Countdown: 69 Days!

69 Days

Memphis surprised people last year by making it to a bowl game. Unfortunately the Tigers fell to Sun Belt champs Florida Atlantic in the New Orleans Bowl. This year, Memphis is expected to build upon last year's successes. WR Duke Calhoun may be the most talented player in Conference USA.

All-Time greatest CFB helmets

If you're like me, you're totally awesome and your shit doesn't stink. Also, you like a good helmet design. I was looking through some old helmets and I accumulated my all-time favorite college football helmets.

I left the Gators off because even though I feel their helmet is the greatest ever I know I am blinded by bias. So enjoy this list and petition the schools involved to revert back to some of the old styles.

These are in no particular order.

I hate Notre Dame, and I really don't like Irish people, but even I know this helmet design kicks total ass. Notre Dame stopped sucking from 1959-1962 to wear these helmets. I'm sure they changed back because all of the pansy ass traditionalists wanted to switch back to the plain boring gold design.

I still don't like Auburn, and I still think their logo is weak. But that orange face mask with the lighter shade of blue stripe makes the helmet design pretty sweet.

Hawaii may have had one of the worse nicknames ever with the Rainbow Warriors, but that didn't stop them from sporting this sweet ass helmet design from 1978-1981. Yeah there's a rainbow on the helmet, which should never be allowed in football, but hey, it was the 70's.

Virginia rocked the shit out of this helmet design from 1982-1983. Personally I don't see how something this awesome only lasted 2 years. The state of Virginia always produces some top-notch uniformage (yeah I just made that word up but it's a pretty bad-ass word, I'm on the phone with Webster's now.) The Virginia Squires have one of my all-time favorite basketball uniforms and the Washington Redskins throwbacks were sweet, that is until the Seminoles absolutely jacked their idea. Bitches....



Long Beach State's football program is now defunct. Clearly it wasn't because of these shit-handling helmets. This design was worn from 1986-1991. I might be a little partial to this design because I'm a San Francisco 49ers fan. I think the NFL 'Niners should change their color schemes and switch to these bad boys.



Growing up in Louisiana I always wanted to go to Grambling. It was mainly because of their helmets and uniforms. Black, Red and Yellow?! That is some hardcore gangsternator shit. Of course all my hopes and dreams of attending Grambling were crushed when my dad informed me it was a historically black school and I was not black. Both came as devastating blows to my aspirations.



Eastern Michigan sported this helmet design from 1967-1975. The then Eastern Michigan AD felt that the helmets were too awesome for the schools shitty on-field performance. He therefore retired this design in favor of the boring ass logo that was to define the program from there on out. I really don't know what the design on this helmet is. It looks like a picture riddle. If you look at it like this it's an E. However, when you turn the helmet (or when an EMU player was knocked on his ass) the design suddenly became a M. Clever.



The Memphis Tigers wore this helmet during the 1988 and 1989 seasons. I really don't know why I like this helmet that much. I think it's because it looks like a design I could come up with. When I was younger, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers had a contest to create their new unis. I made a helmet that looked like this except there was a T instead of a Tiger. I got a letter from the NFL saying my design was too good to be ruined by being placed on the side of some jackass Buccaneer player's head. My draft is now in the Smithsonian at the weapons of mass destruction exhibit.


All of my friend's hated this helmet design when the Aztecs unveiled it in 2002. I think it's a good design. I like how the black fades into the red of the helmet. It's too bad San Diego St. had to compete with the all time greatest football unis, the powder blue Chargers, because this design was overlooked.





I'm not too big on the traditional plain helmet designs. However, Washington's helmet is my favorite current helmet in college football. The purple W on top of the gold paint just looks fresh. That's fresh in a pimp kinda way.


Louisiana-Lafayette groin kicked the competition in the late 80's to mid 90's with this helmet design. Of course, back then the program was known as Southwestern Louisiana. I'm a little partial to this helmet because I'm Cajun. Everyone knows about the Irish football team, few know about the Cajun one. I don't like the fact that ULL added the Ragin' to their helmet. This implies that Cajuns can't spell and are always pissed off. These are both true for the most part, but I just don't like it being implied by a helmet.


