GarySJ

I think the Memphis game is key to UCF's season. If they can win that one, they can think about having a winning season. But I think UCF will have a hard time stopping DeAngelo Williams (as do most teams).

USF official site says 2 PM.

http://gobulls.usf.edu/Sports/News.asp?i=1822&s=Football

No, it's not. They can take 8-3 Notre Dame, but it would not be at the expense of the Big East champ, it would be as an at-large team.

Notre Dame's arrangement with the BCS is independent of the Big East Conference's arrangement. In fact, Notre Dame could play against the BE champ. (Which could happen in the Orange Bowl if the ACC champ goes to the national title game.)

You can't take anything away from USC, but with the way they've started the past 2 games off, if they go up against a team that can contain them on defense they're looking at an L.

True, but USC doesn't play anybody like that.

As for the rest of the national title picture, I wouldn't be surprised if it comes down to "which one loss team" as opposed to "which unbeaten team" will play the University of Spoiled Children. There are too many good teams, especially in the SEC and Big Ten, for the current unbeatens to stay that way.

Question...can Notre Dame knock the BE out of the BCS?  Is the BE tie-in include Notre Dame?

No.

First of all, the intentionally vague rule explanation can be found at http://www.bcsfootball.org/index.cfm?page=eligibility

Here's what the selection order would be if the national title game is USC vs Texas:

1. Rose (BCS #1)

2. Rose (BCS #2)

3. Fiesta (since they lost their "anchor team" Texas to the national title game)

4. Orange (next on the priority list) vs "anchor" ACC champ

5. Sugar (next on the priority list) vs "anchor" SEC champ

6. Fiesta

I see one of two things happening re the Big East:

- Most likely scenario: the Sugar Bowl bites the bullet and volunteers to take the Big East champ, since their bowl is already messed up with the Superdome being unusable. BE champ faces the SEC champ in Atlanta or Baton Rouge.

- Less likely, but possible: the Fiesta Bowl draws the short straw in the pecking order, so the other bowls stick the Fiesta Bowl with the Big East champ. BE champ faces the Big Ten champ, a Pac-10 runner up, a Big XII runnerup, or 9-2 Notre Dame.

- I don't see the Big East champ playing in the Orange Bowl. They have the right to keep the ACC champ, and then pick the second at-large team to face them.

However, if the ACC champ gets plucked by the national title game instead of Texas, it becomes a possibility. The BE champ would face 9-2 Notre Dame (the Orange Bowl loves Notre Dame), or the Big Ten champ, since they would have first pick of a replacement for the ACC champ.

No, we don't have to be #12. An autobid is an autobid. But the poll position of each autobid earner is being tracked, and the Big East needs to keep its average winner above a certain point or risk losing the autobid.

St. Finger's going to shake his Peter at you.

they better send us! rules are rules!

Tell it to the 2002 team. "What, we said teams have to be taken by bowls on won-loss record unless there's a conference contract? Oh, we had our fingers behind our backs, you can make a contract any time you want..."

That lingering bitterness aside, you have to understand the conference's position here. A lowly-ranked co-champion in a tie could drag down the average "conference champion" rating to the point where the conference loses its bid. I'm really surprised they didn't make BCS rank the first tiebreaker.

Good work Smith, I looked all over and couldn't find the Big East tiebreaker rules.

I'm kinda surprised that the tiebreaker isn't "highest ranked team in the BCS poll", since the BCS rank of our conference champion will dictate whether or not the league keeps the auto-bid.

For example, if UofL ends up 10-1/6-1, they'll probably have a decent rank in the BCS poll (say #12-15). A 8-3/6-1 USF team wouldn't be anywhere near that high. Would the conference really send us to the big game over UofL?

In other bowl-projection news, CFB now has us in the Insight Bowl, versus UCLA. That's actually a step up from last week's Poinsettia Bowl projection.

Well, every bowl likes to arrange matchups by geography and interest, but the SEC is more vague about it than other leagues. In most conferences you'll see an official pecking order of 1-BCS, 2-Some Jan 1 bowl, 3-Some Other Jan 1 bowl, 4-Some Dec 31 Bowl, etc. The SEC avoids having a concrete order, other than the champ going to the BCS game.

