Bowl Season: 28th December Games

Thursday 28^th December

Ohio vs Louisiana-Monroe
AdvoCare V100 Independence Bowl – 19:00 on ESPN

Ohio somewhat limped into post season play by finishing 1-4 after winning their first seven games, which included an opening day triumph over Penn State, being lead by the junior quarterback Tyler Tettleton the Bobcats run a solid run game which is backed up by a efficient passing game which has only turned over the ball four times all year. The Warhwaks on the other hand opened up their season by stunning then #8 Arkansas, but ended up dropping games to Arkansas State and Louisiana Lafayette in Sun Belt play and are led by all-passing, all-running Kolton Browning. Look for the Warhwaks to push the pace on offence whilst the Bobcats try to play a controlled offensive game and rely on their defence to make a play.

Players to Watch

Ohio: Beau Blankenship, RB #22. The 5'9", 202lbs Blankenship enters the game at spot on 1500 yards  rushing and averaging 5.1 per carry, he even has a 269 yard game on his resume this year.

Louisiana-Monroe: Kolton Browning, QB #15. Browning has been far and away the offensive star and the reason the Warhawks upset the Razorbacks, he even leads the team in rushing with 441 yards and 7 TDs.

Pick: LA-Monroe

Confidence: 8

Rutgers vs Virginia Tech
Russell Athletic Bowl – 22:30 on ESPN

The Hokies have had one of their most disappointing years in a long time and only just managed to go 6-6 by squeaking past both Boston College and Virginia to end the year. Tech’s chance all fall on the shoulders of Logan Thomas and his play, at times he looks like a top level QB, but far too often he just makes horrible throws.

Rutgers have hung their hats on very strong defensive play, as they rank 5^th in the nation in points allowed, but also have a big play threat on offense in 6”6’ wide receiver Brandon Coleman who can provide a spark with big catches at opportune times.

Players to Watch

Rutgers: Khaseem Greene, OLB #20. ‘Tackle Machine’ Khaseem Greene (think ‘Mean’ Joe Greene), just made that up, but in all seriousness he has 125 tackles on the year as well as 10.5 tackles for loss and 2 interceptions. He is going to be a sneaky high pick in the draft.

Virginia Tech: Logan Thomas, QB #3. Thomas has a huge arm and the ability to make any throw, he just doesn’t do it all the time, and that’s what’s hampered the Hokies offense this season. If he has a good game then Virginia Tech will likely win the game, but more often than not this season he’s been poor.

Pick: Virginia Tech

Confidence: 19

Minnesota vs Texas Tech
Meineke Car Care Bowl of Texas – 02:00 on ESPN

Despite losing Tommy Tubberville, the Red Raiders have a great air-raid offence to fall back on and will be looking for Seth Doege to lead as he has done all season and likely add a few more TDs to his 38 passing scores. The Golden Gophers really struggled through Big 10 play but are faced with an unfamiliar proposition in a very pass heavy offensive attack. If Minnesota adjusts to this then they should be able to put up a fight, but I’m not too sure that they will be able to pull off any kind of upset.

Players to Watch

Minnesota: Donnell Kirkwood, RB #20. About the only consistent piece of the Golden Gopher offence, had a couple of poor games to end the season but could find some lanes against a average Texas Tech defence.

Texas Tech: Seth Doege, QB #7. The fearless gunslinger that orchestrates the Red Raiders offence, he’s piled up a lot of yardage through the air, but needs to watch his turnovers.

Pick: Texas Tech

Confidence: 33

Bowl Season: 27th of December Games

Knowing that you’ve been missing some Double Coverage content over Christmas and Boxing Day, I’m back to preview a few more of the upcoming bowl games. There are a lot to watch in this run up to New Year, so stay on top of your Bowl Mania entry and hope that you have the magic touch when it comes to picking the winner (unlike me). A review of all of week three’s games will be posted next Monday.

Wednesday 27^th December

#24 San Jose State vs Bowling Green
Military Bowl – Presented by Northrop Grumman – 20:00 on ESPN
 

Here we have another bowl game where the head coach of one of the teams, San Jose State, has already moved onto another job, Colorado, and the players will be looking to complete the season without the man that got them there, Mike MacIntyre. Bowling Green are a very solid MAC team and rank 8^th in the nation in points against and so will be a test for San Jose State’s 11^th ranked passing attack. The Falcons offence will be looking to feed off of a strong defensive performance which has largely been their key to success this year.

Players to Watch

San Jose State: Travis Johnson, DE #43. The WAC player of the year on defense had 12 sacks this year to go along with his 19 tackles for a loss, and is a key piece of the Spartans winning puzzle as they will look for him to go to work and pressure the Falcons backfield if they are trailing and need to pass.

Bowling Green: Chris Jones, DT #19. Another conference defensive player of the year, Jones has 12.5 sacks coming from the interior of the D-line, Bowling Green will also be looking for him to regularly get into the backfield to pressure David Fales.

