Last night we expected fireworks with two games laced with guady team and individual offensive statistics. Today? Dont get your hopes up. The three games that close down the bowl schedule today dont deliver a lot of offensive goodies, at least not on paper. Tonight we’ll have the 51st, 62nd, 74th, 75th and 106th ranked offense on display. That makes Nebraska’s 34th ranked offense in tonight’s Holiday Bowl look like 1999 Rams by comparison. All three games yesterday had Over/Under bars set in the mid-60s or higher. The games detailed in these posts are set at 47.5, 50 and 53.5. We’ve already talked about the Armed Forces Bowl today and are already invested in its action. Here’s a quick look, with picks of course, on the rest of the day’s card.
Pinstripes Bowl: Kansas State vs Syracuse, 2:25, ESPN. Lines, Pick ‘Em, O/U 47.5
The Rich Rodriguez Coaching Calamity 2010 Postseason Tour continues. We had a stop last week in Florida as exiled position coach Vance Bedford, swept out the door like most of Carr’s assistants after the 2007 campaign, helped lead the Louisville Cardinals to victory in his role as defensive coordinator. We bopped clear cross country in advance of Christmas to San Diego State where another former Michigan assistant, and, in this case, darkhorse 2011 head coaching candidate Brady Hoke bombed Navy, giving SDSU their first bowl win in years. Today? The tour stops in the Bronx for what might be the most damning set yet in the case against the current Michigan head coach. The Syracuse Orangemen’s return to the postseason rankles all sides of the Rodrigguez argument. Not only is his first defensive coordinator Scott Shaffer, fired after Year One in Ann Arbor, doing wonders with the same scheme for the Orange, but Syracuse’s success this season stands in sharp contrast to Rodriguez’s current defensive coordinator Greg Robinson, who was an abkect failure as head coach with the Orange before he was canned and current leader Doug Marrone took over. Yes, there are plenty of other stops on this Calamity Tour. We have the Sugar Bowl, featuring the two highest profile player defections from the first months of the regime. Not to mention bigtime games next week involving the man people wanted to hire in 2007 and the man people want to hire now. Despite those future tour dates, I think the one on display today, is the primary reason the Rodriguez Era might only have a few hours left in power. The fired defensive coordinator is kicking ass at a school where the current defensive coordinator left a massive pile of fail in his wake. Excuse me, while I go pound this liter of Anti-freeze.
Anyway, getting back to this game. Shaffer’s defense is the only thing that leaps off the page in Syracuse’s matchup today at New Yankee Stadium against the Kansas State Wildcats. They’re 5th nationally in total defense, 6th against the pass and 13th in total points. Pressue defense has been the key. Shaffer’s stop troops can get sacks and pressure on the QB from everyone on every level of the D. They used to be among the lead leaders nationally, but struggled the last couple of games pinning down quarterbacks. They’re still good for at least three sacks going up against a KState team that’s struggled protecting the QB. They’re 89th in sacks allowed and they’re going to have trouble most of the day keeping the Orange D at bay.
To be sure, we saw an excellent Big East D in West Virginia get schooled the other night in a bowl game. But, KState’s offense doesnt even have an ounce of explosiveness that the Russell Wilson-led NC State offense has. Both teams have average offensive numbers. The Wildcats can run the football with Daniel Thomas. But the Orange can do the same with Delone Carter. Thomas, though, is running into the 18th best rushing D that allows just 118 yards per game. Carter gets to pound away at the 116th rushing defense. Only four teams in the nation allow more than the 216 yards per game the Cats permit on the ground. Edge to the Orange. Both QBsm Ryan Nassib and Carson Coffman are solid, not spectacular signal callers. I like Nassib’s ability to generate points out of the passing game for Syracuse as opposed to Coffman and, well, he’s going up against the weaker defensive outfit.
