Wednesday, November 3. 2010Red, Blue And Pigskin
Well, sure glad that's over. Air Force week lives up to it's miserable history as they play yet another close game against the Utes. The Utes survived and set up the most important football game ever to take place in the state of Utah. #6 in the AP, and Coaches Poll, #5 in the BCS, the Utes welcome #4 in the AP/Coaches Poll, and now #3 in the BCS to town for a massive showdown. Meanwhile BYU was off last week, and now face a 3 week stretch that should be easy, but based on the way they've played this year, you never know.
What Can We Take From Air Force Game?
The truth is, absolutely nothing. Air Force is such a different animal. For one week a season the Utes, have to abandon their normal defensive scheme, and come up with something designed to handle the tricky triple option. The Offense gets extremely scaled down, as the Utes focus on time of possession and keeping the ball out of the hands of the Falcons. That said there were a few things that present either hope or worry. On the hope side is the fact the Utes forced 5 turnovers. Wynn had a terrible interception to make the Utes a +4 on turnover margin. Their season total was brought down drastically from -5, to -1. Going into the game the Falcons were a +22 in turnover margin. The Utes can't rely on their laurels though, and will need to force some turnovers, while holding onto the ball themselves, this week with the Horned Frogs coming to town. The thing to worry about, as is always the case with Air Force, is injuries. WR Devonte Christopher didn't make the trip. During the game, eventual Defensive Player of the Week Brian Blechen played with his hand wrapped in a cast. Even more scary was towards the end of the game when before a play he went to the ground and needed to be helped off the field. The other major injury was linebacker Chad Manis, who needed to be taken off the field in crutches. Supposedly all three are listed as questionable on the injury report, but all are expected to play. Never Again I enjoy watching the service academies play football, especially Air Force. That said, I don't ever want to see them play the Utes again. Air Force is a guaranteed 60 minutes of never give up football. Through 27 games in the series, the Utes and Falcons are now separated by 14 points. Air Force is the only school in the MWC to have a winning record against Utah at 14-13. I'm okay leaving that record right where it is. I never want to see Air Force on a Utah schedule again. The Showdown Calendars have been marked since the schedule was released. Everyone has been waiting for this week. ESPN is even rolling into town with College Gameday. The last two years, the winner of this game has gone onto a BCS bowl game. As much as I doubt it would happen, the stakes could be even higher for the winner this year. It's TCU week. We know the recent history. 2008 Utes score with a little over a minute to go to take a 13-10 win in the first ever blackout game. Last year, Utah scored more points against TCU than any other team, but still was blown out 55-28. So what can we expect during this year's matchup? TCU isn't quite up to the standard that last year's team was, but they still come in sporting the #1 scoring defense in the nation giving up 8.7 points per game. In the last 5 games the Frogs have given up 16 total points. The offensive side of the ball the Frogs come in scoring 40.8 points per game, 9th in the nation in scoring offense. As for the Utes, they aren't slouches themselves. Last year was a rebuilding year, and the TCU game was Jordan Wynn's second ever start, and his first start on the road. The lessons learned in that game has helped the Utes offense this year. The Utes bring in the 3rd overall scoring offense with 45.3 points per game. Defensively the Utes are 6th in the nation at 14.1 points per game. TCU is slightly better on defense, while Utah is better on offense. This is going to be a battle. Slow Starts The Utes have been a bit slow starting out games this year. The Utes have scored more than a TD in the first quarter only once this season, and are averaging only 6 points in the first quarter. Of course the Utes have been making up for it by exploding in the 2nd quarter, averaging 17.6 points per game in the second quarter. TCU has also been a bit slow to start out games. Not counting the game against Div 1-AA foe Tennessee Tech the Horned Frogs are scoring 9.8 points per game in the first quarter. Both Utah and TCU are like championship boxers who use the first few rounds to feel out their opponents and find the weak spot before going for the kill. The key to this week will be which team can find the other team's weakness and capitalize the fastest. Wynn vs. Dalton Jordan Wynn is a true Sophomore making his 11th career start, is a 5th year senior. They are the top 2 QB's in the league, with only San Diego State's Ryan Lindley even being close. Both QB's are really good QB's who can move their team through the air. Both QB's are also very efficient. The other thing both QB's have, is they can both be a bit reckless. Wynn has thrown 6th int's this year, while Dalton has thrown 5. The key for both teams, will be to put pressure on the qb, and force them to make mistakes. Whichever QB can keep themselves reigned in, and stay within the offense, will be the team to watch. Special Teams Battle The matchup to watch during this game, may not be on either offense or defense. This game features two of the best special teams players in the nation. TCU's Jeremy Kerley and Utah's Shaky Smithson have seemed to trade off special teams player of the week awards this season. Kerley averages 28 yards per return for a kickoff return. Shaky is averaging 22.4 yards per punt return and 