Banner Logo
Home
The Real Kato
About Me
Twitter
Facebook
Frozen Lunches
Links
Kottke
Daring Fireball
Amalah
Secret Agent Josephine
Dooce
Contact



Archives
Most Recent

2024 March
2018 October
2018 September
2018 August
2018 January
2017 September
2017 June
2017 January
2016 November
2016 October
2016 September
2016 August
2016 January


Categories
All Categories 

bloggers 
books 
commentary 
dating 
food 
funnyhaha 
interesting 
life 
movies 
music 
politics 
reviews 
science 
site-business 
sports 
style 
techwatch 
television 
theater 
travel 


Recent Comments
On College Football 2022: Week 6 Recap and Week 7 Pre...
Ken said:
Yeah, we've both had our share of hope and disappointment in this game. Let's just hope for a good b...
On College Football 2022: Week 6 Recap and Week 7 Pre...
Dan* said:
I'm not sure how I feel about this game. On one hand, I feel pretty optimistic that we have the tale...
On College Football 2022: Week 1 Preview
Dan* said:
Glad to see you'll be back writing football again, Ken! Congrats on the easy win today. You didn't ...
On College Football 2021: Week 10 Recap and Week 11 P...
Ken said:
Yeah, sorry one of our teams had to lose. I've come to appreciate Penn State as a classy and sympath...
On College Football 2021: Week 10 Recap and Week 11 P...
Dan* said:
Hey Ken, congratulations on the win yesterday! Some really odd choices by our coaching staff in that...


<< Previous: College Football 201... | Next: College Football 201... >>

College Football 2018 Week 6 Preview
Friday, 2018 October 5 - 4:52 pm
Michigan hosts Maryland; NCSU hosts Boston College; Penn State has a merciful bye.

Michigan vs. Maryland, 12:00 PM ABC
Maryland is a difficult team to figure out; on the one hand, they beat a turns-out-to-be-pretty-good Texas team, but then they were blown out by a not-good-at-all Temple team in a game where they had only 195 yards of offense and zero offensive touchdowns.

Maybe the variability can be explained by the coaching turmoil, as D.J. Durkin was jettisoned for abusing his players, and journeyman O.C. Matt Canada has taken the interim reigns. Canada usually runs a trickery-filled offense full of pre-snap motion and odd alignments... Michigan will need to be sound in its defensive assignments.

The Maryland defense seems to be decent (except when playing the dreaded Temple Owls, I guess). It features a backfield-terrorizing Antoine Brooks at outside linebacker; a key matchup will be him against the Michigan tight ends, who will need to either block him in space or challenge him in pass coverage.

I think Michigan could have some success running the ball, as the defense seems schematically similar to Nebraska and we all see where that went. If we see a sustained drive in the first quarter by Michigan featuring a slew of successful running plays, I'll start to breathe easy about this game.

Prediction: Michigan 28, Maryland 13.

NCSU vs. Boston College, 12:30 PM ACC Network
Boston College is one of those pesky always-pretty-good-but-never-great teams, kind of like the Iowa of the ACC. They're usually sound in their schemes but sometimes plodding. This year they've beaten a pile of weak opponents (including Temple, cough cough) and lost to a not-very-good Purdue team. Star running back A.J. Dillon is questionable for the game, also. I don't think BC will be able to match N.C. State's athletically. The key matchup will be State's front seven against whatever tailback B.C. trots out.

Prediction: NCSU 30, Boston College 16.

Penn State: Bye
PSU gets a bye week to recover from its tough loss against Ohio State, and they'll need the extra time to prepare for Michigan State next week.

Games to Watch on TV
Kind of a bum week; no real premier matchups. In the noon-ish time slot, we've got the Michigan game on ABC and the NCSU game on the ACC network. There's also the Red River Rivalry game (#19 Texas vs. #7 Oklahoma) on Fox; I guess this is your Game of the Week. Northwestern at #20 Michigan State on FS1 is something to keep an eye on, too.

At 3:30, #5 LSU plays #22 Florida on CBS. Florida is perhaps underrated; their Kentucky loss doesn't look nearly as bad now as it did when it happened. So that could be interesting. Florida State plays #17 Miami on ABC; everyone expects a blowout win by Miami but it's a rivalry game so who knows. At 4:00 Indiana will probably get demolished by #3 Ohio State on Fox. Indiana has become much less interesting since bringing on former Michigan OC Mike Debord... his playbook is, shall we say, uninspired.

At 7:00, #13 Kentucky gets a real test against Texas A&M on ESPN. Will the Cinderella run continue? At 7:30, Mississippi State could give #8 Auburn a challenge; that's on ESPN2. Meanwhile, Nebraska and UCLA will both probably remain winless; Nebraska plays #16 Wisconsin on BTN, and UCLA plays #10 Washington on Fox. Watch one of those games just for the schadenfreude, if you like.

At 8:00, #6 Notre Dame plays #24 Virginia Tech. VT beat Florida State and previously unbeaten Duke, but the FSU win is really less impressive in hindsight, and Duke is still Duke. So this one might be a blowout win for Notre Dame, who's found an actual quarterback in junior Ian Book. Notre Dame and Michigan are in the uncomfortable position of rooting for each other the rest of the season, since wins on both sides will raise the stature of their opening-week game.




Permalink   Bookmark and Share
Posted by Ken in: sports

Comments

There are no comments on this article.

Comments are closed for this post.
Login


Search This Site
Powered by FreeFind