The Pick: Syracuse +1, 1 Unit…..I foresee an ugly game. I’m risking a single unit on the team with the best group and that is the Orange with Shaffer’s defense. Except for the contenders at the top of the league standings, I dont think the Big 12 is all that great. And KSU might be their worst postseason entry. Fading this league has been helpful so far this bowl run, why not another turn. The Orange, in front a partisan New York crowd, take this one 21-16 holding off the Cats with a final defensive stand.
Music City Bowl: North Carolina vs Tennessee, 6:35, ESPN. Lines, UNC -1, O/U 50.5
The SEC debuts this bowl season in this one, but the problem is the Vols might be the worst entry the conference has this postseason. Yes, Rocky Top did streak to wins in a row to close the season, climb out of a 2-6 hole and qualify for a bowl game on the last day of the season. That’s great. The caveat? Try the fact that they beat 4, by and large, dismal teams in the process that have a combined 13-35 overall record. The Vols might be one of the worst teams from a BCS league to make a bowl game and they only got into the game after completing perhaps the least inspiring 4-game winning streak of the seasson. Meanwhile for UNC, it wasnt even close to the season they expected. Dogged all season by the summer agent and tutoring scandal and then hit hard by the injury bug, it’s been hard to figure out who is going to play for UNC on a week to week basis. All things being equal, it wasnt that bad of a season for them even though they never were close to the full strength of a team most folks factored back in the summer. They could have had a better record but missing so many key parts left them a gear behind in some of their showdowns against Virginia Tech, Miami and LSU, for example. They just didnt have enough in the fourth quarter in those games.
I dont think that will be an issue today. For one, I dont think the Vols are that talented of a team. Sure, they’ve developed a nice little passing attack with freshmen QB Tyler Bray. And, he has a nice target to throw to in Damarious Moore. But, again, dont overlook a lot of those impressive numbers were done on the backs of those poor opponenets they faced down the stretch. They dont even come close to running the football like a semi-vintage Vol outfit. I think they’re going to struggle against this Heel defense. They wont be totally shut down the way they were in the Peach Bowl last year, but the Vols arent as good moving the football now as they were then either. I just dont see them scoring a ton of points. The Heels, meanwhile, can score a bunch. I can see them topping 30 points with ease. Tennessee is in the bottom half, if not final third, in a lot of team defense categories. Tonight, they face TJ Yates, who believe it or not, has put together a stellar senior campaign. He’s 7th nationally in completion percentage, 19th in passing yards, 23rd in efficiency and 24rth in yards per attempt. Bottomline, as strange as it sounds, but he’s the best offensive player in this game. I dont think the Vols will be able to slow him down enough to allow their average offense a chance to win this game. Yates can spread the ball out to a lot of targets, keeping the young Vol secondary on it heels. They’ll have issues matching up with Dwight Jones. The Vols defensive backfield improved a lot in November, but, again, this is a major step up in play compared to who they faced that final month. While I think Bray and the Vols will land some punches, in the end an O-Line thats been shredded all season–they’re 100th in rushing yards and 112th in sacks allowed–will have problems keeping guys like Quinton Coples and Quan Sturdivant from blowing up a lot of the offensive schemes. One last factor. Dont be surprised if the Heels take this game personally. They had a home and home series lined up for 2010 and 2011 with the Vols until Tennessee pulled the rug out from under the would-be series. I think the Heels send a bit of a message today.
The Pick: UNC -1 x 2……Whoa, stop the presses, the first double play of bowl season. I think more will be on the way the next couple of afternoons. I dont think the Vols are anywhere as good as the teams that have topped UNC this year. While on the other hand, the Heels are much better and more talented than the team the Vols did beat just to gain entry into this game. The Heels have been dealing all season with screwy personnel issues. They enter this game after weeks of prep and I think Butch Davis will have more than enough strategy to overcome the continued depleted depth chart they have. Yates will flirt with 300 yards passing. The Heel defense will harass the freshmen Bray into mistakes. The Heels will be a step ahead the whole way, eventually tucking this one away by double digits. Book It!
