Beware of Big East Football!
By Erie's Scribe on Nov 07, 2007 with Comments 0
West Virginia QB has his eyes wide open and focused on the Big One
I’m tired of Big East football getting no respect. All I hear about is SEC, Big 10, Pac 10, and Big 12. What the hell is this? Who went 5-0 last bowl season? Whose teams are sporting a stellar, 28-11 non-conference schedule this year!! Oh yeah, that would be be the Big East. Top to bottom, the other conferences aren’t even close to the Big East. And don’t get me started on that those team stealing jerks over at the ACC. How is Miami treating you now? Sure BC looked good for a couple of months this season, but after that Florida State loss they’re headed back to being the same old sorry ass Boston College as always. What a crock.
I can break the Big East teams into three categories; perennial powerhouses, up-and-comers and rebuilding teams who can go out and beat any team on any given Saturday.
The perennial powerhouse list includes West Virginia and Louisville (and Rutgers soon). The Mountaineers were ranked 5th and Louisville 10th by the AP in the preseason (Sports Illustrated had the Cardinals ranked ranked 5th). The Cardinals are having an off year, but that can be expected from any great program. In the last 3 years they’ve gone 12-1 twice (including a BCS bid last year), and have gone to bowls in 9 straight seasons. And even though they’re struggling this year, they could still blow up on any defense in the country. The Mountaineers have bumped back up to 7th in the BCS standings and 6th in the AP poll. After a loss to the then red hot South Florida Bulls, they have been rolling teams. How can they not be mentioned as one of the one loss title, national title contenders? Pat White, Steve Slaton, Darious Reynaud and company are rolling. Who can stop them? How about two straight, 11 win seasons and bowl victories over Georgia and Georgia Tech the past two seasons? Where is the respect?
The up-and-comers’ list includes Cincinnati, South Florida, Connecticut and Rutgers. Cincy and UConn have showed they can play football as well as basketball this year, sporting 7-1 and 8-1 records respectively, good enough to earn UConn the 13th spot in the BCS, while Cincy continues to get screwed by the pollsters. Typical anti-Big East bias. South Florida was on a tear to start the season, beating Auburn and West Virgina early. The Big East schedule is so tough, however, that they dropped 3 straight conference games (still undefeated outside the conference). If they were in a lesser conference like the ACC, Big Ten or Big 12, they would probably be sitting in the top 5 right now. Then you have Rutgers, the team with possibly the most upside. Coach Greg Schiano is now tapping into not only the wealth high school football of talent in New Jersey, but also using his Florida (he was the coordinator at The U for 2 years.) connections to recruit in the Sunshine state. The roster, which reads like a New Jersey all-star team, also includes 17 players from the state of Florida. They might be mediocre this season, but if that talent pipeline stays open and great athletes continue to matriculate to the jewel of the Garden State, the Scarlet Knights will be a force for many years to come.
That leaves us with the rebuilding programs, Pitt and Syracuse. Two programs with great tradition that you know will be strong again real soon. Let’s run down a list of great football players who attended these two schools. How do Jim Brown, Dan Marino, Curtis Martin, Donovan McNabb and Marvin Harrison sound? Either one of these teams could easily destroy Duke, Maryland, Baylor, Iowa State, Minnesota, Northwestern, Washington State, Stanford, Ole Miss or Vandy. Will you look at that! The bottom two Big East teams would blow out any of the other conferences’ bottom two teams. I’m not shocked. Best Conference Top To Bottom. Get it through your skulls.
Now I understand how it’s easy to get confused since the media tends to focus on the old-guard other conferences, so I’m not bitter at you. You’re welcome for exposing you to the Best Conference in the land. Check here and here for more Big East football talk!
–PantherFan22
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