After Texas A&M’s narrow escape last weekend over Fresno State, Brett Zwerneman of the San Antonio Express-News continues to lead the chorus (see earlier posts here and here) that doubts A&M football coach Dennis Franchione is going to produce a serious Big 12 South contender in Aggieland:

How did it come to a triple-overtime game against a smaller program that finished 4-8 last season? The Aggies, however, did double up on Franchione’s oft-stated goal of simply scoring one more point than their opponent. [. . .]
The No. 25 Aggies had better progress in a hurry, however, if they’re to compete for their first Big 12 title in nearly a decade. A&M is lucky Bulldogs receiver Marlon Moore tried sticking the ball out for a touchdown ó resulting in a fumble ó during Saturday’s first overtime. Texas A&M Otherwise, the Aggies would be 1-1, and Franchione might’ve had a tough time holding on to his gig ó during the season.
A road game at Miami looms Sept. 20, with contests later in the season at Texas Tech, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Missouri, comprising A&M’s rockiest schedule since the league started play in 1996.
The above games are supposed to be tough. Fresno State wasn’t. [. . .]
Franchione is a mediocre 27-23 through 50 games at A&M, but this was supposed to be the season that his veteran squad finally emerged as a true threat in the league.
Instead, all of the old questions about A&M’s direction are bubbling to the surface. As one frustrated A&M graduate put it, Franchione was hired to close the gap with Texas and OU, not Baylor and Iowa State. [. . .]
Franchione, 56, already owns the worst overall loss and the two worst bowl losses in school history over his previous four seasons.

But hey, even if the Aggie football team is not top ten caliber, the Fightin’ Texas Aggie Marching Band is!

AP Photo/David J. Phillip
Texans 20 Chiefs 3

Pinch yourself. The Houston Texans have won three straight regular season NFL games (previous weekly summaries are here).
The Texans (1-0) took advantage of four turnovers and a tepid Kansas City offense to win their season opening game for only the second time in franchise history. The Texans defense, which is the area of the team that clearly has the most potential, held the Chiefs to 219 yards total offense and DE Mario Williams returned one of the KC fumbles 38 yards for an early third quarter TD that put the Texans up 17-0. Meanwhile, the Texans offense was not great, but it was better than the Chiefs’ offense. QB Matt Schaub guided that unit to 315 yards total offense, including a 77 yard TD bomb to WR Andre Johnson. Schaub was 16-22 passing for 225 yards in his Texans debut, including the TD pass to Johnson and a first quarter interception in the Texans end zone. The Texans face a stiffer test on the road next Sunday against Carolina (1-0), whose back-up QB is the Texans fromer QB, David Carr.

Texas Longhorns 34 TCU 13

The Horns (2-0) pulled away late in a game that was closer than the final score indicates. Texas was down 10-7 late in third quarter when the sloppy kicking game of TCU (1-1) scuttled the Horned Frogs’ dreams of a defining win and BCS bowl contention. After the Longhorns tied the game at 10, a TCU fumble on the ensuing kickoff was recovered by Texas on the Horned Frog 26 and, a few plays later, a rejuvenated Texas offense rammed the ball into the end zone for Texas’ first lead of the night. Then, on the ensuing kickoff, an illegal block penalty backed up the Frogs to their own 10 and, after a three and out, Texas’ next drive started at the TCU 44. The Horns ground out a couple of first downs and then kicked a field goal, making the score 20-10. The following offensive possession generated another three and out for TCU, and when the Horned Frogs punter dropped the snap, Texas’ Brandon Foster scooped it up and returned it for a TD and a 27-10 Longhorn lead. Game, set, match. The Longhorns go on the road next week to Orlando to help C-USA member Central Florida (1-0) christen their new stadium.

