Not so Merry-Land

Tummystix and OS are in College Park calling yours truly with updates. For the pregame post the bastards would like to report the following. The MD student section is clad in black shirts and referring to it as a "black out". We Bastards find that to be decidedly racist. They have also chosen to show their sportsmanship by chanting "Fuck you Slaton" throughout warmups.

On the lighter side of things... OS has botched several good kodak moments. One by refusing to stop eating a sausage while two feet away from the Flutie. And another good Erin Andrews pic because he is generally boner-ass in most respects. I only hope he is wearing his Wes Ours edition bright white sneaks and a tiny hat from Sheetz.

More news to follow as I hear it. For now I will retire to ESPN, and say Lets Go Mountaineers!

Around the Conference Week 3

The Big East is currently sitting at 14 wins and Syracuse for the year. This week marks another step up in competition for the conference as a whole except for Rutgers who continues the march of the cupcakes. Last week included wins over Auburn and Oregon State for the conference and more BCS teams are on slate this week starting with Maryland on Thursday vs. WVU. The rest of the conference is as follows:

Saturday UConn continues their brutal non-conference schedule, in basketball as the Huskies take on Temple. UConn has wins over Duke and Maine in the previous weeks while Temple has lost to Navy and then were beaten 42-7 last week by Buffalo. After two games Temple has 38 yards rushing (ranked 116 in the nation) on 50 carries and has thrown 4 interceptions. The Owls are giving up 292.5 rushing yards per game. Leading UConn rusher Donald Brown II is so excited he may need a few sixers to call down.

Pitt steps up the competition level this week with a trip to Michigan State. In the first week the Panthers lost QB Bill Stull during a win over Eastern Michigan and last week the Pantehers lost DT Gus Mustakas for the season with an ACL tear versus Grambling State. Pitt may be a few weeks away from asking fans to play, which would mean a lot of yellow seats on the field. Michigan State has wins over UAB and Bowling Green to start the season. Sparty is led through the air by Brian Hoyer with 451 passing yards and on the ground by tandem Javon Ringer and Jehuu Caulcrick each with around 150 yards.

Syracuse takes the freak show on the road again this week with a tilt at Illinois. The Orange have been outscored 77-12 in losses to Washington and Iowa (neither of which are ranked). Some numbers. The Cuse are 117 in rushing offense, 106 in passing offense, and 118 in scoring offense. Nice. They are also getting outgained by an average of 155 yards to 426 yards. Illinois is 1-1 with a win over Western Illinois and a loss to Missouri. This game will be extremely orange, but only one team will look like they are on their way to a rollerball final with an S on their helmet you can see from space.

Cincinnati is coming off of a big win over Oregon State in which they held the Beavers to 3 points and only 36 rushing yards. This week the Bearcats face Miami (OH). The Redhawks have a win over Ball State and a loss to Minnesota. Leading rusher Brandon Murphy is averaging 6.5 yards per carry which should be going down this week. The game will be the first non-Thursday game for Cinci all year and could be a problem for the all-black uni's in daylight.

Rutgers continues to play name that team with a game versus Norfolk State this weekend. Rutgers has wins over Buffalo, Navy, and a high school journalism group trying to sell magazines door-to-door. Norfolk State ran up almost 500 yards of offense in their only game vs. Virginia State with 44 passes and 49 rushing attempts. On Saturday they may be attempting 45 punts. Ray Rice already has 62 carries in two blowout wins. Ray's mother is busy filing an injunction before the conference games start and he carries the ball 75 times a game.

The final game of the week (USF has the week off to participate in victory orgies rest after the win over Auburn, except for kicker Delbert Alvarado, he gets no poon is going to keep practicing) matches Louisville at Kentucky. Last year Louiville edged the Wildcats 59-28 and lost Michael Bush for the season. This season should put a hurt on the scoreboard as Kentucky has Andre' Woodson matching Brain Brohm pass for pass and Rafael Little and Tony Dixon to run with Anthony Allen and George Stripling of the Cards. So far Louiville has scored 131 points to Kentucky's 106. Louisville is averaging almost 700 yards a game while Kentucky is averaging a more sane, but still impressive 526 yards. Vegas has tried to calculate an over for the game but so far this has killed four oddsmakers.

