Tuesday, October 09, 2007

No rehash – By now I am sure everyone has dissected the Kentucky/USC game ad nauseum, so I won’t go into great detail … However, the Gamecocks really pulled together a complete effort from all phases of the game against a good opponent and the great thing is – there is still room for improvement … If this team stays true to form by improving on a weekly basis, then that bodes well for all Gamecock fans! … P.S. – It was nice to follow up a huge ESPN game with seemingly no altercations or incidents on what resulted into an open weekend for USC Football – good job guys!

Traffic Part 1 – Awful! … We left Cayce at 3:45 p.m. – 4 hours prior to kickoff – and arrived at our Farmer’s Market parking spot two hours later! … The bumper to bumper traffic from the old Granby neighborhood and through Olympia was pitiful and the Columbia police and S.C. Highway Patrol did nothing to help matters … Also, eliminate trains from crossing these corridors prior to game time.

Traffic Part 2 – It was about as bad after the game as it was prior to the game … We waited until 1 o’clock in the morning before making the five minute trek back to the house and if not for a stroke of luck that a gate was open on Bluff Road to the Williams-Brice Stadium parking lot near the Cockabooses, then we would have had to repeat our two hour drive by going all the way down to I-77 – Bluff Road was packed! … Still, it took us more than a half hour getting home – I don’t know what has changed this year, but it’s not good!

Lofty Rankings – USC is ranked #7 in the country -- are they that good? ... After Saturday, why not? ... You could throw 10-15 teams in a hat and draw to see who is better on that day ... In the Massey Ratings, South Carolina is rated #6 in the country and has faced the nation's 12th toughest schedule ... SEC power ratings by Kenneth Massey: #1 LSU; #6 South Carolina; #12 Auburn; #15 Florida; #17 Kentucky; #20 Miss. State; #32 Tennessee; #34 Georgia; #44 Alabama; #62 Vanderbilt; #84 Arkansas; and #96 Ole Miss.

Gut-Check Saturday – How many of you heard that cliché 100 times on Saturday … Oh well, what a weekend to sit back and watch college football:

  • The LSU/Florida 4th quarter was unbelievable ... Can you rank these teams #1 and #1A? ...
  • UT thrashed Georgia ... Matthew Stafford has cement shoes -- he doesn't need to go swimming anytime soon ... To play quarterback in the SEC you better be able to move at least a little and he can't ... Throw in his erratic arm and that's a recipe for disaster -- which Georgia found out on Saturday in Knoxville ... UGA has now lost six consecutive games vs. SEC East Division foes dating back to last year …
  • Bobby Johnson's Vanderbilt squad is pathetic and Auburn proved that on Saturday (I don't want to hear anymore talk about how good of a coach he is) ...
  • North Carolina beat an awful quarterbacked Miami team (Kyle Wright), but the Tar Heels have a very good placekicker ...
  • Maryland nipped Georgia Tech to send the Clemson faithful into more of a free fall ...
  • llinois upset Wisconsin -- win one for the Zooker ... The Illini have some very promising youngsters in QB Juice Williams and RB Rashard Mendenhall ...
  • Florida State downed N.C. State ... Xavier Lee is an upgrade from Drew Weatherford at QB for the Seminoles, but not good enough to win the ACC ...
  • And, Virginia Tech blew the doors off of Clemson -- I had to adjust the color on my TV set to make sure I was viewing ALL PURPLE uniforms (it looked like a Crayola box had exploded on the screen) ... Was it as bad in person as it was on the television? ... The Tigers are not a good football team right now and haven't been for some number of years despite the upstate "spin" constantly spewed on sports radio talk shows and CU-propaganda websites ... I said before the season that Clemson looked like an 8-4 team this fall ... I'm sticking by that prediction, but don't think the Tigers will reach that number ... I knew the Tech teams (Georgia & Virginia) would beat them and have a pretty good feeling that Maryland (Ralph Friedgen) and South Carolina (Steve Spurrier) will beat them ... Wake Forest (Jim Grobe) might beat Clemson and Duke has a pretty good shot as well ... Heck, Central Michigan might give the Tigers a run for the money in two weeks ... CU is 5-6 since starting 7-1 last year ... The Tigers' last 10 losses are games in which Clemson was favored ... I felt like the hiring of Andrew Powell and Chris Rumph were totally hollow -- I knew both when I worked at USC and though I like those guys, I don't think very much of them as coaches ... David Blackwell seems to still be ticked off for not being named defensive coordinator … Rob Spence has turned into a “Looney Toon” instead of the “Mad Scientist” … According to the Massey Ratings, Clemson is rated 37th in the country has faced the nation's 44th toughest schedule ... Look at these numbers for Tommy Bowden vs. the ACC:

