Baylor Screwed Themselves

It will be interesting to see if Baylor can keep humming along this season with tonight's game in Stillwater. An impressive victory along with their already impressive season will prove that the Bears deserve a national title shot this season. But, being that we all know that only two teams can go, if Baylor finishes the regular season undefeated and still does not get a BCS championship game berth, then the only people to blame would be their coaching staff and athletic administration for the team's September out-of-conference schedule (Wofford, Buffalo, Louisiana Monroe). Lousy out of conference scheduling was a theme this season with fingers finally beginning to point at SEC programs and more emphatically at Louisville (do you remember when they were a national title contender?) and Ohio State. But Baylor was under the radar at the beginning of the season and only brought attention to themselves by scoring 69, 70 and 70 in the three games mentioned above. Now Baylor had not originally scheduled Wofford, currently 5-5 overall and fourth in the Southern Conference, but when SMU cancelled their meeting with Baylor earlier this year the Bears were left scrambling. That's understandable, but SMU, who themselves played Texas Tech, Texas A&M and TCU before beginning conference play, would have sounded a little better than Wofford but are currently 4-5 and would have done nothing to change the appearance of Baylor looking to avoid anyone who could challenge them prior to conference play. That's nothing against either program, or solid Buffalo and Louisiana Monroe programs, but Baylor's on-the-rise program needed a statement September victory. Actually, so too Louisville and that would have been a much-anticipated early-season contest. The Cardinals played Ohio, Eastern Kentucky, Kentucky and FIU instead and not one college football fan cared, even with Kentucky. Baylor probably would have won that game and would be sitting much better now. But at least Baylor crushed the lesser programs on their schedule, including conference lowlights West Virginia, Iowa State, KU and Oklahoma (just kidding Sooner fans!). Ohio State played a weak schedule and did not even look good against most of it, including teams like Cal and Illinois that just are not very good. If Baylor wins out then they should be ahead of Ohio State and ready to pounce if Alabama and Florida State falter.

Tonight's Pick

What have we learned so far this young 2011 season? If you have dreams of BCS games dancing in your head, it is prudent to schedule Cupcake U. opening week. Oregon, Notre Dame, TCU and Georgia would all have been better off facing weaker competition this weekend. All four of those teams made the kind of mistakes that one could expect this early in the season. And while it is true that their opponents were in a similar boat, the reality is that most of the Top 25 played someone they could beat even if they played poorly. And compounding the issue for the four mentioned week one losers is that they do not even have a cupcake scheduled for week two, and so to avoid falling to 0-2 Oregon must beat Nevada, ND has to win a night game in Ann Arbor, TCU must win at Air Force and Georgia has to beat South Carolina.
Today I love SMU getting 15 points from an over-rated Texas A&M squad.