Game Week--Maryland

First some WVU stats. WVU currently has the 2nd rushing offense in the nation and 4th highest scoring offense. Defensively WVU is 49th in total defense, 28th against the run, and 94th versus the pass. Both Slaton and White are in the top 30 for rushing in the country and White is 25th in total offense. Darius Reynaud has 14 catches for 226 yards and 2 touchdowns to rank 12th nationally and 3rd in the Big East. Reed Williams leads the Mountaineers with 3 solo and 20 assisted tackles, Mortty Ivy is tied for second with 6 solo and 9 assisted with Marc Magro (3 solo/12 assisted). Johnny Dingle has a solo sack and three assisted sacks to lead WVU with Mortty Ivy at 2 total apiece.

This week marks the final game between WVU and Maryland for at least 2 years and possibly longer. WVU travels to College Park for a Thursday game on ESPN at 7:30. Two of the Bastards will also be making the trip and I haven't been this excited since the announcement of Tron 2 because the first left so many unanswered questions. During my last trip to College Park I was able to watch the team walk to the stadium through the campus which is pretty cool and WVU would do it but it would mean walking through Sunnyside and losing players to fire, famine, Mutts, and all other sorts of ailments along the way. As the Terps reached the stadium and started the walk to the locker room the band played the fight song and everyone cheered, except for the equipment guys. Those poor bastards had to remove all the heavy AV equipment from one of the carts so that Fridge could ride down the hill to the lockerroom. I guess the previous attempts at rolling him were unsuccessful and putting him on a runaway sled would endanger too much life, even in College Park. The poor cart looked like the car at the beginning of the Flintstones when Fred orders the ribs. So as a tradition it is kind of a mixed bag since it is really the walk/ride/try not to flip over.

On to the teams. Maryland went 9-4 last year with almost every game played within a score or two no matter the opponent. That is except WVU. The Mountaineers jumped out to a 28-0 lead behind the running of Slaton, mistakes of the Terps, and smell of the guy next to Wolf. WVU then cruised to a 45-24 win to take a commanding series lead over Maryland 22-21-2. In that game Slaton ran for 195 yards and White only attempted 9 passes. For the Terps Sam Hollenbach was 24 for 45 for 211 yards with 2 touchdowns and 2 interceptions. Maryland ran for 122 yards on 33 carries. The Maryland receivers were lead by Joey Haynos with 8 catches followed by Darrius Heyward-Bey with 5 catches. On the sidelines Keon Lattimore yelled at teammates, coaches, and fans on his way to making sure everyone knew he was related to Ray Lewis.

This year the Terrapins have started 2-0 with wins over Villanova and Florida International. Jordan Steffy has assumed the starting job and completed over 75% of his passes for over 300 yards in two games, but has yet to throw for a touchdown. Steffy was supposed to battle with Josh Portis for the starting job, but Portis decided to instead fight a losing battle with academic integrity. On the ground the Terps are running with Keon Lattimore and Lance Ball. Lattimore has over 200 yards and averages 5.7 ypc with 5 touchdowns with Ball has just under 100 yards thusfar. The big play guy is Heyward-Bey. He already has 10 catches for 129 yards. As a team Maryland is averaging 28.5 points per game and around 350 yards with passing and running being almost identical in yardage. On defense the Terps are giving up 175 yards per game and under 50 yards rushing and only allowing 12 points. The defense is led by Erin Henderson in a never ending family of Hendersons playing linebacker at UMD with 8 tackles and 13 assists and DB Christian Varner with 5 solo and 6 assists and corner Kevin Barnes with 2 interceptions.

The weather for Thursday is calling for mostly sunny with highs around 80 and lows around 63. There is a 0% chance of precipitation and a 100% chance of me calling Fridge a fatass.

WVU-Marshall Highlights (There's even a screen pass. Yah!)

Some initial observations before I get to watch the replay and try to break it down a little better: The downfield blocking seemed pretty piss poor, the defense was asleep most of the game, Marshall's second TD was an illegal forward pass as the QB had crossed the line of scrimmage, and Wicks had a bad game. Here's to working out all these problems before we start playing tougher games.

Round of Reubens

JT Thomas and Ellis Lankster were each granted continuances for their felony preliminary hearings yesterday. The postponement in the legal process likely means that JT and Ellis have little chance of getting back on the field this year.

That process was prolonged today, when their lawyers telephoned the magistrate's court to seek a postponement. The hearings will be rescheduled later, though the court's busy schedule means that they couldn't receive a new hearing until Sept. 24 at the earliest and that the postponement could take as long as another month.

Speaking of the defense, it appears as though the short week is coming at a bad time for Keilen Dykes according to msn as Kykes has sprained his foot and is currently day to day.

Keilen actually went into the game with a little bit of a foot sprain and he played through the first half with it but I think it got worse for him,” Rodriguez said. “We X-rayed it and it’s not broke. He needs to get some treatment on it and we’ll see how it holds up.

