Here’s my take on upcoming Week 3 games:
Game that won’t live up to previous years: No. 3 Mount Union at John Carroll. JCU has given Mount Union fits at home at times in recent years, but not this time.
Game that will live up to previous years: Lycoming at Widener.
Top 25 team most likely to get upset: No. 11 Trinity (Texas). Hopefully they travel better than the last time they visited SCIAC country and lost to Pomona-Pitzer. Redlands is better than that P-P team.
Close but not quite: Texas Lutheran will give Mary Hardin-Baylor a game but won’t be able to push over the top.
Best key game: I think the game between No. 13 Salisbury and No. 20 Christopher Newport will be the best game of the day, at least among games featuring two playoff contenders.
Two and a half games: Keith McMillan mentioned in ATN the chance to see Hardin-Simmons and Mary Hardin-Baylor each at home on Saturday, but start a little earlier in the day and take in the first half of the McMurry/Austin College game, which starts two hours earlier on the other side of Abilene.
Wake-up call: Franklin and Marshall better have put its bye week to good use after losing at Bethany, because Hobart is not going to be as … err … diplomatic.
Culture shock: Springfield gets to see what a WIAC team is like. UW-Stout might not have faced the triple option before, but they see the wishbone year-in and year-out, so the learning curve won’t be great.
One-man show: There are doubts whether Earlham’s Justin Rummell will be healthy enough to go against Anderson, so we’ll pick Augsburg’s Marcus LeVesseur, put back in at quarterback last week at Wartburg. (That’s his picture above.) Augsburg went 2-8 last year yet still gave North Central a game on the road. What will they do at home?
Here’s my two-cents (plink, plink)…
– Most likely game to disappoint: I’ll dissent from Keith’s ATN take on this one. I see the Wildcats winning pretty comfortably (15+) with a sizable lead at the half.
– My schedule maker hates me: Okay, so Willamette gets D-II Western Oregon then #2 UMHB then Azusa Pacific, who’s usually strong? Ouch.
– Gordon’s super ridiculous pick of the night: How about Newport News beating Brockport to go 3-0? Alright, not likely, but that’s why I used this heading. I hope the Brockport guys have a nice bus for these painfully long trips.
– Saturday night’s alright: The best night game on the docket is Muhlenberg-Union. The Mules’ defense looked great against TCNJ, but how much of that was a product of the Lions’ struggles? Actually you could say the same about Union last week who held a new cast at Springfield to 7 points. This will give us a better sense whether these teams are for real.
– No time like the present: Two good games open IIAC play with Coe traveling to Central and Wartburg hosting Simpson. No chance like the present for Wartburg to erase a slow start to 2005.
Reading material for the morning:
Alma/Wittenberg preview: It’s been more than 50 years since the Wittenberg University Tigers football program started a season 0-2.
Lakeland/UW-Whitewater preview: Colleagues of Lakeland College football coach Jim Zebrowski wonder what he was thinking when setting up the Muskies’ 2005 schedule.
On the air: Western Wisconsin Sports Saturday, on which I’m a guest pretty much every Saturday morning, airs from Menomonie today and will have UW-Eau Claire coach Todd Hoffner on momentarily.
Nick Suchyna: If you think the SUNY Brockport football team had victory snatched out of the air last fall, consider how Nick Suchyna felt. The third-string quarterback for St. John Fisher heard his name called with two seconds left, the ball at the Brockport 39 and Fisher losing 32-31. … “Coach said ‘Sooch, you’re in!”’ Suchyna recalled. “I said ‘Are you serious?’ and he said ‘Yes!’ So I took a step onto the field.” That’s as far as he got.
Wow fellas, if it’s gonna be all that, maybe you should get yours in for Around the Nation, and we all Mark our Words.
We could do the same categories each week … or if you think you want to keep it here, I’ll point it out in the column. 🙂