Texas Aggies 47 Fresno State 45 (3OT)

The most entertaining game of the day occurred in College Station where the Aggies (2-0) blew a 19 point lead and then held on for dear life to pull out the victory when Fresno St. missed the mandatory two-point conversion at the end of the third overtime period. As with last season, the Aggies have a good and competent team, but it appears unlikely that the Ags will be able to contend with the likes of Oklahoma and Oklahoma for the Big 12 South championship. The Aggies can control the ball and clock with their strong rushing attack, but they have no downfield passing game and — outside of RB Michael Goodson — do not have anyone with quick-strike capability against first-rate defenses. Meanwhile, the Aggie defense is just average, so the Ags will be giving up plenty of points this season. Without a high-scoring offense and with a defense that will give up some high point totals, my sense is that the Aggies are an 8-4-type team. At this point, it’s hard for me to see them at any better than 9-3. They have another sure win next Saturday at home against Louisiana-Monroe (0-2) before going on the road the following Thursday to play a very average Miami (1-1) team in the Orange Bowl.

Baylor 42 Rice 17

The headline to last week’s Rice Football Newsletter story on the Owls’ loss to Nicholls State was “Could it get any worse than this?” Well yes, it could, as the Owls (0-2) found out on Saturday in Waco. The Owls gave up 531 total yards to the same Bears team that could only muster 282 yards and no points a week earlier against TCU. It’s a bit frightening to think how many yards and points that Texas Tech (2-0) might run up on the Owls next Saturday at Rice Stadium.

The Houston Cougars (0-1) were idle this week and play C-USA rival Tulane (0-1) in New Orleans next Saturday.

It has not been a good year so far for Notre Dame.
After getting hammered 41-14 by LSU in the Sugar Bowl, Fighting Irish head coach Charlie Weis got poured out in the trial of his medical malpractice lawsuit against the surgeons who performed a gastric bypass operation on him. Then, the Irish were pummelled in their first two games of the season, 33-3 at home by Georgia Tech and 31-10 yesterday by Penn State. A wounded but talented Michigan team looms next week.
Thus, it’s probably no surprise to anyone that more than a few of Notre Dame’s opponents are enjoying the current troubles of the Fighting Irish. One of those passed along the flow chart below:

Rejoice! The seemingly unending National League Football pre-season is over!
It’s Year Six for the Houston Texans and the fourth annual preview of the Texans since this blog began back in 2004 (previous previews are here). Thankfully, this past off-season for the Texans was not as eventful as the off-season after Year Four:

After unexpectedly finishing the 2006 season with a couple of wins, the Texans are riding a wave of optimism into the 2007 season. Unfortunately, most of those optimists forget that the team looked deader than a doornail in the game before those final two wins;
After changing the management model of the football team during the off-season after the 2005 season, Texans owner Bob McNair and second-year coach Gary Kubiak changed the marquee player of the franchise, which was followed by the typical potshots that occur after such changes;
Does the Michael Vick affair provide some hope for the Texans’ draft strategy?; and
Texans owner Bob McNair — one of the truly good guys among NFL owners — was rated much more highly than his team.

So, is the optimism for the 2007 Texans justified? Well, in addressing that question, it’s helpful to review briefly the Texans’ tumultuous first five seasons. As noted in the pre-season review before last season, the Texans were the toast of the town for their first three seasons of existence in which the team and the local media trumpeted the party line that the organization was building a playoff contender “the right way” — i.e., through prudent drafting and development of young players while eschewing the temptation of short-term rewards provided by over-priced veterans who were on the downside of their careers. The progressively better won-loss records in the first three seasons (4-12, 5-11, and 7-9) — plus the drafting of young stars such as WR Andre Johnson, RB Dominack Davis and CB Dunta Robinson — seemed to indicate that the Texans’ plan was working.
Unfortunately, those progessively better won-loss records during the first three seasons camouflaged some big problems, such as the fact that the Texans entered each of their first four seasons with the same two core problems — the Texans’ offensive line could not protect the quarterback and the Texans’ defensive front could not apply adequate pressure on the opposing team’s QB. Although former Texans GM Charlie Casserly tried (remember the Texans’ flirtation with LT’s Tony Boselli and then Orlando Pace?), the Texans were never able to address those problem areas effectively. Ultimately, both Casserly and original Texans head coach Dom Capers were fired after the disastrous Year Four for their failure to solve those two core problems.