Richmond used this script design from 1989-1994. The Spiders now rock possibly one of the worse helmets in CFB with that stupid little spider design. This script design was pretty cool because it make you think, If a spider could write, I bet he would write like that.

For more helmet design check this out

Big East Expansion?

Big East commissioner Mike Tranghese announced that he is retiring from his position after the season. Tranghese saw the Big East make tremendous strides during his tenure despite the departure of Miami, Virginia Tech and Boston College to the ACC. The Big East also added South Florida, Cincinnati, Louisville and Connecticut as well as booted out Temple in recent years.

I got to thinking, Why doesn't the Big East expand to 12 teams so they can have a championship game? The big East catches a lot of heat because they're champion isn't decided through a conference title game.

Their situation is different than that of the Big Ten and PAC-10 because their teams do no have the name recognition and tradition as those programs.

I believe I have selected four schools that would make good additions to the conference. They are listed below along with their record since 2005 (when USF, Louisville and Cincy were added.)

1. Central Florida- Their record since 2005 is 22-17. They have a big name coach in George O'Leary and are located in a recruiting hot bed. If the Knights were elevated to a bigger conference they could see a similar success as their rival South Florida has seen in recent years.

2.Memphis- Their record since 2005 is 16-21. That number is somewhat skewed by an out of character 2-10 season 2 years ago. Memphis has always been able to get top talent recruits that slip through the cracks or don't qualify academically elsewhere. Memphis' induction into the football conference could be boosted by their basketball program which is looking to join the Big East.

3.Southern Miss- Their record since 2005 is 23-18. The Golden Eagles have always been well respected as a non-BCS school. With a recent stadium upgrade, Southern Miss could have one of the premiere facilities in the Big East.

4.Navy- Their record since 2005 is 25-13. Army made a disastrous attempt to play in a conference when they spent 3 years in C-USA. This would be different. Navy has clearly shown that they are the class of the service academies. Air Force is in the Mountain West, so I see no reason why Navy can't join a conference.

While I'm on the subject, I feel there should be no more independents. Notre Dame should join the Big Eleven, Army should join back with C-USA (especially since I'm proposing the Big East take 3 of their teams) and Western Kentucky is actually already committed to join the Sun Belt.

To see how these teams would stack up against the current Big East, here are the teams' records since 2005.

1. West Virginia 33-5
2. Louisville 27-10
3. Rutgers 26-12
4. South Florida 24-14
5. Cincinnati 22-15
6. Connecticut 18-18
7. Pittsburgh 16-19
8. Syracuse 7-28

So, in the past five years, Central Florida would have been the 6th best team, Memphis would be 8th, Southern Miss would be 5th and Navy would be 4th.

Another reason for the expansion would be the fact that the Big East now has 7 bowl tie-ins. That is a ridiculous amount for a conference that only has 8 teams. Only 6 teams qualified last year with 5 of them receiving bids.

With this expansion, the conference would have to be split into two divisions. Here's how it could look

North

1. Rutgers
2. Navy
3. Cincinnati
4. Connecticut
5. Pittsburgh
6. Syracuse

SOUTH

1. West Virginia
2. Louisville
3. South Florida
4. Southern Miss
5. Central Florida
6. Memphis

That seems like a pretty decent conference to me.

Also, imagine where the championship games could be played. I don't think any other conference could play their title game in cities like New York, Philadelphia, Boston or Baltimore. They also would be able to pick form the usual hot spots of title games like Tampa, Charlotte or Miami.

On the come up

I am a pretty big optimists. I usually feel that every team has a good chance to improve upon the previous year's performance. Of course this is total bullshit. We all know there will be teams that will blow like they always do.



To stop myself from giving you a huge list of teams I feel will be improving this year, I figured I would break it down by conference.



So here are the teams that will improve the most by conference.



ACC



North Carolina- The Tar Heels already showed signs of improving last season. With a full season at the helm, Butch Davis will have a much better grasp on his team than he did going into last year. Hakeem Nicks is one of the best wideouts in the nation and he will have a talented T.J. Yates to get the ball to him. Anthony Elzy and Greg Little form a powerful duo in the backfield as well.