The loss of Dykes would leave the Mountaineers with Johnny Dingle, RS Freshman Scooter Berry, 235 pound Thor Merrow, and Doug Slavonic as the only D-linemen with real experience against the Terps run game.

The football Mountaineers are currently sitting at number 4 in both polls after the weekend. Oklahoma has moved past WVU in the AP while Florida is ahead of the Mountaineers in the coaches poll. Although the coaches poll has Auburn receiving more votes than South Florida and has Miami still receiving votes after their performance against Oklahoma. In order to impress the voters the Mountaineers need to be more consistent on offense, including not abandoning the run for the pass in the first half, start covering punts and kick returns or kick everything out of bounds, and probably blow up the defense.

If anyone watched Oregon run the same basic sets as WVU they probably started weeping. Oregon was able to stretch Michigan horizontally AND vertically by running inside and out and throwing the ball short, intermediate, and long. In addition, Oregon seemed to have a playbook about 1,000 pages longer than that of WVU as the Ducks would use every play to set up a counter on the next play. Oregon even ran a fake statue of liberty after running a statue of liberty. WVU ran a screen pass and then another screen pass. I keep hearing about all the plays WVU has and saves, but why practice and then not use these plays ever? And finally, if anyone has faith in the 3-3-5 please defend it in the comments. The Mountaineers haven't been able to blitz out of this defense since Lorello left two years ago. If linebacker position is so deep then why not switch to a 3-4? I'm not sure I can take to many more games of making average quarterbacks look like all-Americans.

Finally, in futbol news both WVU teams are playing well. The men are ranked number 15 in the latest poll and dropped Duquesne 1-0 yesterday in the home opener to improve to 3-1 on the season with a game versus number 2 Duke on Saturday. the 18th ranked women beat number 15 Penn State over the weekend to improve to 3-1 as well. The women will play the number 2 ranked Texas A&M Aggies on Friday in College Station. The best part of a soccer game is that the crowds are small enough for individual taunting. A quick story related to me from my Australian friend about the taunting. WVU beat MD 1-0 last week. During the game the MD crowd was taunting a New Zealander on WVU's team. The taunt was basically, "Hey Cunningham you sheep-fucker, I'm going to name my first born after you and then beat the shit out of him everyday." This caused Cunningham to laugh, then break out into a song.

Welcome to the Asylum

"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results." - credited to Albert Einstein, et al.

Saturday, the Bastard Institute of Psychiatry had the misfortune of conducting two clinical reviews of individuals suspected of psychosis or other similar mental disorders. The first review began at 11:00 a.m. and was conducted in Huntington, WV. It can be read below. The second review will be posted later.


Subject: Rich Rodriguez.

Time: 11:00

Place: Huntington, WV.

Subject is the coach of a Division 1 college football team entering the game ranked #3 in the nation to face the Marshall Thundering Herd. Marshall has been deemed by most scholarly articles as a "shitty school with a worse football team". ("Shaturday Matshupsh", Holth, 9th ed. 2007). Consequently, WVU entered the game as a heavy favorite.

Prior findings: Widely recognized as an "offensive genius". However, during the Subject's first few years as head coach of the West Virginia Mountaineers, he frequently called a halfback off tackle play. While it would occasionally work as designed, the play was called, in most experts' opinions, way too frequently to the point that many fans were left scratching their head in disbelief.

Background: The WVU defense is playing particularly underwhelming this morning. The defense has been colloquially referred to as "sleep walking" though the game. Consequently, Marshall is hanging with and at a few points leading the heavily favored Mountaineers.

Observations: Throughout the first half, the Subject continually refuses to place the ball in the hands of his playmakers, Steve Slaton and Patrick White. Instead, the Subject repetitively calls a play described to this reviewer as a "screen pass". Repeatedly, the "screen pass" fails miserably resulting in either no or insignificant positive gain. However, despite the continued failures of this play, the Subject returns time and again to this same play. Of note, Steve Slaton carried the ball only five times in the first half. A WVU fan sitting near this clinician described the Subject's behavior as "fucking retarded" to which I corrected, "fucking insane".

In contrast, the Subject called for two downfield passes during the first half. The first of which resulted in a large downfield gain and the second of which would have resulted in a large downfield gain but was unfortunately dropped by the intended receiver. It was explained to this clinician that occasionally attempting this plays would stretch the field vertically, but the Subject did not again attempt this play for the remainder of the game.

