Oregon went down in a blaze of injuries and turnovers to Arizona, 34-24, becoming the fifth number two team in America to fall this year, joining USC, Cal, South Florida, and Boston College. All fell to unranked opponents, which bodes well for Kansas. Kansas plays unranked Iowa State, but officially, they are number 3, so they avoid the official curse until Sunday’s voting.
However, their next opponent after that is sure-to-be-ranked Missouri in the long-standing “Border War”. So if the curse’s current conditions hold up, Kansas should make it to the national championship game. Now, can LSU hold up their #1 position? They’ve gotten a pass because they play in the mighty SEC, but there’ll be no way for them to explain yet another slipup. Most people, including myself, do believe that LSU is the most talented team in the nation. But they need to actually start playing like it. These close calls they’ve had won’t get done in the SEC Championship game, likely against a motivated and rejuvenated Georgia team.
As for Oregon, please hold off on the “I always knew they were overrated” postings to message boards and discussion groups. Oregon looked poised to dominate this game up 8-0 when a pass that should have been caught bounced into the arms of an Arizona defender, giving the home underdog some much needed life. Once starting QB and Heisman candidate Dennis Dixon went down, the roof just caved in on the Ducks. Granted, a great team would have found a way to overcome all that and find a way to win, so no one shed tears for Oregon. However, no one needs to act like it was a crime against humanity that they were #2.
Well, maybe one of these days, Pac-10 commissioner Tom Hansen, or his successor, will get Pac-10 teams into better bowls, and an upset like this would be not nearly the costly disaster that this loss is probably going to turn out to be for the conference….going from two BCS teams to having your second best team in the underrated, forgotten, and poorly scheduled Holiday Bowl.
College football, gotta love it!
My mom was going to get me tix to the KU/MU game, but I leave town about 2 hours before it!
brooklyn gal
November 16th, 2007
Ugh. I don’t consider myself to be a resident of Kansas… just a long-term temporary visitor. But living in Southeast Kansas… I have Kansas, Missouri, AND Oklahoma to root for.
::waits to see which bandwagon to jump on::
Beej
November 16th, 2007