Pick: San Jose State

Confidence: 12

Cincinnati vs Duke
Belk Bowl – 23:30 on ESPN

After a flying start to the season going 5-1, the Blue Devils limped into bowl play by finishing the year with a palendromic  1-5, whilst the Bearcats finished at 9-3 including a three point victory over Virginia Tech. The key to this one could be Cincinnati’s defence which ranked 12^th in the nation and is backed up on offence by a strong rushing attack lead by senior running back George Winn. The Blue Devils on the other hand are very pass heavy lead by Sean Renfree who earned the Tatum Award for being the ACC’s top senior student-athlete. Despite this being another game that looks fairly easy to call, I think Duke might be putting up more of a fight than many expect.

Players to Watch

Cincinnati: Greg Blair, LB #51. The senior has been the lynchpin of the Bearcat defense and averages 10.25 tackles a game with 8.5 tackles for loss, 2.5 sacks and 2 picks. Duke will be looking to keep the ball away from him, but may not have the choice.

Duke: Jamison Crowder, WR #3. This sophomore had a big season in blue and accumulate over 1000 yards on 70 receptions, which included one of those mythical 99 yards TD receptions.

Pick: Cincinnati

Confidence: 10

Baylor vs #17 UCLA
Bridgepoint Education Holiday Bowl – 02:45 on ESPN

This one is late for all of us UK fans but I bet it’ll be a good one to watch if you stay up for it as there should be plenty of offense on show between the Bruins and the Bears. UCLA will be looking to top off their comeback season in the Pac-12 with a bowl victory whilst, Baylor will probably just be looking to chuck the ball through the air for as many yards as possible. The Bears rank 5^th overall in points scored and 3^rd overall in passing yards and are unlikely to play any defense as they have demonstrated throughout the season by allowing at least 45 points in 5 of their games. The key here could be the turnover battle, the Bruins have picked off a total of 15 passes and have a turnover margin of +4, whilst Baylor have a margin of +5 having 18 interceptions themselves. For me, the team that gets ahead early on could see themselves winning, UCLA have the ability to grind out a results on the ground, having said that, I wouldn’t count Baylor out even if they were down by a few scores.

Players to Watch

Baylor: Nick Florence, QB #11. The man who replaced RGIII has done a fine job in leading the offence with over 4000 yards and 31 touchdowns, I think the word gunslinger applies here and he’ll certainly be looking to slice up the Bruins defense.

UCLA: Johnathan Franklin, RB #23. After being a early Heisman contender, Franklin experienced a slow down in his production mid-season before having more 150+ yard games and finally ending the season with 194 yards against the Stanford front seven. Look for the explosive Franklin to get lots of touches tonight.

Pick: UCLA

Confidence: 17

College Bowl Season Week 3: Part 1

Now the bowl season really gets into the meat of it's action with a total of thirteen games being played this week! So in the spirit of Christmas and evening out my writing load, you are going to get a few preview presents at a time over the next week, so keep checking back. First up we have the Christmas Eve and Boxing Day games to take care of, and if any of you support one of these four teams (don't know why you would though), then I hope you get all that you wished for off of the BCS Santa.

Monday 24^th December

Fresno State vs SMU

Sheraton Hawaii Bowl @ 01:00 on ESPN

This Christmas Eve clash sees a three loss Fresno team lead by Derek Carr (brother of the infamous David Carr), take on a SMU team, who barely made it into postseason play and are lead by former Texas Longhorns QB Garrett Gilbert. In the end I think this is a rather weak bowl matchup that should see the Mountain West newbies bully their way past the Mustangs of SMU.

Players to Watch

Fresno State: I have already mentioned his name, but he is probably known to most college fans due to his family ties rather than his outstanding play this year, Derek Carr (QB #4). He has a QB rating of 160.6 with 36 touchdowns and only 5 interceptions on the season, so look for him to be slinging the ball all over the field in Hawaii.

SMU: Zach Line, RB #48. This senior will hope to have a big impact in his last game for the Mustangs and he needs to if SMU are going to have any chance against the Bulldogs. It’s the age-old football story of keeping the ball out of the oppositions explosive offense’s hands, Line needs to pound the rock and take some of the pressure off of the shaky Gilbert.

My Pick: Fresno State.

Confidence: 29

Wednesday 26^th December

Western Kentucky vs Central Michigan

Little Caesars Bowl @ 00:30 on ESPN 

How do you choose between two average teams from the MAC and the Sun Belt conference? And no, it’s not a joke. For me, the schedules revealed a lot about both sides with Central Michigan having been beaten up by mostly running teams, whilst the Hilltoppers are a good running offence and have only lost to some of the countries surprisingly good teams this year. If it sounds like I’m clutching a little at straws here, it’s because I am, having not watched either of these teams this season I’m probably in the dark as much as you guys.

Players to Watch

Western Kentucky: Antonio Andrews, RB #5. The workhorse of the Western Kentucky offence, he has amassed 1609 yards on the ground as well as another 411 through the air, showing that he’s a big part of their game plan.

Central Michigan: Justin Cherocci, LB #41. The tackling machine in the Chippewa defense that needs to scythe down Andrews on every play, look for him to always be around the ball.