Fortunately, the Subject's psychosis appeared temporary in nature. Following a brief recess after the second quarter, the Subject's play calling returned to relative normality. Steve Slaton carried the ball 19 times in the second half for 144 yards. Patrick White contributed 125 and some guy, Noel Devine, or something like that, pitched in 76. The Mountaineers scored 42 points in the second half compared to only 6 in the first 30 minutes and go on to win 48-23.

Additionally, the WVU defense apparently woke up during halftime and put forth a much better effort holding Marshall to 10 points in the second.

Analysis: During the first half, the Subject displayed behavior reminiscent of his first few years as the Mountaineer's head coach, to wit: calling the same play over and over again despite its less than stellar results. At this point, the behavior is merely annoying and frustrating to the fans. However, this clinician is very concerned that if this behavior manifests during some of WVU's more competitive matchups, the results may be significantly more severe.

Diagnosis: General manic taurocapition (bullheadedness) created by the Subject's perception that "it'll work god damn it, do it again!". However, further study is recommended to rule out any more serious mental conditions such as general insanity.

"One man's insanity is another man's genius..." - uncredited.

Friends of Coal Bowl Weekend

One of we bastards was in attendance Saturday as the Mounties showed up in the second half to give it to the Thundering Herd. More pics and stories will come this week as they are processed and polished. For now, I offer this pic of Bastards faithful Kaptian Judy with Mountaineer legend Don Nehlen as we attended the Friends of Coal banquet Friday night at the Pullman Plaza. Other notable attendees included President Garrison, Bob Pruett, BSR, Marshall's President (I forget his name and don't care to look it up.) and the Big D with Carebear in tow. Not pictured here is the K-dogg.

"Now sometimes you want to mix it up. Maybe go off left tackle on 2nd and 9- then off the right on 3rd and 7. You always want to keep them guessing." - What I am sure Nehlen is saying here.

Weekend Watching

There are some games played by teams outside of Morgantown and and even outside of the Big East. The following is a preview of some of those games so that you can impress your friends or if that isn't an option you can impress your collection of stuffed animals and posters while watching football this weekend.

VT v. LSU--Both teams will lean heavily on their defense and special teams. ABC will lean heavily on sideline reporters telling stories that have nothing to do with the game in an attempt to make both of these football teams somehow related to a school shooting and a hurricane. Fun fact for this game to cheer everyone up after the 4,000th report on death during the Tragedy Bowl, if you hit Frank Beamer's neck with a broom candy comes out. LSU had 6 interceptions in game one while VT was only able to get 33 yards on 31 carries forcing Sean Glennon to throw 33 times. If Glennon throws over 25 times in this game VT has no chance.

Boise State v. Washington--Boise State ran by Weber State 56-7 in week 1. Ian Johnson and Jeremy Avery both had over 100 yards rushing for the Broncos while Taylor Tharp added 184 yards in the air. Washington pummeled Syracuse 42-12 behind 302 rushing yards. The Huskies rely on first year starter Jake Locker for both rushing (83 yards) and passing (142 yards). Fun fact for this game. While reporters have focused on the death threats received by Ian Johnson for his wedding to a Boise State cheerleader, no one mentions that he MARRIED A HOT CHEERLEADER. How many people would take a nasty letter or two if someone would let them hit that, show of hands people.

Nebraska v. Wake Forest--The 'Huskers dispatched the Pistol offense of Nevada last week with 233 yards rushing from Marlon Lucky. WF lost to BC to start the season and gave up 462 yards but only 54 on the ground. Fun fact for this game. Bill Callahan hates you.

ND v. Penn State--This game will be on tv because of the mandate that ND be on tv every week. Florida International took a 59-0 beating from Penn State last week in a game in which Penn State had 549 yards of offense including 313 passing yards. ND lost to GT 33-3 and had -8 yards rushing for the game. Jimmy Clausen did pass for 34 yards so he is the new starter. Fun fact. Charlie Wise is fat and Joe Paterno is old. It's a ready made sitcom.

Miami v. Oklahoma--Oklahoma beat North Texas 79-10 showing the compassion that has made Bob Stoops famous. The Sooners racked up 674 yards of total offense. Miami held Marshall to three points and 234 yards of offense. Miami was only able to pass for 81 yards and must be more effective in the air to stay up with the Visor II in Norman. Fun fact for this game. Boomer Sooner is the fight song for OU. The song ending chant was stolen from UNC's fight song. Oklahoma was only able to come up with three words of their own. Bill Callahan was right.

