BullBlood

Exactly. We had a good season in a solid conference last year. Either CJL is doing a great job evaluating talent or he's doing a great job coaching with lower-level talents. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle, but you can't argue with 9-4 in the BE. Not to mention beating LOU last year and WVU+PITT this year. Do you really think Rivals/Scout can really evaluate all of the FL talent accurately? CJL and Co. are around these kids year-round.

washington, kelly, and butler all have potential star power. Claude Davis will have the biggest impact if he can make it on campus.

It will mean that we can expect very big things in a very short period of time. The way this team is being built; we're not going to be one of those "southern miss/memphis" top 25 teams that will sulk back into oblivion the following year (one hit wonders). Once we crack post-season top 25 status, I expect us to stay there for years to come. It will do wonders for our recruiting, especially out of state.

They also mentioned that Mo Plancher had a torn achilles tendon last year. I thought I remember hearing it was an ACL tear. Which was it?

We need a guy like ford because last year we couldn't line it up and rush for 3-4 yards on first down. And by "rush," I mean hand it off to the RB like normal football teams do. This was a combination of OL and RB not performing well. Even in our big win against WV, we just could not count on running the ball with our backs to get 3-4 yards. We gained our yards by Grothe passing, Grothe running, or WR running. Not going to get too far without at least forcing the defense to stop our running attack. Florida was an exception this year because of some incredible talent at the WR and Fullback (tebow) positions. Look at Rutgers this year. All they did on offense was hand the ball to ray rice and gain positve yardage on every play. That got them all the way to #12 in the AP.

CAL @ number 10 When are these jackasses going to learn. Most overrated team in the nation every single year (sans ND, who he left out, surprisingly).

Leffers is now working with the SMART institute on BBdowns just north of fletcher. He has a new partner, Dr. Nefsinger, who is also very good. SMART institute is part of USF health so you may not face some of the insurance problems that have been encountered at FOI. Dr. Guttentag is also a very skilled surgeon located on BBdowns, North of Bearss

safety

Ford was obviously the biggest surprise thus far.  Honestly who thought we were going to get this guy to commit?  (I didn't even realize he was still around) As far as recruits that "will surprise," I have to agree with Quenton Washington.  This kid is a player.  Major productivity in a good league.  He may not come in and start right away but he will be a major contributor in his time at USF. I would have said Claude Davis, but I doubt he'll make grades >

If Ford doesn't make it to USF then I will say RBs. Otherwise, the OL is the weakest link. Granted they didn't have a great RB last year, but most of the time there just weren't holes. We didn't have a big sack number, but that is attributable to grothe's play-making abilities. While grothe was making those amazing plays while under pressure and escaping defenders.....nobody was commenting on the fact that the OL shouldn't have been letting those defenders get so deep into our backfield. Grothe made the OL look better than it was, but our runningbacks weren't good enough to do the same. We're returning a bunch of guys on the OL, so I'm expecting an improvement over last year. But based on the performance of 06 (especially towards the end of the season where we didn't show much improvement), the OL is our weak link.

there must be some kind of error in either 1. counting the students or 2. reporting the numbers to the media. Student section was packed this year. And they were incredibly rowdy. The only other explaination is if non-students were sitting in the student sections for games.

If coaches are thinking Butler can play DB, then maybe that would account for the high number of RB recruits. In other DB related news....Did I hear that USF commit quenton washington had 11 ints this year? That's impressive. Who keeps throwing in this kids direction after he's already had 10 picks???

Great link. That's a lot of speed for a guy that size. I think we could use him as either a fullback (coaches would have to put in some new plays), or as a RB. We should try and use him in the Alstott-role. Fullback to block, but put him in at tailback to carry the ball when we need to pound it. Great pick-up.

Exactly where would he see that???? Are you suggesting that oklahoma's HC job just became available, because I could have sworn we were all discussing Alabama and Miami. Two horrible offenses.

Agree with Pulpit. they simply got the ball back a few minutes later at our 30-35 yardline and took it in from there. Time was the only thing they lost there.

