The betting favorites for the four playoff spots center around five teams. Florida State and Alabama are considered virtual locks. Oregon, Auburn and Oklahoma are all priced reasonably comparably for the final two spots before the dropoff in the odds begins.
When we heard the phrase “Group of Five” in conjunction with college football, that natural tendency is to think of the five power conferences. But there’s another Group of Five at the reverse end of the college football spectrum. Conference USA, the American, the MAC, Mountain West and Sun Belt all represent the college football midmajors. We’re going to target the nine teams from these leagues mostly likely to have national impact.
Whether the head coach’s fifth year will produce the proud program’s first major bowl win since 1993 and its first national title since 1988 will require a lot to go right, but Notre Dame continues to appear moving on an upward trajectory.
Northern Illinois has become a favorite of mine over the last few years. I can’t claim “real fan” status because I wasn’t rooting for them during the down years. But I live just a couple hours north of DeKalb, made it down for their final home game a year ago (in freezing weather) and have come to thoroughly enjoy following the Mid-American Conference in general, and NIU in particular.
Brian Kelly finally woke up the echoes in South Bend, as Notre Dame football became relevant on the national stage for the first time since the departure of Lou Holtz following the 1996 season. The Irish went 12-0 in the regular season, won a big statement game at Oklahoma and reached the BCS National Championship Game.
The college football season starts Thursday night. TheSportsNotebook has completed all previews of the major conferences, as well as the mid-majors. We’ll have a final preseason extravaganza on Wednesday, with national championship picks and projections of major bowl matchups. Today we’re going to warm up by reviewing the top 11 teams. I’ve chosen the number eleven for three reasons—I have to make a superficial effort to be different from everyone else, the number has obvious relevance to football, and most importantly it’s my tribute to Oceans 11, both the original Sinatra movie and the Clooney/Pitt/Damon/Garcia remake, a name I also use for my Fantasy Football league teams. With that out of the way, TheSportsNotebook runs through the top 11 teams in the country…
Big 12 football is sporting a new look this fall, as Missouri and Texas A&M have left for the SEC and the conference welcomes in West Virginia & TCU. Add that to the departures of Nebraska and Colorado prior to last season and this is not your father’s Big 12. Well, actually since the league has only existed since 1996 maybe we should say it’s not your older brother’s Big 12. Whatever it is, it’s a league trying to survive as a power league in an era of change and TheSportsNotebook previews the 2012 race…
Big Ten football is suffering from a public relations problem right now. The on-field performance hasn’t been up to snuff for several years now, between close Rose Bowl losses and utter debacles in the majority of the minor bowl matchups against the SEC. Then there have been the off-field scandals at Ohio State and Penn State that effectively gutted the division race on one side of the conference. But if nothing else, the conference has a chance to fix its on-field perception this year, with most teams returning key players on the defensive front and most quarterback situations looking stable. TheSportsNotebook breaks down how the conference race is likely to shake out.
Conference USA is always good for an interesting conference race, and so long as you don’t place too high a value on defense and tackling, the individual games can be as interesting and wide-open as the league race itself. Today TheSportsNotebook previews both C-USA, along with three independents who operate on a similar level within FBS, those being BYU, Navy & Army.
The MAC and Sun Belt may occupy different geographic milieus in the world of college football, but they come together in the postseason. Surely you set aside time to watch the fabled GoDaddy.com Bowl, which features the champions of each league in early January. Even though both conferences are at the bottom of FBS college football, the league races are exciting and MAC football gets TV coverage with their Tuesday and Wednesday ESPN dates. TheSportsNotebook offers a concise summary of both the MAC & Sun Belt as we stand seventeen days from the first college football game of the season…
If there’s two entities that get more play than they should in the college football media it’s the University of Notre Dame and the Big East Conference. The two are connected in more ways than hype (in the case of Notre Dame) and a guaranteed major bowl slit (in the case of the Big East). ND not only plays basketball and other sports in the Big East, it’s a part of that conference’s chain of command when it comes to lining up postseason bowl slots. So TheSportsNotebook ties the two of them together as we continue our preview of the 2012 college football season.