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wPride Of The Fall |
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If Baseball is America's Pastime, Football is its Heartbeat.
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w8.15.2002 |
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All That Matters: The Pride's Top 5
What joy does it provide to know that your team is ranked 16th? What is the difference between #14 and #22? Time? Distance? Exposure? Such is the way with the major college polling apparatuses, uniquely able to tell you who is #1 but forced to arrange deck chairs so everyone has a seat at the table. Limiting my slots to 5 teams keeps the margin for error relatively narrow. Plus, it also hits upon the name and teams that you know the most. This is not meant to discount the teams that I don't put here. Indeed, as Colorado, Fresno State, and LSU proved last year, surprises are not spontaneous, they are created.
This season offers both the fresh and the familiar -- empires resurgent yet established, expectant but surprising. The five baronies that occupy the preseason poll may falter and be replaced by others. However, for now, they have earned a comfortable seeding.
#5 -- TENNESSEE
#4 -- FLORIDA STATE
#3 -- TEXAS
#2 -- OKLAHOMA
#1 -- MIAMI
The Hurricanes stormed to the mythical and Sears-sponsored national championship last season, and this year again field a team that is studded with NFL talent on both sides of the ball. This secures them the top spot, as the men in orange and green ride the ibis, with the wind of their brash predecessors of the 1980s blowing them along. Oklahoma, the 2000 champion, won the huge games against Texas and Kansas State last year, only to buckle to Nebraska and lethargically slip away against Oklahoma State in the season finale. The OU defense seemed to right the ship in the 2002 Cotton Bowl against Arkansas, and headlines this year's squad. Big 12 South rival Texas yearns to return to the pastures of the elite, but so far has flirted with greatness during Mack Brown's tenure as head coach. The offense, led by QB Chris Simms, is one of the nation's best. They can control the vertical through receivers BJ Johnson and Roy Williams, and the horizontal on the legs of RB Cedric Benson. However, the road to the national championship must go through the OU showdown in Dallas and a trip to Lincoln to face a weakened but capable Nebraska squad.
Florida State and Tennessee chafe at disappointing seasons. After an 8-4 "disaster," the 'Noles figure prominently in the ACC race, overloaded with talent and youthful vigor. Tennessee could smell the Roses in the SEC Championship game, but its loss to LSU sent them returning to the familiar orchards of the Citrus Bowl. A crushing dismemberment of Michigan helped rejuvenate enthusiasm, and QB Casey Clausen should have a stellar year.
Yet still others clamor for respect and others must defend what belongs to them. Colorado and Oregon look to play spoiler by simply defending the Big 12 and Pac-10 titles, hardware acquired through hard work and monumental play down the stretch. Virginia Tech seeks to be the antidote to the Miami juggernaut. Nebraska, having suffered the worst sequence of football in the program's history, must regroup in the unforgiving confines of the Big 12 North Division. The Florida Gators, led by new headman Ron Zook, surely can still smell the blood of its SEC rivals in the water.
Here is the silence of the pads. The commentariat offers its opinions on the upcoming season, yet the players have not had their chance to settle the issue on the field. Soon, the aspirants will make their move. And the 5 must survive the onslaught.
posted by
Lorenzo at 8/15/2002 03:04:00 PM
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