Today’s Recommended Viewing

Some great freakin’ football on tap for today…

11:00 a.m.

• Pitt at Syracuse - Start your day by catching the matchup between two of the very worst coaches in Division I - or whatever it’s called now - today.  Dave Wannstedt vs. Greg Robinson is a battle between two excellent defensive coordinators who are classic examples of people being promoted one level above their competency.  Wannstedt at least knows how to recruit, so he definitely has the talent advantage, but he has shown an ability to lose to any given team on any given Saturday, so nothing is for sure.
• Minnesota at Ohio State - This game is very intriguing.  Minnesota has been playing some representative football this year, and Ohio State has, like Pitt, shown the ability to play down to the level of even Ohio.  This game could be the first major upset of the day.

11:30 a.m.

• Army at Texas A&M - just for grins, flip over to the Versus channel to see if the hapless Aggies can at least phycially compete with Army.  They got pushed around by New Mexico, so that’s actually a legitimate thing to wonder. 

2:30 p.m.

• Arkansas at Texas - Texas should cover the 27.5 point spread in this one.  Arkansas is really, really bad, and Petrino shows the same fire on the sidelines that Fran showed at Aggieland for five years.  This guy would choke on “hoooooooo pig soooooey!”  Not a real good fit.  Kinda like Mackovic at Texas.
• Tennessee at Auburn - it’s always fun to watch Phil Fulmer get his ass whipped, but Auburn probably isn’t capable of doing that, since they play offense like your basic Pop Warner squad.  But they play defense like the ‘78 Steelers, so this will likely be your basice SEC 13-6 yawner unless Tennessee commits about 14 turnovers, which come to think of it, could happen.

6:00

• TCU at Oklahoma - can the Frogs repeat the upset of OU they pulled off several years back?  Not bloody likely, but they play defense well enough to present something of a challenge to OU’s offense, the first such team the Sooners have played this year.  So, if nothing else, this game will be interesting just to see how well the Sooner O moves the ball.

6:45

• Alabama at Georgia - every objective measure says this very young Alabama team is a year away from being able to beat the Bulldogs between the hedges.  But college football is seldom about objective measures.  This could be an upset special.  Or not.

7:00

• Illinois at Penn State - finally, we get to see if Penn State is real or not.  With Ohio State foundering around, someone in the Big 10 needs to step up and take some semblance of control.  This is Joe Pa’s chance to demonstrate he really has something special on his hands.  Of course, if you’re in Texas, you can only see this game if you subscribe to ESPN Gameplan.  Otherwise, you’re stuck with a thrilling matchup between Nebraska and Virginia Tech.  Yay!

It’s going to be one hell of a fun day.