TCU v. Texas--The other matchup of two top 25 teams that is getting no publicity because Texas had a shooting like 40 years ago and TCU wasn't effected by Katrina. Texas struggled to a 21-13 win over Arkansas State in week 1. Texas was held to under 350 yards of total offense and gave up close to 400 yards. TCU beat Baylor 27-0 and held the Bears to under 300 yards of total offense. The Horned Frogs were led by 205 passing yards from QB Andy Dalton. This game could be another defensive struggle, but without all the crying of LSU-VT. Fun fact for this game. Mack Brown is actually white.

Round of Reubens

Bad news for next week's opponent. Back-up/potential future first string Maryland QB, Josh Portis, got suspended for cheating. Some have suggested the punishment was too harsh, but we Bastards have uncovered that not only did Portis cheat on a quiz, he also stole some leftovers from Friedgen's personal fridge. A lesser player would not have survived such a transgression.

In Tuesday’s Baltimore Sun, Heather Dinich reported that Brandon Bullock, who now attends East Carolina, said that Portis cheated by looking on his paper during a quiz in American Studies 212 (Diversity in America) during the spring semester. Portis refused comment on Dinich’s article, which went into a few other details. Bullock, who is from Bel Air, told Dinich that he got a note back after that quiz to see the instructor who brought up academic dishonesty while showing him copies of his quiz and another quiz with the name covered up and the answers to the quiz were similar including one question that they were identical “word for word.” Portis reportedly sat behind Bullock and to the left. Bullock also told Dinich that Portis approached him later and asked him to say that there answers were so similar because they had studied together.

Speaking of Maryland, tummysticks and I will be in hostile territory next week thanks to some much appreciated generosity. We're packing extra sammies in case we cross paths with a wheezing, photon lensing mass of a football coach. Maybe we'll run into Steve Danneman and I can convince him to bet on Maryland again while tummysticks bums beer from Gavin Smith.

In other news, based upon Notre Dame's success last week not really picking a quarterback before its matchup with Georgia Tech, Pitt head coach Dave Wannstache has decided not to pick a starting quarterback for this weekend's matchup with Grambling. Wannstache will instead wait until kickoff to choose his starter by following his magical dowsing mustachio.

Finally, Cincinatti dutifully represented the Big East earlier this evening by easily defeating Oregon State 34-3. While Oregon State's performance was magnitudes worse than during its defeat of USC last year, the credit goes to an aggressive and hard hitting Bearcat defense. The Big East is now 9-1 in interconference play to start the season.

Dynasty Saving Halftime Difficulty Level Adjustment (a/k/a the damn game cheats on Heisman level)

Steve Fraggle Rock Kragthorpe enjoyed his first taste of EA's NCAA 2008 by pummeling the opponent, Murray St., 73-10. He scored on every possession. So coming into this week's game he thought, hey, maybe I should up the difficulty level.

Sitting down before his PS3 and selecting another relatively easy opponent, Middle Tennessee, he slides the difficulty level up to Heisman. Might as well give it a try, he thinks. But I think someone needs a little more practice with the hit stick.

At the half, it is somewhat ugly. Kragthrope is winning, sure, but the stats exemplify the uphill battle he is facing. The Blue Raiders have amassed 322 yards and 35 points. But thanks to a fumbled kick return providing an extra possession, Louisville has the lead at the half 38-35. Looking slowly around him and finding no one paying attention, Kragthorpe opens the settings panel and slides that difficulty back down to "All-American".

The adjustment proves the difference as Louisville holds on to win 58-42. The teams combined for 1,284 yards. Brohm continues a decent Colt Brennan impression (minus the alleged dorm room rape assignment misunderstanding) by throwing 25/39 for 401 yards and 4 touchdowns. More impressively, Anthony Allen rushed 35 times for 275 yards and 2 touchdowns.

Depending upon your perspective (for instance, from our perspective), there was some good news as Mario Urrutia, despite a team leading 7 catches for 142 yards and two touchdowns, looked sloppy dropping a few key passes including one in the end zone. Additionally, Louisville's rush defense looked as solid as our pass defense. Middle Tennessee rushed for 265 yards on 29 carries. Furthermore, Louisville liked to mix it up on pass defense with the very confusing "don't cover the wide out" formation.

The single game record for combined total yardage was set in 2001. In a matchup between San Jose State and Nevada, the teams combined for 1,640 yards (pdf). I expect that record to be challenged on November 8th. If you haven't already taken the over on the WVU-LU matchup, get your money in and tease it up to 300.

If you missed the game, be sure to catch LSU-VT and imagine the exact opposite of what you're watching. Speaking of VT, I want to thank the WWL for making it easy to hate the Hokies again. After the tragedy, there was... uh... admittedly... maybe a little... um.. empathy. But after hearing "its an emotional weekend in Blacksburg" 3,405 times last weekend, its back to hate. Strike Zones and End Zones speculates upon what they have in store for this weekend.

