Football Weekend Preview

I guess Bill Belichick will be fine without Charlie Weis and Romeo Crennel. Thursday night was “business as usual” for the Patriots, as New England opened the 2005 season with a 30-20 win over the Raiders.

Oakland took the opening kickoff and drove in for a TD, marking the first time New England had allowed an opening TD to an opponent, in 37 games! However, the defense calmed down after that, allowing only a 73-yard TD ‘bomb’ to Randy Moss in the second quarter and a conceding TD (with a 30-14 lead) with about three minutes left in the game. play. On offense, Brady threw for 306 yards with two TDs (no interceptions) and Dillon rushed for two touchdowns, despite rushing for just 63 yards.

New England has now won 35 of its last 39 games (counting the postseason), including 21 in a row at home! No team in the Super Bowl era has won three straight championships and in NFL history, only Lombardi’s Green Bay Packers have won three straight titles. Green Bay won the NFL title in 1965 and then went on to win the first two Super Bowls, following NFL title game victories in the 1966 and 1967 seasons. Can the Pats pull off three straight Super Bowls and four in five seasons this year?

I guess so, but these days it’s not easy to even make the playoffs year after year. New England has won three Super Bowls in four years, but in 2002, the Pats didn’t even make it to the postseason. Only three franchises have made it to the postseason in each of the last three years. Philadelphia tops the list with five straight playoff appearances, followed by Green Bay (four in a row) and Indianapolis (three in a row).

The Eagles finally broke their NFC title game hex last year, beating the Falcons 27-10 in the NFC Championship Game, where they had lost the previous three years. The Eagles are easily the best team in the NFC again this year, but they are faced with the fact that four straight losers and five of the last six Super Bowl losers failed to post winning records the following year!

The Bengals have the longest playoff drought, having last been in the postseason in 1990. They will enter the 2005 season on a 14-year playoff-less streak. Trailing behind Cincinnati is Arizona with six straight seasons out of the playoffs. Buffalo, Detroit, Jacksonville and Washington have missed the postseason in the last five years.

The San Diego Chargers ended an eight-year playoff drought last season, improving from 4-12 in 2003 to 12-4 in 2004. A turnaround like the one the Chargers experienced last year hasn’t exactly turned in the norm, but it is not a rarity either. .

Over a five-year period (2000-04), 25 of the 60 playoff entrants (41.7 percent) have been teams that were .500 or worse the year before. Along with San Diego last year, Atlanta (5-11 to 11-5), New York Jets (6-10 to 10-6) and Pittsburgh (6-10 to 15-1!) made the playoffs leaving a season without winning. Who will be this year’s surprise team?

Week 1 continues on Sunday with the main game with the Colts ‘visiting’ Baltimore to play the Ravens. For those of us who grew up with Johnny U, the Colts are NOT supposed to be the road team in a game played in Baltimore. Week 1 concludes with a rematch of the NFC Championship Game between the Eagles and the Falcons. However, this time the game is in Atlanta, not Philadelphia.

college football

Three games top the second Saturday of college football. No. 2 Texas will visit Columbus, Ohio to take on No. 4 Ohio State, No. 3 Michigan hosts No. 20 Notre Dame and No. 5 LSU, displaced by Hurricane Katrina, will play in Tempe against No. 15 Arizona State (instead of hosting the Sun Devils in Baton Rogue).

TEXAS in the STATE OF OHIO

Texas scheduled this game years ago and right now you may be wondering, “Why this year?” After Oklahoma’s pathetic season-opening performance against TCU, 2005 could be the year the Longhorns FINALLY beat the Sooners. A win over Oklahoma on Oct. 8 would make Texas one of the prohibitive favorites for a spot in this year’s Rose Bowl, but NOT if the Longhorns lose in Columbus. Ohio State is 6-1 SU under Tressel against the top 10 teams and this will be the school’s seventh night game at Ohio Stadium. In six previous “under the lights” games, OSU is 6-0 SU and ATS! As for Texas, the Longhorns haven’t lost a ‘true’ road game since a 42-38 loss in Lubbock against Texas Tech in 2002 (eight-game winning streak).

NOTRE DAME in MICHIGAN

Talk about an underdog series? The ‘dog’ is an amazing 14-2-1 ATS when Notre Dame and Michigan meet. Notre Dame opened with a 42-21 win at Pitt as the Irish topped 500 yards of offense with 33 FDs in Charlie Weis’ debut. Michigan’s defense hasn’t played well since the team’s eighth game last year. Since then, Michigan has allowed exactly 37 points to Michigan State, Ohio State and Texas, while two other teams, Northwestern and Northern Illinois (last week), have allowed more than 400 yards. In Michigan’s favor is a great offense of their own and a SU record of 14-0 in “the Big House” since installing their new artificial surface.

LSU in the STATE OF ARIZONA

Hurricane Katrina forced a venue change for this game, as LSU was scheduled to host the Sun Devils in Baton Rogue. Could the Pac-10 finally get “lucky” when it comes to a weather-related game changer? In 1998, a hurricane postponed UCLA’s game with Miami from early September to early December, when Miami was a much more polished team. UCLA’s loss in December of that year cost the undefeated Bruins a chance to play in the first BCS title game. Again last year, a hurricane pushed Cal’s game at Southern Miss to the end of the season and a closer-than-expected margin of victory in that game may have cost the Bears a trip to the Rose Bowl.

Is this the year it works in favor of the Pac-10? LSU is loaded and would have been a solid home favorite, but playing Tempe, the game is a toss-up. ASU now has its two biggest games of the year at home, Saturday night against LSU and an Oct. 1 matchup with USC.

CLOSING NOTE

Akron was the only MAC team not to play last weekend and Purdue was the only Big-10 team not in action. Akron has the distinction of being the only bowl-eligible team in 2004 (not suspended) that did NOT receive a bowl offer. Purdue was only 7-5 in 2005, but all five of the team’s losses came by a total of just 14 points! After opening the 2005 season 5-0, the Boilermakers lost consecutive games to Wisconsin (by three points), Michigan (by two), Northwestern (by two), and Iowa (by two). Purdue won its last two games of the regular season, but then lost to Arizona State in the Sun Bowl, 27-23.

If last week’s results are any indication, Purdue shouldn’t be too concerned about having a close game on Saturday. The MAC teams went 1-10 (3-6-1 ATS) last weekend, the only victory for Toledo over I-AA Western Illinois (62-14). The 10 losers allowed an average of 38.3 PPG! As for the Big-10 last week, the conference was a perfect 10-0 SU and 7-2-1 ATS.