24.1 yards per kick return. Shaky is the only returner in the nation with 3 punt returns of over 70 yards. So what this means, is both teams will be trying very hard to keep the ball away from the returner. Gameday And the Blackout So with all the attention this week being on the Non-AQ teams this week thanks to the TCU/Utah game as well as the game between Hawai'i and Boise State. With this being a matchup of top 6 teams, ESPN will be arriving into town for the game. This marks the second time that Gameday has been at Rice-Eccles Stadium. The first time of course being for the 2004 Utah/BYU game when Utah became the first ever team to bust the BCS. Gameday taping is Saturday from 7a.m. to 10 a.m. in the West parking lot of the stadium. The TCU game 2 years ago started the Blackout game for the Utes. I still don't like the tradition. I'm not much for gimmicks, especially gimmicks designed only to make money. The other thing I don't understand is why use the Blackout for a team that already wears black uniforms at times. That said though, being at the game, the stadium looked really cool with all the black in the stands. I also really like the blackout uniforms for the Utes. This year though isn't a typical blackout. The Utes have joined with the Wounded Warrior Project, and is instead doing a Camo-Blackout game. While this is still just a gimmick designed to sell jerseys, ones which by the way are kind of ugly, at least I can respect the overall thought behind it. The Other Game This Week After a week off to fix some of their many issues this season, the BYU Cougars are also at home this weekend. They welcome in the Rebels of UNLV. New coach Brady Hauck has had a rough freshman season in Vegas, as his team is 1-7 this season, with the only win coming against New Mexico. The Rebels haven't been close in any of their losses. BYU is sitting at 3-5, and is fighting for their bowl hopes this season. While the offense has continued to be dismal, and may have in fact continued to get worse as the season has gone on, the defense for the Cougars seems to have found a spark since Bronco took over the duties as Defensive Coordinator. The next three games will be the easiest stretch of the season for the Cougars. UNLV will be one of only two games left where you can think that this is a game the Cougars will win hands down. The stretch to carry momentum into next season starts with this week. The Bad Get Worse New Mexico is in the middle of what has to be the worst two seasons in school history. How head coach Mike Locksley still has a job is beyond reason. Now the Lobos have lost their starting QB for the season after Brad Gruner had season ending surgery on this throwing hand. So how did Gruner injure his hand? Did he hit it on a helmet? Did he use it to cushion a fall? Did it get trampled on by a defender? Nope. He sliced his pinkie while carving a Halloween pumpkin. I guess when it rains, it pours. The Commander-in-Chief's Trophy Air Force wasn't able to pull the upset against the Utes, no matter how scary they made it. However, they have, arguably, their biggest game of the season this week. Thanks to their 14-6 victory over the Navy Midshipmen earlier this season, the Falcons simply need to defeat Army this week to reclaim the Commander-in-Chief's Trophy. A victory by Air Force will end Navy's 7 year hold on the trophy. Rankings Game The number of undefeated teams in the country is down to 5 after losses by Missouri, and Michigan State. Three of those undefeated teams come from Non-AQ schools At least one of the remaining undefeated teams will suffer their first loss in Rice-Eccles Stadium. This unfortunately means that the chance to really screw with the BCS with a large number of undefeated teams is down the drain, as the BCS has survived a 4 undefeated team season previously. With the losses of those two undefeated teams, the Utes were able to move up two spots in the AP Poll, and 1 spot in the Coaches poll, coming in at 6th in both. Thanks to their season schedule reaching the tougher stretch, the Computers showed a bit more love to the Utes, and helped them move 3 spots to 5th overall. Utah faces BCS #3 overall TCU this week. Loser of this game can kiss BCS dreams goodbye. #4 Boise State, who was jumped by TCU this week, faces 7-2 Hawai'i. This is the first of three tougher games for the Broncos this season. A loss by Boise State, and their dreams are caput as well. #6 Alabama travels to the Bayou to play #10 LSU. Alabama is the biggest threat to all Non-AQ's by a 1 loss team. Win out and a 1 loss Tide will be in the title game, even if two Non-AQ's are undefeated. LSU probably wouldn't get the human love to ever jump Utah, TCU or Boise, but this game will at least completely eliminate one of these two teams. #7 Nebraska traves to Ames Iowa to face the Iowa State Cyclones. A victory by the Cornhuskers shouldn't cause a jump, but an upset by the Cyclones would be unbelievably huge for the Utes, as the Utes crushed them a few weeks ago. The rest of the teams close to the Utes play average competition that should equal easy wins. Fortunately though the caliber of opponents isn't enough to cause a jump this week. When Nationally Televised, Isn't Technically the Utah/TCU game will be nationally televised. Unfortunately thanks to the terrible MWC TV Contract, it'll be buried on a channel that many don't get, or don't realize they get. It's too bad that after all the hype about the game that ESPN will give it, and after Gameday, many people will have to scour their listings to find it. The game this week will be on CBS College Sports. On Direct TV it is channel 613. Of course it could always be worse, at least it's not The Mtn. Trackbacks
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