florida stamped their authority on lowly Tulane to keep up in the loss column, but they were eliminated when Southern Mississippi defeated Tulsa.  UCF lost to both USM and ECU, which would be the first tiebreaker.  As a result, the winner of 6-1 East Carolina and 5-2 Southern Mississippi next week is your East division winner.

As for the bowl situation, both contenders from the West have the required minimum of six wins, while all contenders from the East as of Friday are eligible as well, except for UAB.  The Blazers must defeat UCF to get their sixth win.  Marshall become bowl eligible with their win over SMU.  Conference USA has only five primary bowl affiliations, but anyone needing to go to the at-large market should not have a problem being selected over teams from the MAC or Sun Belt.