By now, we all know about ESPN’s hype machine. For the last few years, “no one” has been as good as the Big Ten in basketball (despite zero national championships in over 10 years). “No one” has been worse than Tim Tebow (despite him having a better playoff record than many current starters). It is what it is. As fans, we’re used to it. But last night, ESPN’s “excuse machine” was in full motion. I’ve never heard them try so hard.
I can hear the comments now from the four letter network’s talking heads: “The ACC loses more BCS conference match ups….” The presumption is that the ACC is a weak football conference if they lose lopsided match ups like unranked Virginia Tech vs. #1 Alabama. I’m not convinced. Conferences should not be judged by the performance of middle or bottom tier teams. Would an Illinois victory over Kentucky indicate that the Big 10 is a better conference than the SEC? No way.
The biggest game this weekend for the ACC is Clemson vs. Georgia. As a matter of fact, it is the only game that really matters on the national front.
A Clemson victory would likely catapult them into the Top 5, put them in the national title conversation, and set up a nationally relevant game against Florida State on October 18th. Florida State, the other ranked ACC team, has it’s own responsibility for carrying the ACC flag. The Noles need to win their games against inferior competition and continue their presence near the Top 10 for a majority of the season.
How many years has it been since an ACC football team has been in the national title conversation in November? It’s up to you Clemson and Florida State to buck the trend.
Non-Conference Schedule
How many non-conference ranked opponents will be played by conferences this year?
ACC: 11
Big 12: 2
Big 10: 4
Pac 12: 8
SEC: who cares
Winston Debut
As Florida State finishes up preparations for the Pittsburgh Panthers, most fans are eagerly anticipating the debut of freshman QB Jameis Winston. Winston has generated a significant amount of hype since his MVP winning Elite 11 camp in 2011. The hype reached epic proportions after Winston’s spring game performance highlighted by a 58 yd strike against All-ACC conference corner Lamarcus Joyner.
It is a Sunday in July. Basketball is a distant memory. Baseball and lacrosse are over. The Grant of Rights has expansion talk limited to the Big 10 imperialists. Football is close, but perhaps not close enough. So let’s change that with a poll. Who do you think is winning the ACC this year? Schools are shown randomly. Do not forget to comment below as to why someone is going to win…
The Confidential previously announced that it will be sponsoring free fantasy football leagues. As we begin to head towards the season opener, we will take a look at the ACC’s top playmakers–ergo, the top fantasy football studs–for 2013. The first analysis was quarterbacks. Then we did the running backs. Today, we will look at the wide receivers.
The Confidential previously announced that it will be sponsoring free fantasy football leagues. As we begin to head towards the season opener, we will take a look at the ACC’s top playmakers–ergo, the top fantasy football studs–for 2013. The first analysis was quarterbacks. Today, we will look at the running backs.
The phrase “hot seat” is now commonly used to describe coaches that are under a lot of pressure to start winning immediately. The implication is that failing to have a sufficiently-good season will lead to termination. In the old days, a coach would get five years to turn a program around. Now, coaches are on much shorter “leashes.” Not literally, obviously. Anyway, who are the ACC coaches on the hot seat headed into the 2013 college football season?
According to ESPN’s latest football recruiting rankings, the ACC has three of the top 10 teams, with Notre Dame knocking at the top 10 at #11. Specifically, Florida State is at #4, Clemson is at #8, and Miami is at #10. The three traditional ACC powers are where they should be in the recruiting rankings. But there is other good news.
On Monday, the Confidential kicked off the countdown to, well, kick-off, with the announcement that we will be sponsoring free fantasy football leagues. As we begin to head towards the season opener, we will take a look at the ACC’s top playmakers–ergo, the top fantasy football studs–for 2013. Today, we will begin with the quarterbacks.
Update: Capital One Cup has confirmed that UCLA is the Men’s Winner. See below for the revised final standings.
The College World Series of Baseball is over, and as every good Big Ten fan knows that can only mean one thing: time to hand out the Capital One Cup honors, which is the most important way of measuring a Conference’s success, behind of course how much revenue that conference distributes to its teams.
The official results have not yet come out, however based on the final rankings of College Baseball, we can extrapolate who the winner will be.
So unless there are some other Division 1 National Championships yet to be determined, or unless Professor Dumbledore can hand out special points at the final Capital One Cup banquet, it’s time to crown the winner.
It’s important to note that going into the CWS, the hands on-favorite to win the Capital One Cup was a team that was currently in the top-10 and still in the College World of Series final brackets; namely the Indiana Hoosiers who were tied for 5th place with 76 points and only needed a top-5 final ranking to finish on top of the COC final standings (seriously, the acronym for Capital One Cup is “COC”). So, without further adieu… Read more…
The Confidential 