Ducks Lose, Big 12 Wins

Did you not see this coming? I did. Now that the Oregon Ducks are the latest casualty of the dreaded #2 BCS ranking, all eyes move toward the Big 12 to see who will not only be crowned the conference’s champion, but who will be playing for the BCS Championship in January.

First, how about those uniforms? That’s all anyone wants to talk about when it comes to Oregon. Can’t say I blame them. With the exception of the USC game in Eugene this team hasn’t really done anything spectacular (except for handing a beat down to the much hated Michigan Wolverines in September) this season. Sure they beat Arizona State, but who really thought they were a true top 10 team? Maybe in a couple years after Dennis Erickson has had time to build a squad.

Not that that being a top 10 team means anything this season. Parody (hate that word) seems to have finally taken over college football. 85 scholarships, welcome to the NFL junior league with no damn playoffs. With no opportunity for a +1 system until after 2010, this is how it could be for the next few years. Yippy skippy.

Each of the three teams ranked in the BCS top five from the Big 12 (Kansas, Oklahoma, Missouri) hold their destiny in their hands so to speak. If each of these teams wins out, the one that does so will probably be playing LSU (provided they don’t loose) for the national title.

Kansas should move up to #2 if they don’t lose to Iowa State, who has been playing well as of late beating Kansas State and Colorado, tomorrow in Lawrence, Kansas. Oklahoma and Missouri should follow in at #3 and #4 respectively. In my humble opinion, the only team I think is truly strong enough to be in a title game with LSU in their backyard is Oklahoma. I think Missouri and Kansas would be more out of their league than Ohio State was last year playing against a faster, more athletic Florida team.

Don’t get me wrong, you can’t take away the fact that Kansas and Missouri have had fantastic seasons and can take them to even loftier heights provided they win out. However, between the two schools they have one quality win. That came on the first weekend of the year when Mizzou defeated Illinois on a neutral field. Whichever team wins on November 24^th (Missouri in my opinion, once again) will have the opportunity to prove just how good they are when they play (a rematch) in front of what will be a mostly pro-Sooner mob in San Antonio for the Big 12 Championship game.

Any way you slice it there is no avoiding that the Big 12 is on top of the conference heap. It’s just too bad Nebraska picked this year to have one of their worst in modern college football history.

Speaking of which, the Huskers will enjoy their bye week before traveling to Boulder to try and secure a bowl game berth next Friday. If they win, the Huskers are projected to play Arkansas in the Independence Bowl. That would be great, considering Darren McFadden plays for the Razorbacks and the "Blackshirts" have one of the worst run defenses in college football. Yikes.

Extra credit reading here here and very unfortunately here.