Big XII



Texas Tech- I know Tech had a great year last season, but I expect them to have an even better one this year. Graham Harrell is already a record holder for a school that does nothing but produce record breaking QB's, and he will once again be throwing to receiver of the year Michael Crabtree. Ruffin McNeil already has the defense headed in the right direction. If the D improves, the Red Raiders could be in the hunt for a conference crown.





Big East



Pittsburgh- The Panthers ended last season on a high note by defeating rival West Virginia and knocking them out of the NC picture. Dave Wannstedt is returning his best team sine he's been at the helm. LeSean McCoy is one of the best running backs in the nation. Derek Kinder and Oderick Turner are back at WR, and Pat Bostick and Bill Stull are both capable QB's that are available to start.





Big Ten



Michigan St.- The Spartans will definitely be the best team in their state this season. They will also have a shot at being one of the better teams in the Big Eleven. Javon Ringer is one of the better players in the conference at any position. What could make or break this season for MSU will be their defense. I expect them to field one of the better defenses in the Big Eleven, which should help them rise through the ranks.





C-USA



Memphis- Memphis started off very slow last year. Couple that with low expectations and you can see why fans started to turn on Tommy West and his team. However, the Tigers turned it around and improved drastically as the season went on. Earning a New Orleans Bowl berth. Unfortunately Memphis was throttled by Sun Belt champ Florida Atlantic. Memphis returns Duke Calhoun at the receiver position as well as a stout defense. I bowl better than the New Orleans Bowl should be in store for the Tigers.





MAC



Ball St.- Nate Davis and Dante Love form one of the better aerial duos in the nation. This alone makes them one of the favorites to win the pass-happy MAC. Unfortunately the Cardinals are stuck in the MAC West with Central Michigan. It should come down to those two, and with Davis running the show, I wouldn't count Ball St. out.





Mountain West



Utah- BYU should breeze through the Mountain West this season up until the Holy War against the Utes. I would not be surprised if Utah would pull that one out. You never know what will happen in rivalry games. Brian Johnson is back at QB to lead the offense with his arm and his feet. The Utes defense will be tough once again with defensive-minded Kyle Wittingham at head coach.





PAC-10



Washington- The Huskies have been inching toward respectability since Tyrone Willigham took over. The Huskies were in the game against both Ohio St. and USC last season until they folded down the stretch. This figures to be a make or break year for the coach so the Huskies will have extra incentive. If QB Jake Locker can remain healthy, Washington's chances at a bowl are vastly improved.




SEC

Ole Miss- The Rebels were horrible under Ed Orgeron. Fortunately for new coach Houston Nutt, Orgeron was an excellent recruiter. There is ample talent in Oxford(and for once I'm not talking about the ladies.) Nutt is a great coach, and he will get this thing turned around quicker than most people think. Texas transfer Jevan Snead is the new QB and he will have some talented receiver to throw to, including Mike Wallace and Marshay Green.


Sun Belt

Louisiana-Monroe- Florida Atlantic is still too tough for anyone to unseat them as kings of the conference no one cares about, but the War Hawks have a shot to unseat Troy as number two in the Sun Belt. Monroe was a totally different team at the end of last year compared to the beginning. They ended the season with tremendous momentum thanks to the stunning win at Alabama. Veteran coach Charlie Weatherbie called the win the biggest of his career. The War Hawks do lose starting tailback Calvin Dawson, but they also return All-WAC caliber Kinsmon Lancaster at QB. Lancaster is a playmaker with bot his arm and legs.


WAC

Louisiana Tech- All the focus in the WAC this year is on Fresno St. and Boise St., as it should be. Watch out for these Bulldogs though. Derek Dooley is a tough-minded coach that has finally gotten his players to buy into his approach. Georgia Tech transfer Taylor Bennett is immediately available to start the season. That should help the pain of losing Zac Champion at QB. I expect Louisiana Tech to make a bowl game this season. That is a big turnaround from previous seasons.