Continue reading →

The Web continues to amaze with the depth and quality of the sites being generated. Check out this one analyzing the win-loss record of every BCS and mid-major college football team and conference in the U.S. What a great way to track trends among conferences and teams — or simply to keep up with your favorite team — throughout the season.

The Labor Day weekend marks the beginning of the college football season and HCT’s weekly local football reviews, so here’s the first edition of the 2007 season:
Oregon 48 Houston 27

Well, you have to hand to the Coogs, they certainly don’t schedule only creampuffs for non-conference games and they keep things entertaining. After spotting Oregon a 14-0 first quarter lead, the Cougars closed to within 34-27 with 1:50 left in the third quarter. But then on the next play, the Ducks exploited a chronic weakness of the Cougars during the Art Briles era — a porous defense — for an 80 yard TD run for a 41-27 lead that took the wind out of Houston’s sails. The Cougars actually outgained the Ducks (538 yds to 468 yds), but Houston’s five turnovers (two interceptions, two fumbles and blocked punt, three of which were inside the Oregon 20) more than made up for that offensive output. Despite the continuing defensive struggles, the Cougars appear to have found a good QB in redshirt freshman Casey Keenum and will have two weeks to regroup before taking on Tulane in New Orleans on September 15.

Texas Longhorns 21 Arkansas State 13

H’mm. Texas fans are rightfully concerned after watching the Horns fumble and stumble against Arkansas State. The Indians outpassed the Longhorns (272 to 223), outrushed them (125 to 117), tallied more first downs (26 to 23), punted fewer times (3 to 4), threw fewer interceptions (1 to 2), had a stronger kickoff return game (94 return yards to 73), and held the ball longer in time of possession (30:12 to 29:49). The Longhorns have been tabbed as 10 point favorites in their game against mid-major power TCU (1-0) next Saturday in Austin, but expect that line to move down a bit as the game approaches. Absent a substantially better effort against the Horned Frogs, the Horns could well lose that game.

Texas Aggies 38 Montana State 7

After spotting Montana State an early 7-0 lead, the Ags methodically hammered out the victory using their somewhat boring but effective strategy of emphasizing the rushing attack, throwing short passes and restricting turnovers. However, even the most optimistic Ags have to be concerned about an Ag defense that gave up over 400 yards to a Division I-AA team that replaced its head coach just three months ago and an offense that still does not appear to be able to execute a pass play of over 7 yards or so. The Aggies get a stiffer test at home next week against Fresno State (1-0), who enter the week as 17 point underdogs.

Nicholls State 16 Rice 14

Coming off the Todd Graham affair, this is not how the Owls wanted to kick off the David Bailiff era. The Rice Football Webletter commented as follows in this article entitled “Could It Get Any Worse Than This?”:

Perhaps the worst strategic decision made on the turf of Rice Stadium Saturday night came not from the Owl quarterback, not from the head coach ñ though both sources stunned the crowd of 11,800 with the length and breadth of their miscreancy during the course of this excruciating, five and one-half hour game.
Nope, the worst decision came from the tongue of Rice Athletic Director Chris del Conte, who, given the election of sending the teams home and playing the game over later in the season after the second of two, hour-long, lightning-induced weather delays ñ or electing to wait it out and get the game in ñ chose to stand fast and play ball.
The Rice Owls responded by imploding their own building here Saturday night as a, shall we say, less-than-imaginative offense yielded up five key turnovers en route to a 16-14 loss to an aroused, strutting and confident Nicholls State team.
The fancy banners which newly-adorn the stately, former-72,000-seat-edifice still stand on a muggy Sunday morning. But down like so many tons of concrete and structural steel have fallen the remains, not of a building, but of a rebuilding.

Ouch! The Owls attempt to rebound as 6 point underdogs next week in Waco against Baylor (0-1).

Is that you can find far better previews of college football teams than are served up in the mainstream media. A case in point — TAMABINPO’s 2007 Aggie Football Preview. Check it out to find out everything you need to know about the 2007 Aggie football team.