College Football Week 2 Awards 2013 September 9, 2013

(Note:  All rankings are current AP [week 2] unless otherwise noted.)

COACHES
Wish I were him: Brady Hoke, Michigan

Glad I’m not him: Tommy Tuberville, Cincinnati
Lucky guy: Mike Leach, Washington State
Poor guy: Lane Kiffin, USC
Desperately seeking a wake-up call: Kevin Wilson, Indiana
Desperately seeking a P.R. man: Dave Clawson, Bowling Green

Desperately seeking sunglasses and a fake beard: Mack Brown, Texas
Desperately seeking … anything:  Ron Turner, Florida International

TEAMS
Thought you’d kick butt, you did: No. 23 Baylor (defeated Buffalo 70-13)
Thought you’d kick butt, you didn’t: Michigan State (defeated South Florida 21-6)
Thought you’d get your butt kicked, you did: Virginia (lost to Oregon 59-10)

Thought you’d get your butt kicked, you didn’t:  South Florida (lost to Michigan State 21-6)
Thought you wouldn’t kick butt, you did:  Kentucky (defeated Miami (OH, 41-7)

Dang, they’re good: Oregon
Sir Charles says “They’re Turrable”:  Buffalo
Can’t Stand Prosperity:  Texas

Did the season start?  Florida
Can the season end?  San Diego State
Can the season never end?  Michigan

GAMES
Play this again:  No. 11 Georgia 41, No. 6 South Carolina 30

Play this again, too:  No. 17 Michigan 41, No. 11 Notre Dame 30
Never play this again: Boise St. 63, Tennessee-Martin 14

What? Illinois 45, Cincinnati 16

Huh?  Miami (FL) 21, No. 12 Florida 16
Are you kidding me?  Navy 41, Indiana 35
Oh – my – God:  BYU 40, No. 15 Texas 21

NEXT WEEK

(rankings are current AP (post-week 2, pre-week 3)
Ticket to die for:  No. 1 Alabama @ No. 6 Texas A&M

Best non-Big Six vs. Big Six matchup: Virginia Tech @ East Carolina
Best non-Big Six matchup: Marshall @ Ohio U

Upset alert: No. 25 Ole Miss @ Texas

Must win: Vanderbilt @ No. 13 South Carolina

Offensive explosion: Fresno State @ Colorado
Defensive struggle: Iowa @ Iowa State
Great game no one is talking about: No. 16 UCLA @ No. 23 Nebraska

Intriguing coaching matchup: Gary Patterson of No. 24 TCU vs. Kliff Kingsbury of Texas Tech

Who’s bringing the body bags? No. 21 Notre Dame @ Purdue

Why are they playing? Lamar @ No. 12 Oklahoma State

Plenty of good seats remaining: Florida Atlantic @ South Florida

They shoot horses, don’t they?  Nicholls @ Louisiana-Lafayette

Week 2 in Review:

Two really good games followed each other consecutively in South Carolina @ Georgia followed by Notre Dame @ Michigan.  In the case of the former, the Gamecocks’ season is not lost by losing to a tough Bulldogs squad who had their collective backs against the wall after blowing the season opener on the road to perhaps the best Clemson team that school’s history.  Conversely, had Georgia lost two games in a row to start off their season, no matter if they won out for the remaining weeks, the season, by team’s and fans’ standard would have been clearly lost.

In the case of the latter, some degree of poetic justice was achieved in the Wolverine’s victory over the Fighting Irish.  It is understandable why Notre Dame saw fit not to renew the rivalry on their schedule, what with trying to broaden their geographic outreach into the recruiting hotbeds, which, to remind certain fanbases, are NOT in the Midwest anymore (Ohio notwithstanding, to an extent, but Ohio State owns that anyhow, and should). But that does not obfuscate the other understandable situation where the Michigan fanbase feels snubbed by a team that still acts as though it is “above it all.”  Did I say “poetic justice”?  How about vindication?

Meanwhile, going forward, it is worth pointing out that when it comes to the prognostications for the upcoming week, the two most difficult things to predict are the offensive explosion and the defensive struggle.  The Michigan-Notre Dame game certainly did not live up to the latter billing (41-30); neither did the West Virginia-Oklahoma game (16-7).  One should have reversed those two games into opposite categories, and then we would have had something (in 20-20 hindsight, at least)!

Oh, and the latest news has it that Texas’ defensive coordinator Manny Diaz has taken the fall for the Longhorns’ ignominious loss to unranked BYU.  The Horns gave up a school record 550 rushing yards on defense.  This means that even though Texas had some very bad teams in the 1980s and some of the 1990s, even they did not give up that much yardage on the ground in a game.  Something obviously had to be done.  Mack Brown has appointed Greg Robinson (former Syracuse head coach – one of those guys who is better as a vice president than as a chief executive) as the new defensive coordinator, a role that he actually already served in for the team in 2004 (that same team that came back to beat Michigan in the Rose Bowl).  On paper, it is a good hire; time will tell if what is on paper will manifest in reality.  But regardless, it’s still a step up from the inept display the Longhorn Nation had to endure yesterday.