Around the Conference Weak Week 2

The Big East started off 7-1 as a conference last week with the only L coming in the Carrier Dome as Syracuse continued to hurt the eyes of viewers with both playing ability and uniform design. The biggest marquee win for the conference was probably WVU beating Western Michigan as they are the only one of the losing teams that may see a bowl this year. The rest of the victims were Buffalo, Southeast Missiouri State, Murray State, Duke, Eastern Michigan, and Elon. Not a lot of star power there. That trend continues in week two.

Louisville kicks off the week with a game tonight versus Middle Tennessee. Middle Tennessee opened the season with a hard fought 27-14 loss to FAU which is a school and not a fraternity. The loss drops Middle Tennesse to the bottom of the Sun Belt Conference, but the Blue Raiders never stay down for long. Although if they are going to keep it interesting they may want to average more than 1.5 yards per carry for their leading rusher versus Louisville as that is what DeMarco McNair had versus FAU.

Also playing tonight is Cincinnati versus Oregon State. Cincinnatti pummeled SE Mo State last week 59-3 and this week face a I-A team. For the Bearcats Butler Benton had over 100 yards rushing and Jacob Ramsey added 76 yards and 2 tds. Ben Mauk threw for 244 yards and 2 touchdowns last week. Oregon State opened up with a victory over Utah. The Beavers attempted a very un-Pac 10 like 19 passes in that game while Yvenson Bernard (must be from Sweden) carried the ball 29 times for 165 yards and caught 4 of the 8 passes completed. Cinci may want to keep an eye on him.

Friday night Rutgers will be the construction workers as they host the Navy. Ray Rice had 184 yards and 3 touchdowns versus Buffalo last week and Tiquan Underwood had 10 catches for 248 yards. That is a career game for Underwood unless you count NCAA Football stats when he uses himself. Navy beat Temple 30-19 behind 361 rushing yards. Kaipo-Noa Kaheaku-Enhada is the quarterback whose name will be butchered all night, but not on passing downs as he only threw the ball 7 times against Temple.

After WVU-Marshall there are still plenty of Big East games on Saturday. Pittsburgh continues to try to save the 'stache by scheduling lightly. Last week Pitt beat Eastern Michigan, but lost bill Stull to a thumb injury. BTW Michigan had a rough week as a state in football. Michigan, Western Michigan, Eastern Michigan, and Central Michigan all lost. Michigan State did win to keep the state from going hockey only. This week the Panthers take on Grambling State. Grambling State beat Alcorn State last week behind 303 yards passing from Brandon Landers and 143 yards rushing from Frank Warren. The Tigers will have problems with depth during the game, but not with their band as they should have plenty of room to roam around an empty Hines Field.

UConn showed that they would not be a doormat in the ACC with a 45-14 spanking of Duke last week. Now they are going to show that they could still win some I-AA games as they take on Maine. Last week the Huskies got a big game from Tyler Lorenzen as he threw for 298 yards and 2 touchdowns while Donald Brown II ran for 99. As for the Black Bears they rushed for 278 yards and passed for 64 yards in a 21-14 victory over Monmouth.

Syracuse continues the Greg Robinson farewell tour with a stop in Iowa this week. the 'Cuse got beat 42-14 last week in a game that wasn't as close as the score showed. They may have quit for the season earlier than any other team in history. Washington rushed for 302 yards and threw for 142 with a quarterback making his first start. As a team the Orange rushed for 8 yards. Good God. Iowa slipped by Northern Illinois 16-3 last week behind 250 yards rushing which is almost 32 times as many yards as the Orange managed. The Hawkeyes also held NIU to 21 yards rushing on 21 carries and forced three interceptions. This one could be ugly; orange, yellow, black, blue and Syracuse offense. Don't drink or eat anything 1 hour before watching.

And finally the week wraps up with an actual big game. South Florida travels to Auburn Saturday night. The memo Rutgers sent about how to win 10 games by scheduling must have arrived too late for USF. South Florida is coming off of a 28-13 win over Elon. Freshman Mike Ford had 83 yards and two touchdowns on only 6 carries for the Bulls while Matt Grothe attempted 39 passes and completed 23 or 238 yards. Auburn looked ugly against Kansas State for most of the game, but scored the last 17 points of the game to win 23-13. Protecting Brandon Cox as Cox got beat around all night and not just at Vice Versa. The Tigers held Kansas State to 316 total yards and forced 3 turnovers in the win but managed just 291 yards themselves.