22-7 vs. TAR HEEL STATE
6-1 vs. Duke
6-2 vs.
Wake Forest
5-1 vs.
North Carolina
5-3 vs.
N.C. State
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16-24 vs. THE REST OF THE ACC
4-4 vs. Maryland
3-3 vs.
Virginia
1-1 vs.
Miami
4-5 vs.
Florida State
4-5 vs. Georgia Tech
0-2 vs.
Boston College
0-4 vs. Virginia Tech

Carolina Blues – I hate North Carolina ... I hate N.C. State more, but I hate UNC ... With the Tar Heels you have the folks who think they are the aristocracy of collegiate athletics – with the Wolfpack you just have an enormous amount of rednecks ... I've made football trips with the Gamecocks in 1988 and 1991 to Chapel Hill and I'm looking forward to Coach Spurrier hanging half a hundred on the Blue Bellies this weekend in Chapel Hole ... I watched basically the entire UNC/Miami game and it couldn't have been any easier for North Carolina as the Hurricanes slept-walk through the first half ... Spurrier won't allow his troops to do that on Saturday and the 3:30 start time is perfect ... The Head Ball Coach knows how to play his opponents and the polls and you can bet that an emphasized ground game will be in tune (come on John Hunt, get that OL working) -- I look for South Carolina to play its best game of the year on Saturday! ... Carolina rolls this weekend in Chapel Hill -- SOUTH CAROLINA that is, 41-13 (sucker bet of the week is for the Gamecocks to cover 6.5 points).

Last Trip to UNC - I remember that '91 game at Chapel Hill ... USC had won three straight vs. the Tar Heels and Mack Brown finally got his revenge that season ... Natrone Means was the hero for UNC with a TD and a long run that setup the go ahead score ... Bobby Fuller, an underrated QB for South Carolina, was beat up all day -- I think he was sacked 7-8 times and Tommy Thigpen had a big game ... I remember Art Wilkins called an off tackle play on 4th-and-1 for Rob DeBoer instead of Brandon Bennett that cost USC a lot of momentum ... I believe UNC wound up 7-4 and that began North Carolina's good run in the 1990s.

Nice Praise - SEC schools are 29-4 in non-conference games, the best winning percentage (87.9%) in the country ... The Big 10 is second at 80.6% (29-7) … Lots of praise from Butch Davis to refer to South Carolina's defense as resembling those from his Miami days – "as talented and as fast as anyone I have ever seen."

Smilin’ on the Gamecocks – Remember when Steve Spurrier said that God was smiling on the Gamecocks? … Check out the photos from the gallery - http://public.fotki.com/Kubby/kubbys-world/south-carolina-vs-uk/

M-Soccer – Congrats to the Gamecocks men's soccer team who downed Florida International 3-1 on Sunday in Miami ... The win was the fourth straight for #25 USC and improves South Carolina to 8-3 on the year.

Cubs Crushed – My beloved Cubs bowed out of the NLDS unceremoniously Saturday afternoon ... Batting .194 as a team will do that to you! ... I have zero interest in the NLCS between Arizona and Colorado -- yuck!