I think it's because SEC schools get their noses out of joint if they're passed over in the perceived pecking order. I remember one year a similarly-credentialed Georgia team got picked for the Citrus Bowl when UF wanted to go, and UF got all pissy about it, threatening to never play a regular season game there again (as if they were ever going to, but I digress).

So the SEC is pretty loosey-goosey about it, especially the minor ones. I also remember one year Arkansas' players wanted to play in the (nearby and more conveniently scheduled) Independence Bowl, instead of a longer trip to a further-away but slightly more prestigious SEC game. So it was done.

This vagueness also lets the SEC avoid any undesirable matches, like the ones DawgPound suggested. I doubt they have to include an official codicil about avoiding UAB-Auburn type games, because those SEC teams can easily broker a deal to go somewhere else if we want to. "Well, we just felt Shreveport was the best option for our fans..."

Besides, if such stipulations existed in the Liberty Bowl/SEC contract, the C-USA teams would be singing it to the rooftops. As they should. I can't imagine that a "Florida demands not to play UCF in Liberty Bowl contract" would stay secret long.

Hey sport...let's keep the common sense to a minimum. The whole point behind these threads is to allow us to wallow in our coulda-shoulda-woulda fantasies.

I know, but sometimes it's good to throw in a little common sense, just so people can remember what it looks like. You remember those Health Class videos where they compare the picture of the healthy lung to the smoker's lung? Same thing.

Yeah, it is frustrating. And I am a little surprised that Carlton Hill hasn't seen more action at QB, since PJ and CD aren't setting the world on fire at the moment.

I just don't like it when people say Julmiste is starting at QB out of favoritism, or some motivation other than winning football games. I think that's an unfair criticism of our coaching staff. They have shown over the years that they will make changes when necessary. It's also not fair to Julmiste, who earned the starting position back with his performance at Penn State.

Yeah, it is kinda early for that talk. It's just nice that the UM loss didn't push us out of the projected bowl field.

Fair enough, I'll retract my comments. Sorry if I over-reacted. But jeez, we're not "bad apples", we just have a segment of our fan base that enjoys a little trashy internet banter before the game. And please note that we take our medicine when we lose (see other thread). Good luck to the Canes until our next game with them.

Comments retracted in light of txcanes' response below.

If Carlton Hill, Matt Grothe, Anthony Severino, or anyone else on the roster was a better quarterback than Julmiste and Denson right now, they'd be playing quarterback.

Period. End of discussion.

"devotion to pj"? Smazza, where the hell do you get this stuff?

It is insulting to our coaching staff to suggest that they'd play anyone other than the best man for the job. They've made changes before when necessary, and I have no doubt they'll make changes again if necessary. We should trust their judgment.

Imagine 2003 if he HAD blackwell, and then you realize that if we'd redshirted the guy we may have already been to a bowl game...

Blackwell did redshirt. He was a fifth-year senior in 2002.

none of those games were really "winnable" games, all would have been considered MAJOR upsets so losing those games is not that big of a deal.

Well, that's kinda the point. They have the highly-ranked teams, and we don't. We're gonna be the underdog in every single ACC game until our conference starts producing favorites.

BE is 1-5 vs ACC, the only win being WVU over Maryland. Louisville hosts UNC next week. We really need the Cards to win that one.

Congrats to Miami who looked strong and fast and was clearly the better team last night. Also, nice turnout, I didn't expect 53,000. Looking forward to the return game. Good luck in ACC play.

My only question is, why are we listening to someone who only wants to talk trash after the game is over? A search for posts by "Txcanes" shows only this post.

Sorry, but Rutgers didn't impress me at all. They played way way way too conservative after they got ahead of Pitt, and almost let the game get away. I don't think WVU will have any difficulty with them.

UConn always takes care of inferior competition, something that can't always said about USF.

It's too early to tell how good UConn is. Let's see how they do vs. Syracuse and Cincy in the next two weeks.

Cincy is a young team this year. Lost a HUGE number of seniors from last year's squad.