Tagged: okstate

Week 1 Big 12 Picks

Vaqueros Victorioso!

Once again the season of happiness and joy is upon us! Life is a haze of stuff right now for me, as I’m working as a full-time copywriter with a pretty hefty commute, in addition to All That Other Stuff I Do. And, for those who don’t know, these picks are now coming to you from PAC-12 country. So we’ll see how that goes. Those eleven a.m. central time kick-offs are gonna be pretty early for me this season!

Brief recap of last year: my win/loss column last year finished out at 57-15 (.791), and I managed to nail the spread on the Bedlam game (my pick was 37-34, actual score: 38-35), which was probably my shining moment predicting things for pretty much ever.

Conference champ prediction: the smart money’s on TCU, and that’s who I’m going with. However, I think OSU’s schedule is perfectly set up for a run.

I see the conference finishing this way:

  1. TCU (11-1)
  2. Oklahoma State (10-2)
  3. Baylor (10-2, with losses to the above)
  4. Oklahoma  (8-4)
  5. Kansas State (8-4)
  6. West Virginia (7-5)
  7. Texas (6-6)
  8. Texas Tech (4-8)
  9. Iowa State (3-9)
  10. Kansas (2-10)

Anyhow! Let’s get to the picks.

THURSDAY

Oklahoma State 48, Central Michigan 13. Mason Rudolph and the Pokes will be way too much for the Chippewas. While I’m tempted to say that we’ll learn a few things from how, say, the running game produces with the heralded juco transfer Chris Carson toting the pigskin, or if OSU is able to score at will–but I won’t. First games don’t always say much about the teams that play them (see the Pokes’ last season opener in which they all but took Florida State down to the wire, and then proceeded to hit a five game losing streak during conference play). So I’m not sure we’ll know all that much after Saturday. Still–good teams make it look easy against inferior competition.

No. 2 Texas Christian 56, Minnesota 27. Though I fully expect to ultimately see Trevone Boykin and co. slash the Gophers’ throats, I would not be in the least surprised to see this game a little closer than comfortable at halftime. Just a hunch–and it doesn’t hurt that the game’s in Minneapolis.

FRIDAY

No. 4 Baylor 66, SMU 0. Do I need to say much more about this? This game is on a Friday night for a reason–there’s at least one high school-level team playing, and it ain’t Baylor.

SATURDAY

South Dakota State 13, Kansas 16. With the hiring of David Beaty, a new era has dawned in Lawrence. Unfortunately, it will not change the Jayhawks’ score deferential against FCS opponents any time soon.

Sam Houston State 14, Texas Tech 42. This is not going to be a good season for Tech. Tech is going to suck. Hopefully for Kliff Kingsbury’s outfit, it won’t be so readily apparent in game no. 1 as it was last year in their opening 42-35 victory over Central Arkansas. Hopefully.

Akron 10, No. 19 Oklahoma 56. Hand the ball to Perine, hand the ball to Perine, hand the ball to Perine–and this game should be fine. Interested to see who trots out under center for the Crimson-and-Cream.

South Dakota 7, Kansas State 45. The Wildcats shouldn’t have much trouble here, but it’ll be interesting to see who emerges for them as playmakers.

Texas 13, No. 11 Notre Dame 24. This kind of matchup makes me squirm inside to watch, as these are two of the most perennially overrated teams in the country. Oh, how much would it brighten the general perspective of Longhorn fans in general and Charlie Strong in specific if Texas could pull off a victory here? I think this one will be closer than the thirteen-point spread I’m predicting indicates.

Georgia Southern 3, West Virginia 49. Dana Holgerson is officially on the hot seat this year, and as much as I like him, I’m not sure if he’ll be around in Morgantown next season (although some prognosticators at ESPN seem to think WVU has a shot as a Big 12 dark horse, I’m afraid I don’t agree). However, none of that should impact WVU’s demolition of Georgia Southern.

Northern Iowa 12, Iowa State 16. Ah, Iowa State. It’s going to be a long year. Unlike KU, I actually feel bad for Cyclones’ fans.

Week 1 Big 12 Picks

Okay, folks. Last year was such a whirlwind–year two of grad school, starting a literary magazine, teaching college freshmens for the first time–that this blog fell by the wayside. While I can’t say that there’ll be much if anything in the way of day-in, day-out content posted here, I will say that I missed being able to weigh in on things. Hopefully, most fridays you’ll see a post here, and maybe even some postgame thoughts.

There’s a lot of horseshit out there when it comes to sports journalism, and when you’re a fan of a team that has often been one college football’s have-nots, in comparison to, say, OU or Texas or the entire ESPN SEC-propaganda machine, it can be kind of frustrating to watch the media crown teams that haven’t even played the games prematurely godlike. It can be very easy, while watching College Gameday to want to shake your firsts and scream HERBSTREIT I HATE YOU YOU ARE AN IDIOT.

I need a safe place to do this. And here it is.

Everybody’s got their picks. Hopefully, over the course of the season, this is where I’ll post mine. It’s a guilty pleasure, and I like to see if I can out-pick David Ubben, who is, in my opinion, the best journalist covering Big 12 football.

That said, let’s move on to this week’s picks.

North Dakota State 31, Iowa State 34. NDSU knocked of K-State last year in their opener, and, even though they’re one of the best FCS teams in the country, I think ISU will be ready for them. Particularly interested to see if Iowa State’s offense improves dramatically under the tutelage of former KU head coach Mark Mangino. I bet it does, though it may not show much in the opener.

No. 2 Alabama 45, West Virginia 23. I bet this one’s interesting at half-time, but I just don’t see it. Holgerson’s seat might be in ashes by the end of this year, but a good showing here would help. Don’t think it’s gonna happen.

TCU 35, Samford 3. Will TCU actually bring an offense to the table in year three of Big 12 membership? Will Trevone Boykin lineup behind center or at wideout? Could this matchup get any less interesting?

No. 4 Oklahoma 59, Louisiana Tech 10. The Sooners have a history of coming out flat in their season openers, flirting with disaster against UTEP in 2012 and snaking past Utah State in 2010 by a mere touchdown, but this group of land thieves won’t have any problem this weekend. Though I’d certainly be delighted if they did.

Texas 31, North Texas 17. This one, however, has trap game written all over it, and may be a tad closer than Horns fans would like to believe possible.

No. 20 Kansas State 48, SF Austin 6. After last year’s disaster against NDSU, the Snydercats will be ready. Perennially underrated, Snyder’s Jake Waters might just lead this team to a second Big 12 crown in three years if folks aren’t careful.

No. 10 Baylor 63, SMU 31. I know that this is technically a rivalry game, but wake me when Baylor actually schedules an interesting non-conference matchup. Their piddly scheduling wreaks of a time not too long ago when expectations for the Waco Baptists were piddly as well.

No. 1 Florida State 38, Oklahoma State 28. If you’ve been listening to people who talk about football talk about this game, when they talk about it they make it sound like the game’s over already. It’s not.  And maybe there’s a bit too much in the way of optimism here, but did anyone think FSU would lose to NC State in 2012? A lot of things will have to go right for the Pokes to keep it this close, but strange things happen on football fields. That’s why we watch the games.