One Eyed Observations: The BCS National Championship Game, Charlie Strong, and the Sugar Bowl
1. Alabama vs. Texas. First thoughts? My first thoughts of this game are that I could care less because Florida isn’t in it. Oh who am I kidding? I still care because I love college football. I think if Alabama plays the way they did against the Gators (or maybe more importantly if Texas plays as bad as the Gators played against Alabama) then Bama will easily walk away with the crystal ball. In a way, I guess I am rooting for Alabama because I always want the SEC to do well and I don’t have nearly as much hatred for Nick Saban and Alabama as I used to (thanks Lane Kiffin). But there is something inside of me that keeps thinking that if you tell a good team that there is no chance they are gonna win, they seem to show up and surprise everyone more often than not. Texas for the next month is going to hear from all the “experts” that they don’t stand a chance. Reminds me a little bit of when Florida played Ohio State or when Texas played USC in the national championship game a few years ago. And what happened in those games? The underdog won. I know there are plenty of examples that prove the contrary, but something about this Texas team led by a stud QB/WR combo tells me that they will take all of the negative and turn it into positive. Right now (and this could change) I am saying that Texas will win a close and well fought game. Actually looking forward to this one a lot!
2. What effect does Charlie Strong’s departure have on the defense? Being that I think Urban Meyer will promote from within to replace strong, I don’t really think there will be a huge difference on defense in the next couple of years. Strong seemed to really like the Joker defense this year (3-3-5 defense) more than most people do so I am not positive that we will see that as much going forward, but I think it will mostly stay the same besides that. We still have good players across the board and seem to still be recruiting well so I am not too worried. I do think it will take a year or so for the new DC to get his feet wet and to feel really comfortable calling schemes and plays, but after that I think we will be fine. And three years from now that person will take off for a HC job and we will be right back to where we are now. One thing I am glad about, we have had three coordinators leave in the past 12 months or so but almost no position coaches have gone with them. So even though the head of the ship is gone, all the understudies seem to be staying around and “keeping on keeping on”.
3. Anyone you’d rather see Florida play than Cincinnati (national championship game aside of course)? Yes, pretty much anyone on the planet. It’s funny, because when I thought UF was going to the NC game, the only team I really didn’t want to play was TCU because I think they are REALLY good and have the potential to beat anyone. It would have been a lose-lose for the Gators. But once we got beat, the team I really wanted to play was TCU. Granted it still would have sucked to get beat by a mid-major team, but I think it would have salvaged something to beat the team that many people think could be the best in the country. Even though Cincy is ahead of TCU in the BCS now, I don’t have much respect for Cincy, especially their defense. Besides that, the only other team in a BCS game that I would like to play is Oregon just because I am one who really doesn’t like Oregon, yet I understand all the Nike-made hype about them. It would be fun to shut those neon bastards up for a bit!