He does mention USF every now and then, but it's usually some sort of back-handed compliment like, "hey, they've got a PRETTY GOOD, LITTLE program down here." It's not actual praise. Just recognizing that we're having a good season (for our level, and for our conference). Always comes off sounding like he thinks of us as a DIV 1AA team or something. If he says we should win the BE, its probably an argument about how terrible the BE is. And it's a rarity to hear the words USF without hearing UCF within the same sentence. Drives me nuts!!

I don't think he was fired. Sounds like he took the job at Michigan state.

DL is our biggest need for recruiting this year, followed by DB and OL. We're not recruiting players that will come in and start immediately, so we need to think about these positions in terms of two years from now, not "next year." DL- we'll have a bunch of seniors playing the tackle positions next year with clebert, cray, T robinson, george, riley, buie. You don't want to replace those guys with true freshmen. (it's possible we've already helped this position with Fonua, Warren, and Dixon) DB- again, both starting CBs will be Srs next year, plus backups Gilliam and Denson. We've already got roberts and murphy who will replace them, but we're going to need more depth at this position. OL- Granted we are not losing a lot (if any) this year, but until I start seeing some gaping holes, I think this should continue to be a position of importance in recruiting. CJL was quoted on several occasions, saying that we've only got 6 or 7 guys that he trusts in there. We need to get to the point where we've got 9 or 10 BE caliber linemen if we want to start competing for the BE title. Depth is always going to be most important on the OL. Big games are won in the trenches. RB - we've got 4 decent players returning in Ponton, Plancher, Dorsey, and Samuels, but I would imagine we're going to try to go after 2 more this year to push the starters. We can't EVER afford to be starting walk-ons at any position if we want to be considered a legitimate program. I'm sure we're going to go after a big-time back this year that may be able to compete immediately (don't think we'll get one though). QB - Voss is likely not going to be playing QB for USF (probably safety). We need a decent backup for the next couple of years that will have the potential to take over for MG when he graduates or if he gets hurt. K - We've got 3 young guys. 2 are on scholarship. I don't see us wasting another scholarship on a kicker/punter. This is obviously a position that needs improvement, but I think we can improve with the guys we've already got. Our track record has not been very good in recruiting solid kickers the last few years.

Good point Knight. But, I like not getting any attention at this point. We don't really deserve a top 25 vote after some of our struggles this season. We will EARN everything we deserve in the next couple of years. At least nobody can complain that we're overrated this year. We're gonna get there but we're gonna have to earn it beyond a shadow of a doubt. Personally I think we'd beat many of those teams ranked in the bottom 25 and "others receiving votes." I am obviously biased though.

I don't remember anybody whining about Cinci's win against rutgers costing the BE $$$. That upset did as much damage as ours (against WVU). If RUT beat cinci we'd still have an undefeated Rutgers and a 10-1 Lou (with their only loss coming to an undefeated top 5 team. Boise st is the team that really screwed us (BE).

Well, the BE fans really ought to respect us. In our two years as a BE member we've beaten every team in the league, at least once. WVU was the last (of the 7) to go down to the bulls. Now, if we can just put it all together in the same season.......

What's the beef with anthony allen? Is he a florida guy?

I was talking with another student in my class about what a great game Grothe had on Saturday. We were both at the game, but neither of us realized the numbers that he put up on syracuse (400+ yds). A fellow classmate (UF grad) was sitting next to us and chimed in with a sarcastic "heisman candidate." As if it is a joke to consider a BE (or USF) player as a potential heisman candidate. Now, I wasn't thinking or talking about "heisman" in any way shape or form. And I didn't rebute to his statement either. The arrogance of UF fans is just unbelievable sometimes. This is a kid that currently goes to USF. BTW, future and recent heisman candidates from the BE: Michael Bush, Brian Brohm, Brian Leonard, Ray Rice, Steve Slaton, Pat White, and in a couple of years MG.

thanks. I started getting worried there for a second. I hoping we don't get stuck going to Toronto because of the date (early jan).

well, we certainly need him (Griffin) this week. We also need tolley to break into the starting line-up. He's only a freshman, but we need him to live up to the expectations if we are going to have a solid O-line for the next few years.