College Football Week One Recap

Week one of college football is in the books, and it looks like it will be an interesting and fun season. We learned a lot this past week -- like Northwestern might be a real contender to challenge Ohio State after their huge win over Stanford. Or how Alabama is looking again to have another strong year under Nick Saban after beating nationally ranked #20 Wisconsin. In this week’s blog, I will give my take on:

•              A team that will disappoint their fan base this year
•              A team that could be on the rise
•             My team’s first game with Jim Harbaugh
•              My College Football Playoff predictions.

Team to Disappoint: Texas

If you are a fan of this team, this year it might be best to take a spin class on Saturdays. Texas suffered a brutal loss to Notre Dame, 38 to 3 on Saturday night. Texas coach Charlie Strong announced on Tuesday that he demoted co-offensive coordinators Joe Wickline and Shawn Watson and named receivers coach Jay Norvell as his new play caller. Now this is unheard of this early in the season to make a coaching change after one week of play. Most programs will wait until late September or early October to make changes if at all. Where there is smoke, there is fire -- and this is too early for a fire, but I’m predicting Texas will win only five games this year.

Team On the Rise: Northwestern

If you are a fan of this team, put some pop-corn in the microwave and keep the couch warm because this will be a great year. Northwestern had a surprising win over Stanford 16-6, with a very tough defense. The big question is in the Big Ten – who can beat Ohio State? Many people say Michigan State has the best chance to beat them, but I’m not so sure. If Northwestern’s defense can slow down the Ohio State offense, that might be the best team to beat Ohio State in the Big Ten Championship Game. Even though Michigan State has a great defense too, they have lost some players in the secondary to the NFL. So Northwestern is my team to do better than most people expected.

My Team: Be Patient

Michigan fans need to be patient. Michigan suffered a close loss to Utah 24-17 which isn’t bad, but our quarterback Jake Rudock threw three interceptions. I believe this year Michigan will still be painful to watch, and they will go 6-7. But fans shouldn’t lose hope. We know we have the right coach in Jim Harbaugh, who led teams like Stanford and the San Francisco 49ers to great success. It might still be a year or two before we are Big Ten championship contenders. It just doesn’t happen overnight.

My Playoff Predictions

Here are my picks for the College Football Playoff. I have Alabama coming out of the SEC filling in the 4 seed. I have TCU out of the Big 12 in the 3 seed, with their quarterback Trevone Boykin who is a predicted Heisman Trophy finalist. With him leading the way, I think they will blow through the Big 12 this season. I have USC as the 2 seed coming out of the Pac 12. Even though Oregon made it to the playoffs last year, I picked USC because Oregon did lose their Heisman Tropy winning quarterback Marcus Mariota. I don’t see them getting to the playoff without him. And even though I made a point on how Ohio State could fall to Northwestern, I still think they will win the Big Ten Championship game. I have Ohio State as my 1 seed, and I think out of all the teams, TCU will win the National Championship. So those are my predictions for this new exciting year of college football. I will be covering that and much more in the weeks to come.