College Football Rankings- The News about Losing

College Football Humor – The Top Ten Early Season Blowouts for 2009

The grand tradition that is college football is rapidly approaching.  Soon, the overwhelming heat of summer will give way to overwhelming depression of losing in an opening day college football game.

Hope abounds for many programs intending to make a run at a New Year’s Day Bowl game.   The tradition of the college football season includes band marches, parades, cheerleaders and of course, the annual blowout game.  Some of these programs even work in a couple of these laughers to begin the season in the vain hope that wins over Southeastern New Hampshire will vault a school like Nebraska into the BCS polling lead.  Why anyone would pay to see these games is a mystery.  Smarter athletic administrators roll these tickets into the mandatory season ticket purchase package.  If one wants to see the Ohio State-Michigan game, you have to suffer through the home games against the Eastern and Western Michigan.  At least the Wolverines are keeping the embarrassment in state this year.

Still, these games have some meaning.   The aforementioned University of Michigan breathed new life into season opening games the past few seasons by losing at home to Division II Appalachian State.  The school didn’t give much thought to repeating an opening day disaster by scheduling in what was then thought to be losers from Utah.  Utah dished out another disaster in the Big House and ended the 2008 Wolverine program after game one.   Following these games, Wolverine alumni were able to get advanced season bookings for bowl season - in Mexico.

The Art of scheduling is a complex calculation undertaken to both guarantee a win at home for schools expecting to compete for the national championship and to provide some BCS schedule strength.   However, as games are scheduled so far in advance, some schools have thrown the calculation to the wind by writing in the weakest schools willing to play them.

The BCS scheme was originally set to provide better quality games earlier.  Southern schools took this seriously.  Early season games featuring Florida State against Miami and Virginia Tech vs. Alabama should round out a great Week 1 television schedule.  At least some southern schools want to compete.  Those games not on television the first week of the season probably deserve to be flushed.

Other schools perpetually involved in rebuilding years also try to schedule in weak opponents.  This sets up a significant bidding war for schools like Murray State and Western Kentucky.  Doormat schools finance much of their annual athletic budgets by agreeing to be whacked silly by a couple of college football’s powerhouses.

Lower ranked Division I schools also get into the act but are compelled to book games with weak Division II opponents.  Duke in a traditional game against the mighty Richmond (VA) Spiders usually prevails to boast a winning record for at least seven of the 365 days of the year.   The poor Indiana Hoosiers went 2-0 against outclassed opponents to start 2008 only to drop every subsequent contest.  Granted, the Hoosiers suffered some significant player injuries in ‘08, but building confidence with wins over James Madison and someone called Elon just isn’t logical.

So here is the first cut at the top ten blowout games for the 2009 season.  Please comment and offer suggestions for your worst games of 2009.

10. Idaho at New Mexico State – Although not necessarily a blowout, this game deserves mention because it involves two of the absolute worst programs in the country.  The administrations of these schools at least figured out that if two bad programs played each other on opening day and were able to keep it close, the embarrassment of losing big to start the season might be avoided.  New Mexico State’s hopes are rising with the hiring of new coach DeWayne Walker.  Walker hopes that a win will finally make the smell from the Las Cruces feed lots at least bearable.

9.  North Dakota State vs. Iowa State – The Cyclones hired former Auburn Coach Paul Rhoads to take over the floundering program.  (Interestingly, former Iowa State coach Gene Chizik who finished 2008 with a 2-10, wound up getting the Auburn head coaching job.)  Rebuilding may take more than one year, but Rhoads should get at least the first game into the ‘W’ column by playing a game against a school that most didn’t know even had a sports program.  Kudos to the Iowa State brass for giving Rhoads a chance to start out on the right foot, as the rest of this season may easily stumble over the cliff.

8.  Nebraska vs. Louisiana-Lafayette – Nebraska should have just kicked off the season against Big 12 foe Iowa State.  The poor and hapless Cyclones are just as bad and could have put a conference W in the books much sooner.  LA Lafayette has a unique kind of death wish for its program, as it will be fresh off a shellacking by LSU the week prior.

7.  Nebraska vs. Florida Atlantic – deserves honorable mention regardless of opponent strength.  Ostensibly, the Big and Red is preparing for a week three match up with Virginia Tech.  Nebraska used to compete hard for playing the Northern New Hampshire Drum and Bugle Corps in the annual season opener, but has since attempted to improve its Bowl chances in the past by scheduling games against UCLA and Southern California.   The Big and Red lost to USC last year, so they are pinning their hopes on winning just one challenging game before the Big 12 opener – this year against Virginia Tech this time on the road in week 3.

6.  Oklahoma vs. Idaho State (week 2) Why anyone with a marginal team would play OU so early in the season is a guess.  One guesses that the payday to Idaho State had a lot to do with the decision.  Prior to June 15, Idaho State still listed its opponent for that date as ‘TBA.’  The school is desperately trying to forget this game before it happens.  If they can sneak into Norman and slink out with their money before anyone notices, it will be ‘mission accomplished.’

5.  Texas vs. Louisiana-Monroe - Louisiana Monroe is indeed a real NCAA school.  Why they would take on the Longhorns in Austin for the opener is comical.  LM finished next-to-last in the Sun Belt Conference and harbors no real expectations to knock off the ‘horns.  Texas could really improve their chances with a home win against a quality opponent, but in a very un-Southern move, (a worse insult the Sage of College Football cannot imagine), chose to dish out a tail-kicking to an inferior program.

4.  LSU vs. Louisiana-Lafayette – LSU probably didn’t intentionally set this game up as a blowout.  They were just looking for a scrimmage to avoid accidental injury to front line players.  LA Lafayette turns in a decent record but if they pull out a win over the Tigers, the Governor will have the coach hunted through the bayou with hound dogs.

3.  Utah vs. Utah State -  Incredibly interesting that one of the best teams last year hails from an ignored western state where the other state school is a perennial doormat.  At least the Utah taxpayers won’t have to worry about a lot of travel costs to see one of its teams beat the stuffing out of the other.

2.  North Texas at Alabama – week 3.  Alabama will be coming off games against Virginia Tech and Florida International.  Should the Tide roll in those games, they are going to be hungry.  If they fail in either of those games, Alabama will be severely bent out of shape. In either case, the North Texas Mean Green will emerge a color other than what they went in with.

1.  Penn State vs. Akron (week 1) In the Ben Dover Memorial Game, the Nittany Lions are scheduled to administer a royal whupp’n to the Akron Red Hawks to open the season in College Station.  Why games like this count is beyond understanding.   The Red Hawks turned in a respectable 5-7 season in the Mid America Conference last season, but never had to contend with throngs of wild and liquored up blue and white painted fans and a team expecting to be playing football well into 2010.  Akron may be looking past Penn State to their dates with Morgan State and Indiana the following weeks.

Upset special… Michigan vs. anybody in week 1.  Establishing a tradition of losing and causing alumni to again bank their frequent flyer miles, the once mighty Wolverines have fallen on hard times.  This year, Western Michigan journeys to the Big House to see if they can duplicate the App State/Utah magic.  The Maize and Blue, after years of questioning whether there were other football teams in the state, won’t be looking past the Broncos.  In fact, they may just be sitting on the sidelines hoping for a great natural disaster to overshadow another horrible season opening home loss.  At least it might be worth watching.