NCAA Week 9 running thread: Dennis Franklin's Collarbone is fine, thank you

America is a land of premature indignation, particularly when it comes to college football.

 

Georgia is favorite in the East because they play the easiest conference schedule possible and haven't been killed by injuries. When they played Boise, they were so unprepared that they got nailed twice for false starts on the opening series, had players keep leaving the game because they got overheated (in a fucking dome), but...oh yeah, they only lost by 14. Not exactly an ass-kicking.

And it'll be Boise's best win. Not good enough. As always.

(That said, the Barn has been outscored by 38 in conference play, and South Carolina is down to Alshon Jeffery, some duct tape, and chewing gum. I'd put Georgia above both those teams at this point.)

 

That's the thing: If Georgia doesn't repeatedly, catastrophically trip over its own dick against South Carolina, the Dogs are 6-1, 5-0 in the conference, probably in the top 15 and easily on the inside track to Atlanta.

Of course, that's with all other things being equal.

 

My only quibble with anything here is Auburn's not a very good football team. I'm taking Georgia in that one. Auburn doesn't have a QB, its offensive line is awful and Nick Fairly ain't walking through that door to give it a defense. They've slicked out of a couple of games they probably should have lost otherwise they'd be about a 3-5, 4-4 team and the record would better reflect what they are.

 

Are we talking an unbeaten OSU team that beats OU? No. No way. That OSU team would have made it through the ringer. Both Palm and Sagarin have OSU's schedule rated the toughest of the current unbeatens.

 

First of all, I think Oklahoma State is losing at some point, so I don't think you have to worry about the Pokes playing for the title.

I still think Oregon beats Stanford.

Clemson's toughest tests left on its schedule are Wake Forest, South Carolina and, likely, Virginia Tech in the ACC title game, a team the Tigers have already crushed.

Boise State is going to run the table.

This could finally be the year where the No. 2 team in the pecking order isn't clear cut ... at all ... and 6-7 different teams have a legitimate claim.

 

2007 called.

 

How about if Kansas State beats both Oklahoma schools? That would make them legit to me. Not a great nonconference sked, but we'll watch what Miami does.

 

If either unbeaten Big 12 team wins out, they're in. If the Bama/LSU winner wins out, it's in.

Bama/LSU loser goes to the top of the heap among one-loss teams, more so LSU because of the number of tough games away from home (including at Tusky).

 

I don't think an undefeated Kansas State team gets in over Boise, Clemson or Stanford. Maybe I'm wrong.

(Though they'll probably lose to Oklahoma, Oklahoma State and Texas A&M the next three weeks, and it won't matter).

 

I think a one-loss SEC team could finish ahead of an undefeated Boise State, Stanford, Clemson, Oklahoma State, Kansas State and Houston...

 

By the same token, an unbeaten KSU team will have won all three of those games. All high-profile wins in the back end of the season. So while they seem the most obscure of the BCS league unbeatens now, if they somehow sweep those three, they are going to be high in the conversations at a time of year when these conversations matter most.

If KSU beats OU this week, that'll be a hell of a doubleheader Nov. 5 (KSU at OSU).