Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Monday Morning Hangover...(Part 1)

Lots of action in sports this weekend I am going to jump right into it and talk some college football to start things off this week. Week 13 was a big weekend for college football, as there are only a couple of weeks left in the season and a National Title birth is still up for grabs. In action this week WVU readily handled Uconn 66-21 to win the Big East crown and guarantee a BCS bowl bid. WVU was looking sharp on both sides of the ball, and Pat White was just too much for the Uconn defense to handle as he ran for nearly 200 yards. This win puts WVU in the driver’s seat to make a run at the National Championship.

Also, it didn’t hurt that WV received a little help from some other teams on Friday and Saturday. On Saturday, the #2 team in the nation once again suffered a loss. This time it was #4 Missouri beating up Big12 rival Kansas, 36 to 28. (note from Diego: when did these teams get good at football?) The Kansas loss was big for WVU but even bigger was Arkansas, who knocked off the #1 team in the land, LSU, in a thrilling triple OT victory on Friday afternoon. Due to the turn of events this weekend, Missouri (11-1) took over as the #1 ranked team and WVU (10-1) jumped up to #2 in both the AP and BCS polls. Missouri and WVU both have only one game remaining on their schedules with Missouri facing a tough Oklahoma team in the Big 12 championship, and WVU locking it up with Pitt for the 100th anniversary of the Backyard Brawl.

Speaking of Pitt they lost again this weekend, this time to South Florida. Pitt actually was playing some aiite ball in the first half and they even managed to take a 14-10 lead into halftime at Heinz Field Saturday. Pitt’s defense came apart on the first play of the second half, when South Florida QB Matt Grothe outran all 12 men on the field for Pitt and scored on a 80 yards TD run. Bostick had a decent day passing for nearly 300 yards, but his 3 interceptions proved to be too costly for Pitt. The final score was 48-37. Shady Mc Coy was once again the bright spot for Pitt as he led the team in receiving and rushing yards, and also managed to get 3 TD’s on the ground eclipsing Tony Dorsett’s freshman record of 13.

(Pic from viewimages.com)

Will the real Shady please stand up?

Pitt has a chance to play spoiler and ruin WVU’s shot at the National Championship when these two teams meet at 8:30 Saturday night in West Virginia. Although Pitt has been looking more improved week after week they’re going to need a near perfect game to take out the #2 team in all the land. Also, the Pitt defense will have its hands full, to say the least, when it comes to stopping the potent offense of the Mountaineers. If Pitt had trouble stopping Grothe this past weekend they are surely going to have a problem with Heisman candidate Pat White this weekend.

(Pic from sportsillustrated.cnn.com)

Pat White will have the Panthers seeing red...

In my opinion, I hope WV does win (I’m still a Pitt supporter but come on gimmee a break it would be good for the Big East to be represented in the National Championship and Pitt isn’t even gonna make a bowl game this year). Also, I hope that Oklahoma can knock off Missouri. This would leave us with Ohio St. versus WVU for the National title, or how I like to refer to it, the Terrelle Pryor Bowl.

Saturday night was hockey night in Pittsburgh and Snack and Diego managed to score some seats in the club level west right at mid ice, I know people I’m a pretty big deal. Anyway the seats were really great, but the game itself was even better. The Pens seemed to carry over the momentum from their thrilling 6-5 shootout victory on Thanksgiving against the Senators. Everyone out on the ice seemed to be soaring around to the puck and the Pens unquestionably dominated play all night in this one. Therrien once again shook up the lines, putting Crosby, Armstrong, and Malone on the top line. This change was working nicely Saturday night as Crosby, Armstrong, and Malone looked to be playing with a lot of chemistry.

This game was huge for some players who had been recently in a slump. Three of these players were Armstrong, Staal, and Fleury. Staal and Armstrong ended long goal droughts by both scoring their second goal’s of the season in this game. With any luck, this will have a positive effect on both players giving them more confidence going into the next game. The same goes for the Flower, who managed to make a bunch of good saves while compiling 28 total and not letting in a goal for the second time this season. Good to see the Pens getting it together with this 5-0 win and two game win streak. Also a good sign is that their scoring has increased, with 10 goals in the last two games. Only unfortunate situation is that we don’t play again until Friday against a hot Dallas team, but as long as they keep playing like they did last week we will be good.

Part 2 coming soon...


No comments: