College football week 9 thread: The Midshipmen Who Stare at Goats

I'm beginning to think Penn State is a really soft 6-0.

 

That's the price of packing your conferences without Leaders and Legends.

 

You'd probably WANT to be left out of the championship game; get a bye week to heal up your bumps and bruises, dodge a possible loss and have an extra week to prep for the playoffs.

 

True, but winning the conference championship gets you a bye into the last eight. I feel like game theory people have a term for that but hell if I know.

 

Think you could make a case that Penn State should have gone for two there. Miss it and you still have a 7-point lead. But make it and it’s a two-score game with 10 minutes left and Wisconsin not exactly built for speed.

 

Always a fan of doing that, the reward is so much greater than the risk.

 

Even though my team lost today, I can still go 2-1 if K-State holds on against the Beakers. With the Illinois loss, I’m currently 1-1.

 

I think the bye is going to be huge this year because there's I don't see a huge difference between the quality of teams 5-through-12. The games are going to be pretty physical, and guys will be fighting through injuries in that second game. There's always a chance of a key defender missing a half because of targeting....it all benefits the team resting.

 

I'm trying to figure out which Big Ten team is worth a shit. I think Ohio State has the most talent by far, but Ryan Day and Will Howard isn't a match for winning big games IMO. Oregon looks like a legitimate team. I think they are built to last, but who knows. Indiana is the big question mark to me. I don't know if they are a Cinderella deal or the real deal. I think the coach knows how to win.

 

I'm not going to go as far as 73 percent of the Penn State fan base will, but ... damn, Beau Pribula looks good here.

I grew up with his dad, and his grandpa was my college's AD and taught a great "Sports in Society" class.

 

Thing that has impressed me most about the Hoosiers is how physical they are, on both sides of the ball.

On offense, I don’t think they’ve run the ball this well since the Anthony Thompson era. Even against a fairly stout front seven like Nebraska has, the IU backs kept getting healthy chunks of yardage.

On defense, I didn’t see today’s game but UW has a good running back and I don’t think he did much. Plus the Hoosiers offense has built early leads all year, which forces teams to pass more against them.