After a long off-season since Ohio State were crowned national champions, football is only about a month away! Sunday’s are full of college ball in Australia, with games on ESPN basically all day. If you’re thinking of paying close attention but don’t know who to support, you’re in luck.
In Part One, I offered a few suggestions up based on offensive schemes, primarily a ground game or a passing attack. Part Two was all about powerhouse programs, traditional or emerging. And now, for Part Three.
Teams With Great Quarterbacks
Brigham Young: the Cougars opened 2014 with four straight wins, and the sky seemed to be the limit. Then, their do-it-all quarterback Taysom Hill was injured, out for the season, and the wheels well fell off. Prior to that injury, Hill had fifteen touchdowns to just three interceptions, and was completing his passes at about sixty-seven percent. Extrapolate those numbers out to a full season of, say, twelve or thirteen games, and they’re very compelling. Hill will be back and raring to go after a season’s worth of lay-off.
Texas Christian: Trevone Boykin is my pre-season Heisman Trophy favourite, and I’m definitely not alone in that train of thought. A stunning 2014 season saw Boykin throw for 3714 yards and thirty touchdowns, but he’s a dual-threat quarterback, and added a tick over six hundred rushing yards and eight more touchdowns. The Horned Frogs start the season ranked third nationally, and Boykin seems poised for a huge year.
California: the Golden Bears have emerging superstar Jared Goff lining up under centre for his third season in Berkeley, and his numbers to this point have been eye-popping. There’s a rich history of great quarterbacks in the Pac-12 but none have done what Goff did: pass for more than four hundred and fifty yards in a game five times. Not surprisingly considering that, Goff holds nineteen school records. He ranked top ten nationally in touchdowns, passing yards per game, points responsible for per game, completions per game, and passing yards total. Eye-popping stats, aren’t they? His numbers could get bigger and better this year.
Notre Dame: Malik Zaire is going to be big, according to all the trusted college football pundits. We saw him in relief of Everett Golson in the Music City Bowl, and it was an impressive sample size. Golson has since transferred to Florida State, likely because he saw the writing on the wall as far as Zaire being the starter. A four-star recruit, Zaire can throw it as well as Golson, and is, by all reports, a more committed and capable runner. He should absolutely thrive and prosper in Brian Kelly’s offensive scheme.
Baylor: granted, we haven’t seen a lot of Seth Russell, but when you consider the calibre of quarterbacks Art Briles has brought to the program in recent years, combined with the knowledge that Baylor boasts one of the deepest receiving corps in the country, and a very experienced offensive line, Russell looks set to shine. Starting quarterbacks at Baylor have thrown for at least 3500 yards each of the last five years. Ominous numbers.
Oregon: This one is my smoky. The Ducks lost Marcus Mariota to the NFL and will replace him in a rather unlikely manner, bringing in former Division II star Vernon Adams from Eastern Washington. Adams was twice runner up in the Walter Payton Award, the Division II/FCS version of the Heisman, and has a good track record playing against Division I/FBS schools. He’s torched Oregon State and Washington, throwing for more than 400 yards in both. A little undersized, yes, but a dynamic player with an experienced group of players around him, and he’s in that Oregon system now. You’ll want to keep an eye on Adams.
Teams Who Have A Great Home Ground
Clemson: the Tigers entrance to 81,473-seat Memorial Stadium is one of the most memorable in all of college football. It involves the players running down a hill, a tradition begun when the locker rooms were actually up behind the stadium, and rubbing Howard’s Rock on the way, as the Tiger band launches into Tiger Rag. In 1985, legendary broadcaster Brent Musburger called the entrance “the most exciting twenty-five seconds in college football!” The roar of the crowd when it happens is incredible.
Boise State: by no means the biggest or most historically important venue in the sport, but it is the only one with a bright blue field. In fact, Bronco Stadium was the first venue in the college game to have a non-green surface, painted end zones excepted. Recent renovations have the stadium notching a capacity of just over thirty-six thousand, but the atmosphere is such that it seems like double that number. Wonderful place to watch football!
Alabama: a graveyard for visiting teams historically and also recently, Bryant-Denny Stadium, named for a former school president and legendary coach Paul ‘Bear’ Bryant, is the eighth largest stadium in America, and easily top five in terms of most imposing. Fittingly, Bryant was 72-2 all time in the stadium named for him. It should be on any college football fan’s Bucket List. These days, you're almost guaranteed a Tide win. It takes a super-human effort from someone - I'm looking at you, Johnny Manziel - to beat them at home.
Ole Miss: Vaught-Hemingway Stadium is actually more famous for what goes on outside the field of play than what the Rebels have been known to do on it. Simply put, Rebels fans have gotten tailgating down to a fine art. The Grove, through the Walk of Champions arch entrance, is the hotspot, a ten acre heaven for more than 25,000 fans each home game. It’s not unusual to find things like fine China and chandeliers in some tents. And then there’s the ‘Hotty Toddy’ chant as the players swarm through The Grove on their way to the stadium– all of this before the game even kicks off! Ole Miss sits atop most lists as far as the best tailgating/game day experience goes.
Michigan: Michigan Stadium AKA the Big House is the largest venue in football. The stadium set a record with more than 115,000 fans packing in for a Wolverines game against their arch rivals, the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. It doesn’t look as big as other stadiums in the country, but fans are jammed in like sardines, so as long as you don’t mind being pretty close to your neighbours on either sides, you’ll do fine. Singing ‘The Victors’ with so many other people is pretty incredible. They’ve recently added lights, allowing Wolverines games to take place in primetime, and the stadium hosted the NHL Winter Classic outdoor game in 2014.
Texas A&M: home of the 12th Man, Kyle Field is bigger than ever in 2015, with renovations pushing the seating capacity over 102,000, though 110,631 were in attendance when Ole Miss visited A&M in October of 2014. Kyle Field is famous for it’s corps of cadets, who remain standing the entire game, after leading the ‘Midnight Yell’ the night before each home game, which attracts a crowd in excess of 25,000. Incredible spectacle!
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