Game Week--Marshall

I was watching a replay of the WVU-WMU game last night and at the beginning of the 4th quarter Joe Manchin joined the booth. At one point the conversation turned to the WVU-Marshall game and Manchin spent the next five minutes blabbering about how great it was for the schools and the state. His rational was all the money that the game would make for Huntington and for the schools. According to this article Manchin is at best short cited and at worst an idiot as both WVU and Marshall will get shafted out of the normal t.v. money. And going by his "Open for Business" slogan idea, which is now being recalled but will take $50,000 to replace, I'd go with the latter.

Now onto the preview on the field. WVU travels to Huntington for the first time in nearly 100 years as it took them that long to get the smell out of their clothes since the last visit. Last year the number 5 ranked Mountaineers jumped out to a 21-0 lead before beating Marshall 42-10. In the game WVU amassed 485 yards with 312 on the ground. Steve Slaton rushed for 203 yards and White added 48 while passing for 168 and two touchdowns. Marshall was led on the ground by Ahmad Bradshaw with 70 yards on 18 carries. Bernard Morris completed 12/22 passes for 168 yards. Gone from last years Herdies is Ahmad Bradshaw on offense and Albert McClellan on defense. Bradshaw took his Playstation 2 and 1500 yards rushing into the NFL draft and where he was a first round first day selection of the NY Giants while the CUSA Defensive Player of the Year tore his ACL when a pack of wild teenagers fled a showing of We Are Marshall he was attending. Replacing Bradshaw at tailback will be Chubb Small whom I assume according to his name has left a fledling career either in porn or as a male Marshall cheerleader to handle the load (haha) at tailback and has started off strong with 4 carries for minus 2 yards against Miami. In that game the leading rusher other than Morris was Darius Marshall with 16 yards. It appears as though Marshall has no ground game. Despite the lack of ground game and the fact that Center Doup Legursky is best known as the guy that the infamous WVU "spy" labelled as fat, he is up for the Rimington Award. The receivers are the stars on offense for the Herd. TE Cody Slate could have a big day against WVU linebackers in man coverage and Darius Passemore and Marcus Fitzgerald are talented wideouts. Unfortunately they have Morris throwing them the ball. He did manage to throw for 162 yards against Miami but had 3 interceptions in the game. The defense has brought in veteran Steve Dunlap as the coordinator. In his first game the defense gave up 251 yards rushing to Miami. Not a good sign. Remember to set the alarm clocks because this game kicks off at 11 a.m. and should be well in hand by the third snooze alarm.

Just a reminder...

We all missed it... I brought it back. GMO Thursday Morning.

Coach Rod's Tuesday afternoon press conference

It was pretty lame. The biggest news coming out of the press conference was that Jarrett Brown sweats worse than BSR on a whiskey night. And for those of you who don't know, the amount BSR sweats on a given night at the bars could water a good sized farm for a year.

Rodriguez also noted he is hoping he can get by without playing Gadowski or Barclay all season so that he can redshirt them.

RR also said Marshall isn't a rival because they suck we haven't played frequently enough.

Its over at metronews if you want to waste 30 minutes of your life and crash your web browser like I did.

Johnny's Tribute to Michigan

See mainstream media, not all of us merely live in our parents' basement thinking of clever ways to bash the world wide leader. Some of us live in our parent's basement thinking of clever ways to bash the WWL and write songs. For instance, aspiring Bastard Johnny from the Mountainlair put together a little tribute to Michigan's cake walk over close victory against poop-in-the-pants against Appy State this past weekend.



But let's not be too hard on Michigan. We've all been there. Just ate 6 tacos and a beef and bean burrito at 2 a.m. from Taco Bell. Its a 20 minute drive home and, by god, what's that rumbling? Oh God... I'm not going to make it...

Position Reports: Offensive Line

I didn't feel qualified after the game Saturday to post a report because, well, between the booze and 3 very well placed mini-skirt clad 18 year old asses (Please God, let them be 18), I didn't see the game very well. However, I finally caught the abbreviated replay last night on the local Fox affiliate and well, I'm still not very qualified. Those abbreviate replays are pretty sweet if you just want to re-live the best parts of the game. But I was interested in the play of our O-line and our defense, as those are the groups with the biggest question marks. Unfortunately, "abbreviated" meant showing only the positive gains on offense and briefly mentioning the fact that Western Michigan had the ball a few times. However, I was able to take a good look at the offensive line.