Holiday Bowl: Nebraska vs Washington, 10:05, ESPN. Lines, Nebraska -14, O/U 53.5
First things first. If Nebraska wins, I am claiming it for the Big 10. If they take the gas pipe against the Huskies, we’re giving this loss to the Big 12. Sounds fair, right? Glad we got that squared away.
Otherwise, this bowl matchup is disappointing. For one, I hate regular season rematches. And what exactly did we see in the 56-21 shellacking the Huskers put on UW up in Seattle back in September that made bowl gurus think we’d want to see this one again. I am a playoff proponent. But, I also love the bowl games. But, its hard to defend them when we’re given this as a marquee event for the night. If college football movers and shakers were able to manipulate the bowl tie-ins to sub in Boise State for the Pac-10 in the Las Vegas Bowl, why couldnt everyone involved think of the common fan at home who just wants juicier games and place Boise State in this contest for the Pac-10 slot? Frankly, UW’s 6-6 mark is way more worthy of a Las Vegas Bowl bid. And, we could have seen Boise take on a college football traditional power. We could have thrown more evidence into the pile vis a vis Boise’s place in the college football world. Instead, we got to see the Broncos take apart another midmajor, while we get subjected to a 10-win team taking on a .500 ballclub in primetime. What’s sad is the Holiday Bowl annually delivers as one of the best December bowl games out there. It’s brought us high scoring games, back and forth action and wild finishes almost every year in its three decade-plus existence. There is no way you put Boise State in this game, with both the program’s and the bowl’s history, and it doesnt turn into an instant classic. They would deliver us this generations BYU/SMU game. This is one of the least attractive Holiday Bowls in years. A Boise/Nebraska match, however, would have stopped the college football world. Heckuva job, bowl suits. Heckuva job. To soothe those feelings, how about some highlights of that game 30 years ago.
Maybe the Huskies arent as overmatched as it looks, however. Their is that little thing known as Holiday Bowl Magic. It creates a haven for underdogs. In 32 Holiday Bowls played, the underdog is 22-10 ATS with a dozen outright upset victories. It’s trended that way because it seems like at least one of the entrants, be it from the Pac-10 or Big -12, land in this bowl game after being jobbed out of a bigger postseason payday. Tonight, we have Nebraska, who was only minutes away from a BCS bid, but instead are settling for a return date in the Holiday Bowl against a team they already know they can beat. How excited can they really be? The Holiday Bowl has carved out a reputation as hosting the biggest disinterested chalk of the postseason and then watching an upstart puppy come out of nowhere and chase said chalk all the way to the finish line, often finishing remarkably in front of it. Besides, Nebraska would become an official member of the Big 10 once in chokes a bowl win away to a Pac-10 team. They could get that part of the initiation out of the way tonight.
The Pick: UW +14, 1/2 Unit…..A hold your nose and play pick. Probably not the most popular selection. Nor one that makes any sense after ripping the matchup above. But, I’ll risk a measly half unit on 
some Holiday Bowl magic being conjured up. I really do think the Huskers, who really werent playing awesome football down the stretch, sleep walk a bit in this game and take the Huskies lightly since they handled them easily a few months ago. The Huskies will take advantage of that and grab an early lead. Eventually, Nebraska’s talent will win out, but it will take a while to shake UW. Jake Locker will land some blows. The Huskers will pull away, but win by less than two touchdowns. Let’s say 33-21. Besides, the Pac-10 is 15-6 ATS as a bowl dog. The league failed in that spot last night. Tonight, it’s the JCB’s ‘We’re Playing The Percentages, Strawberry” play of the bowl season. What could go wrong? Wait, dont answer that.
The formal 12/30 card
SMU +8 x 1
Aldrick Robinson Over 87.5 receiving yards x 1/2
Jarred Hassin Over 67.5 rushing yards x 1/2
Syracuse pick ‘em x 1
UNC -1 x 2
UW +14 x 1/2
Three 1/2 unit plays, 2 single unit plays and the first double play of the postseason. I might ass some props in the three games in this post that have yet to kick. We’ll send any added plays out via the JCB Twitter
