Trent's Touchdown - Week 14

Oh my God, it all comes down to this. After 13 weeks of utter madness, we come to the final week of the year, with 7 BCS Bowl bids up for grabs (Ohio State, West Virginia, and USC are definitely going). Let’s not discount anything this final week. Especially after LSU lost to Arkansas (which, despite what I said last week, shocked me). Remember, FOX has the BCS Selection Show at 8PM on Sunday night. On to the match-ups:

1) The Big 12 Championship Game - Oklahoma (9) vs. Missouri (1) (at San Antonio) (8:00 on ABC) – Missouri is the number 1 team in the BCS, yet they are underdogs to Oklahoma. If you think about it, Missouri really should have beaten Oklahoma in there first meeting, but all that matters is the W. Missouri is a better team that finally had the opportunity to showcase their talent against Kansas last weekend. Plus, I seriously think that Missouri had a tougher schedule than Oklahoma. Now, before you get all riled up, I think Oklahoma is a good team, but they are not great. Everyone wants to make Oklahoma something they aren’t. Missouri is just a better team, and they should win (I can’t believe I actually like a Big 12 team not lead by Major Applewhite).

2) The SEC Championship Game - Tennessee (14) vs. LSU (7) (at Atlanta) (4:00 on CBS) – I can’t believe Tennessee actually went to the SEC Championship Game with Erik Ainge as the QB. This would be like Peyton Manning beating Florida during his tenure. It’s unheard of. Anyway, this game should feature LSU and Georgia, but for some reason, Georgia tanked to Tennessee earlier in the season. Of course Georgia is now fourth in the BCS, but that’s not the point. I only trust Tennessee when I look at the final score and they are listed as the winner. Then you have LSU. They were ranked number 1 two separate times this year and then lost games they should have won (the OT losses to Kentucky and Arkansas). This could be for any number of reasons, but I think the Kentucky game was a trap game and the Arkansas loss was due to the Les Miles to Michigan distraction. The distraction is still there and Tennessee could win this one.

3) The ACC Championship Game – Virginia Tech (6) vs. Boston College (11) (at Jacksonville) (1:00 on ABC) – If this rematch is anything like the regular season game these two played, it’ll be very close and Matt Ryan will lose his lunch on the sidelines (yes, still bitter about Clemson). In the last game, VT left Tyrod Taylor on the bench, but BC won’t be that lucky again. VT is all about playing the game and finding a way to win the big games. I do not expect VT to lose again, if only because they will do all the little things they need to do and won’t make dumb mistakes.

4) Pittsburgh at West Virginia (2) (7:45 on ESPN) – The reason this goes here is because West Virginia needs to win go to the BCS title game. This is something I picked last year for WVU, but I was dumb. The old saying is you can throw out records when it comes to rivalry games, but WVU should thrash Pitt, and do it with style. Pitt can’t run with WVU, they can’t even run with the team at my old high school, and they sucked.

5) UCLA at USC (8) (4:30 on ABC) – Remember last year when everyone was waiting to announce the USC/Ohio State National Championship Game and then USC went and doused their drawers against UCLA? That should have been everyone’s first hint that USC was a flawed team and John David Booty is a flawed QB. USC has back-doored their way to the Pac-10 championship by taking advantage of Dennis Dixon’s ACL and an overmatched ASU team. USC is not that great, and now I’m going to have to watch a Rose Bowl with an overrated Ohio State team that had a schedule that was easier than Britney Spears on a bender, and USC, which got there because some guy blew out his ACL. That doesn’t sound like fun to me.

6) Navy vs. Army (at Philadelphia) (12:00 on CBS) – I’m including this for two reason. One, it’s a tradition. Two, Bill Belichick said that is was the best game of the year, and when has he ever been wrong…..about football. Navy will win.

Extra Point:

7) For one of the very few years in existence, the BCS has it right. Missouri and West Virginia deserve to play in the National Championship Game. Now, don’t get me wrong, these are by no means the two best teams in the Nation, but they have don’t something no other team could do. They won when it counted. Can you think of another team that deserves it? Ohio State has a horrid schedule. Georgia can’t even get into the SEC Championship Game. Kansas lost to Missouri and has a cupcake schedule. Everyone else has two losses. Now, if one of them loses, then that opens the door for controversy. Also, it opens the door for more playoff talk. Isn’t that what we all want? Of course, with the playoff, we wouldn’t have the ability to bitch about how the BCS sucks. But we would get to complain about the bubble team that doesn’t get into the playoff. In this case, everyone is a winner.