From what I was able to see, we were pretty solid at center, left guard and right tackle. Mike Dent, center, looked to be filling the big shoes of Dan Mozes relatively well. I didn't see any missed assignments. Additionally, Dent would occasionally pancake the first guy and get down field to lay a second block. That's good to see. I also didn't notice any missed assignments or blocks from the aforementioned left guard and right tackle.

However, I frequently spotted problems at left tackle and right guard. The right guard position looked like it was being played by a committee. Unfortunately, no matter who was there, they were getting blown up off the ball often driven several yards into the backfield. Most of the time, this resulted in pile ups or congestion in the backfield preventing Slaton or White from getting into the open field. Similarly, at the left tackle position, there appeared to be some confusion and missed assignments.

I'm not going to call any guys out by name here, yet, because it was the first game of the season (and I couldn't really see the numbers that well thanks to my GF's 12" black and white television). I will say that most of the blown plays appeared to be by redshirt freshman and underclassman. For a lot of these guys, it was their first start and/or most playing time, so I can understand a little confusion and I certainly expect their level of play to improve over the year.

However, confusion caused by inexperience is no excuse for the right guards getting blown off the ball and driven into the backfield. Apparently, our #1 at right guard, Eric Rodemoyer sat out the game Saturday with an injury and is expected to start this coming Saturday. Hopefully, his return resolves some of these issues.

Anyway, its time to look forward to a 6:00 a.m. game at Marshall. We'll have some previews up tomorrow. If attending the game, please be careful down there. Huntington scares me. Seriously. (The city, not the team.)

(Oh, and I "borrowed" the above pic from this flickr account, to give credit where credit is due.)

Check this clip out... Nice.

http://www.eersfan.com/video/wvu_sprint_commercial_hi.wmv

This is a 15 second commercial for Sprint. One I am yet to see televised, but hope to very soon. It was graciously provided to me by my good friend Senor Bundy. Muchas Gracias... Enjoy.

Round of Reubens

Some observations and statistics from the Western Michigan game. The Broncos were not much of a running horse as they were held to 32 yards on the ground on 32 carries. WMU was able to pass for 245 yards, but also threw 2 interceptions and were sacked 3 times in the game. Jamarko Simmons had a big game for WMU with 144 yards and 2 TDs on 14 catches so WVU is going to have to find a DB that can become a shutdown guy for them. He wasn't the only Bronco that had a big day. C.J. Wilson was able to get himself some White/Slaton autographs. He was the safety that kept jumping on the pile with a a Sharpie and picture book.

WVU had 542 yards of total offense and averaged 8.1 yards per play. The Mountaineers only punted once, a booming 6 yarder by Pat who also missed on extra point. McAfee did manage to cause two touchbacks even with the kickoffs coming from further back. Steve Slaton may have a better pro career and may get more Heisman hype, but Pat White continues to be the best player on the field every game. I will continue to point this out for those people I know that were stupid enough to think that Adam Bednarik was the better quarterback a few years ago (I am looking in the general direction of OS and a certain friend getting ready to have a little Owen of his own). White ran for 98 yards most of which came after a normal running back would have been tackled much less a quarterback. He also threw for 192 yards and would have had more had Jalloh's facemask held on, Schmidt held on, Reynaud not fumbled, etc. In fact, White only threw one bad pass on the day. Devine and Sanders both look like they could fit on your pocket, especially compared to Jarrett Brown. But, all three can move and by the end of the year that backfield will be better than half of the backfields in college football if it isn't already.

In other WVU football news the magistrate refused to dismiss the charges against Quinton Andrews meaning he will have pretrail starting on September 25th. Andrews was charged with obstructing justice when he attempted to enter the scene of a jason Gwaltney traffic stop and then refused to provide identification promptly and not so politely requested the officer not enter his home. For his part the arresting officer threatened to mace and/or taser Andrews and forced his way into the home of Andrews. Mind you Andrews had done nothing illegal up until then. Maybe Andrew needs the help of a Constitutional Law specialist. There is one at WVU and he has decided to run for the Supreme Court of West Virginia. Should he get elected, I'm positive that opinions he would write would be the most entertaining/sarcastic opinions in the history of the state.

15 more hours...

I'm about half an old man anymore. I just can't power through a hangover like I could in my mid-20s, so to make sure I'm in tip-top shape tomorrow morning, I am refraining from booze tonight. So like a kid on Christmas Eve, I'll be up all night intermittently reviewing the toy catalog in high anticipation of the coming day's events. Here's a few of the items I'm hoping to see under the tree tomorrow:

Hope to see everyone there tomorrow. Yes, even our buddy Jack.