Weekend predictions

Well the replay bug struck again with Cincinnati being awarded a phantom touchdown last night. It may or may not have been a touchdown but there was no indisputable video evidence. Either way, it's getting ridiculous with the number of controversial replay decisions going IN FAVOR of top 10 and top 5 teams. There are three people in the replay booth, but only one of them makes the final decision, the other two merely assist. I think in order to overturn a call all three must unanimously decide to overturn. Easy fix, no additional cost to it.

I don't foresee a lot of top 25 upsets this week. The teams that I put on upset alert are:
Miami at North Carolina, Pittsburgh against Notre Dame and Oklahoma St. against Texas Tech. I expect Florida to handle South Carolina with relative ease, but you never know with the Ol' Ball Coach. California is favored over their ranked opponent, Arizona, so that's not an upset, but it is a top 25 team that I think will lose. Miami has struggled mightily against every good defense they have played and North Carolina has a great defense, but if North Carolina can't scored 10 points FOR ONCE, they have no chance. As far as Pittsburgh goes, I still think mentally they are not quite a top 10 team and, therefore, might struggle against a team as talanted as Notre Dame. But Notre Dame's coaching, as has been the case for the last decade, holds them back. As far as the Tech-State game is concerned, both teams have explosive offenses with defenses that typically struggle. However, Tech's defense has shown a lot of improvement the past few weeks. If they can force more turnovers than they give up, they can certainly win this tough road game.

Now to the big games: I don't think either will be close. I think Ohio St. will score on Iowa's "tough" defense and Iowa's offense, which depends on the running game, will struggle to move against the best run defense in the Big Ten. I expect a similar fate for Utah: a great rushing attack going against one of the best run defenses in the country (besides their own). Although, with Jordan Wynn playing QB now, Utah will have the ability to spread the field vertically as well as horizontally. Utah has "big game" potential and definitely has the ability to surprise. Jim Boylen, Utah's basketball coach, gave an interview earlier this week where he said the 17-point line on the game was a joke and that it would definitely tighten up before game time. Wrong: it now sits at 20 points. Maybe people know something the Utes don't. I think TCU certainly has the potential to dominate: but Utah definitely has the potential to upset. I think Utah (and Iowa) will be able to keep the games close for a while. However, I expect both of those games to finish something like 31 to 10 in favor of the home teams: high 20's to low 30's for the home teams against a single digit, maybe teens score for the visitors.

Not much needs to be said about BYU at New Mexico. On paper it is a blowout. BYU has shown the ability to blow out inferior opponents, and New Mexico has shown the ability to get blown out by good teams (or any team, really). If this is closer than 4 touchdowns, then BYU is in trouble in the next two games.

MWC basketball had an OK night. Teams at the bottom of the conference struggled against crappy teams or lost to them. BYU came up big against Bradley, never trailing except for 2-0. CSU handled UC Davis at home. Utah and Wyoming lost their home openers against teams they could/should have beaten. TCU and Air Force both struggled against crummy directional schools, while getting W's.