My Pick: Western Kentucky

Confidence: 3

College Bowl Season Week 2 Review

Thursday 20^th December

San Diego County Credit Poinsettia Bowl: BYU 23 – Sand Diego State 6

The undisputed player of the game; Kyle van Noy.

This game was intriguing to watch play out, it was a messy football for three quarters with the Aztecs looking good but unable to actually break the whitewash, whilst BYU looked sluggish and almost as if they didn’t want to be playing. But luckily for BYU, Kyle van Noy decided to take over the game and accounted for two touchdowns with both a fumble recovery after his own sack in the endzone as well as a pick six. In the end, the game itself won’t be memorable, but van Noy’s performance will be.

Player of the Game: Kyle van Noy. As previously mentioned he single headedly won the game for the Cougars, having a key punt block, big sacks and two scores on defence. A truly dominant performance!

Players to Watch: Ansah had a nice game with an interception as well a forced fumble. Outshone by van Noy in the end, but overall a solid showing. Muema was the only bright spot for the Aztecs on offence, despite not scoring, he had some excellent runs to really help his team out.

Pick: Correct – 6 confidence points won. Once again, my low confidence looked warranted as BYU were really poor to start with, but in the end I managed to pick up another win and kept adding to my points total.

Friday 21^st December

Beef ‘O’ Brady’s Bowl St. Petersburg: UCF 38 – Ball State17

In the end, Mr. Bortles was too much for Ball State to handle.

Despite my pick going the wrong way for me, this one was fun to watch. Bortles and UCF’s offence put on a show and ran the game from the get go, never giving the Cardinals a look in. If the Ball State's offence had shown some of their form from earlier in the season, the game could have been close, but credit UCFs defence for stifling them and holding Ball State to only 3 from 9 conversions on 3^rd down.

Player of the Game: Blake Bortles: His performance was head and shoulders above the rest as he threw 3 TDs and was also the teams leading rusher with 80 yards off of 9 carries with another score.

Players to Watch: As mentioned, Bortles put in the performance I expected but Ball State’s Edwards didn’t get enough of the ball to make a big impression on the game. I believe this was mainly due to his side playing from behind, but he did average 6.4 yards whilst only having 14 carries, so his production was quite good.

Pick: Wrong – 2 points lost. I felt like this one was a coin flip, hence only 2 points wagered on it, first loss of the bowl season for me.

Saturday 22^nd December

R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl: LA-Lafayette 43 – ECU 34
 

Despite a solid ECU performance, they trailed LA-La all game.

If I say that there were 45-second quarter points, I think that tells you roughly what you need to know! From 98 yard drives lead by the backup QB for the Ragin’ Cajuns to ECU’s Justin Hardy making a spectacular leaping catch for a touchdown, offensive junkies had a lot to digest. ECU dug themselves a bit of hole, making this game look like one to sleep on before rallying themselves and making a go at but coming up short in then end.

Player of the Game: For me, this could have gone to either Terrance Broadway or Alonzo Harris, but Broadway accounted for 426 yards and 2 scores whilst taking some real punishment, in my eyes, that’s player of the game worthy.

Players to Watch: Broadway certainly did me proud, but Hardy showed glimpses of what he could do without really taking over the game. Carden really shared the ball around the ECU offense so Hardy’s impact was limited, but he did show off his physical talent with the jump he made to haul in his touchdown.

Pick: Correct – 5 points won. My points looked safe early on before ECU found their groove, but UL-La rode the play of Broadway to give me another tick in my ESPN entry.

MAACO Bowl Las Vegas: Boise State 28 – Washington 26

"Wait, you're telling me we're playing them to kick off next year as well??"

The second instalment of bowl play on Saturday night turned out to be another evenly matched encounter that saw the Broncos of Boise narrowly edge the Huskies with a late field goal. There was plenty of trickeration from the Boise offence, which constantly kept the Huskie defence on their heels whereas Steve Sarkisian’s team relied on the more traditional run game, leaving Bishop Sankey to grind out plenty of yards. In the end, despite taking the lead in the fourth quarter for the first time, Washington gave up a big return on the ensuing kick, ultimately making the Broncos offence and Michael Frisina’s job of winning the game a lot easier.

Player of the Game: It’s hard to fault Joe Southwick’s performance, but despite being on the losing team, Bishop Sankey’s performance was the best of the day, keeping his team in the game with 205 yards and a touchdown.

Players to Watch: Sankey’s performance has already been mentioned, justifying my player to watch pick, but Demarcus Lawrence on the other hand let me down massively, so badly in fact that he did not play at all! He was suspended for a violation of team rules late in the week before the game, but at least I was right saying that he was a player to keep an eye on.

Pick: Correct – 18 points won. Boise seemed to be sailing to an 18-point gain for me, but Washington almost threw a spanner in the works at the end, my biggest haul of the bowl season so far!

Double Coverage Bowl Mania Standings after Week 2

With my correct picks in three out of the four games I amassed another 29 points to take my total to 44, but I am still languishing in fourth place. At the top of the league is Zinkus RTR with 71 points after the UCF win netted him 20 points. Next week sees 13 more games being played meaning that the league will really start to take shape.

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