NCAA Cupcake Weekend

The Game Room
1

College football fans have complained about non-conference cupcakes for time immemorial. We’ve heard the arguments: teams need 7-8 home games to be profitable, too risky losing a game before the conference season starts, etc… but this is getting ridiculous!

Last week was pretty bad: Four of the top six teams played D-IAA teams (Georgia, LSU, Oklahoma, Ohio St).

And this week? No ranked teams play each other! All of the Top 25 are playing unranked teams.

With all the $$$ the networks have invested in college football, I wonder if TV will start “forcing” some decent matchups?

Looking at two of the premiere conferences: SEC & Big XII

Tulane at Alabama
La.-Monroe at Arkansas
Southern Miss at Auburn
Miami, Fla. at Florida (no, Miami isn’t ranked)
Central Michigan at Georgia
Norfolk State at Kentucky
Troy at LSU (postponed)
Ole Miss at Wake Forest
Southeastern Louisiana at Mississippi State

San Jose State at Nebraska
Cincinnati at Oklahoma
Eastern Washington at Colorado
New Mexico at Texas A&M
Kent State at Iowa State
SE Missouri St at Missouri
Northwestern St at Baylor
Houston at Oklahoma St
Montana St at Kansas St
Louisiana Tech at Kansas
Nevada at Texas Tech
UTEP vs Texas

There may be some potential upsets in there, but I’d imagine each game has a double-digit favorite.

My humble proposal: Have ESPN sponsor an “interleague weekend”, like they do in college basketball with the Big 10 vs ACC. Rotate among the conferences (Pac 10 vs Big 10, Big East vs ACC); do home and home, and switch conferences the next time (SEC vs Pac-10, etc). Compare the above weekend to this one (pairing similar-strength teams):

Here is the Dr Pepper Big XII-SEC Challenge Saturday.

Oklahoma-Georgia
Texas-Florida
Missouri-LSU
Kansas-Auburn
Texas Tech-Alabama
Nebraska-Tennessee
Texas A&M-Kentucky
Colorado-South Carolina
Kansas State-Arkansas
Oklahoma State-Ole Miss
Iowa State-Mississippi State
Baylor-Vanderbilt

2

The silver lining to cupcake matches is that they make for the most delectable of upsets. Maybe Michigan should stop scheduling cupcakes for Week 1; they keep choking to death on them.

I like your idea of extra-conference play, but there’s some of that already (just not organized universally on one weekend), and without ESPN involvement, which would make me uneasy anyway. Good luck trying to implement such a notion, though – the mandarins who draw up the schedules fill some slots many years in advance, and there’s always the schedule spaces allocated for traditional rivalries. Getting all the conferences to agree to something like this would be like herding so many cats through a dressage routine.
Nitpick: Miami’s no cupcake, even several years after their last national championship. Sure, on paper at least they’re set to lose big tonight against Florida in The Swamp, but there’s still a world of difference between an outmatched squad and a cupcake non-contender. Last week both Miami and Florida iced their respective no-name cupcakes, although the Gators were slow to get their offense in gear (rather like their cold-blooded mascot’s having to bask in the sun for a while in order to get, literally, warmed up). So who knows? We might be in for a great game after all!

3

As usual, Notre Dame’s cupcake handled them thru 3 quarters then laid down, handing them another undeserved win. :rolleyes:

Actually, when SDSU missed the extra point, I knew it was over. I figured they would lose by that one point.

God, I hate Notre Dame.