College Football Lineal Title

Sports Watcher for the Weekend of 10/4-5

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All times PDT.

Saturday
9-12:30 PM: College Football, Iowa @ #17 Michigan State (ESPN2). Wait, my new “mid-major lineal title” just got created, and all my thoughts were on whether Oregon State had done enough to crack positive B Points next week! (It will depend a LOT on SoS… but why do I keep reading, like from ESPN.com blogger Ted Miller, “what if the Penn State game was the fluke”? Penn State’s in my top 5! Didn’t the Beavers lose to Stanford as well? Win that game, and their B Rating is probably over 1 even without a better performance against JoePa! And that’s the only thing this entry has to do with the entire Big Ten.)

12:30-4 PM: College Football, Kentucky @ defending 2004 Auburn-Utah titleholder Alabama (CBS). Nick Saban is 1-0 this season in games against teams in my C Ratings with the Auburn-Utah title at stake.

6-9:30 PM: College Football, defending Princeton-Yale title holder Missouri @ Nebraska (ESPN). Preceded at 3 PM by Auburn-Vanderbilt, so games REALLY got crammed on ESPN today. Blame the Breeder’s Cup, but seriously, this seems like a natural opening for one more college football contract. But the SEC just re-upped and the Big 12 signed last year.
Sunday
10-1 PM: NFL Football, regional action (CBS and/or FOX). The WNBA Finals, below, cleared out space for NFL Football to not be restricted to SNF.

1:30-4 PM: WNBA Finals, Silver Stars @ Shock (ESPN2). Man, the WNBA Finals can’t even get an ABC slot on a weekend now? Blame NASCAR, running from 11-3 today with the AMP Energy 500. In other news, even women’s basketball players think the WNBA stinks. I really wish supporters of women’s equality in sports would put more chips on other sports like golf or softball. Basketball is either boring or incomprehensible no matter who plays it.

4-7:30 PM: MLB Baseball, Angels @ Red Sox (TBS) and 7-10 PM: MLB Baseball, Cubs @ Dodgers (TBS). I suspect some game time changes may occur if the Phillies-Brewers series ends early. Hey, by getting football out of the way earlier in the day we could fit baseball in here (SNF is 5:15-8:30) and have a whole day of college football! Thanks, WNBA, for bumping out the Chase for the Cup! (Baseball would have bumped out a primetime game, not an afternoon game as in past weeks.)

Five weeks in the books in college football…

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If you had Week 4 in your “First Lineal Title Change” pool, collect your prize! If you had Week 4 in your “First Lineal Title Held By A Team That’s Not Unbeaten” pool, collect your prize! If you had both… you obviously saw the Oregon State upset of USC coming (or you saw Mississippi State beating LSU, or you had Alabama losing by now).

It’s funny… before Georgia beat Hawaii in the Sugar Bowl to unify it with the Auburn Title, the 2004 Utah Title was, in a way, the “mid-major” title. Now, if Utah beats the Beavers this week, the 2007 Boise State title, another title created by a mid-major BCS buster, could serve the same role – only going through Washington, Ohio State, Illinois, USC, and Oregon State first. As for Bama, although this means the Auburn-Utah and BCS titles are now both held in the same division, it’s a long road to unification – LSU must beat Florida, South Carolina, Georgia, and Tulane (two of those teams are ranked), while Bama must face Kentucky, Ole Miss, Tennessee, and Arkansas State (one of those teams is ranked and another is in positive B Points). It would actually have been a shorter road if Georgia had won, as Georgia would have had to face only Tennessee and Vandy, but Vandy is still ranked. Bama really runs the risk of losing to Kentucky this week, and if that were to happen we’d need another loss or a Kentucky-LSU title game for unification before the bowls, but the game is at home and Bama can handle the pressure.

Lineal title updates and the new C Ratings, including stylesheet changes and most logos, are now up (or should be up by the time 45 minutes have passed from the timestamp on this post). No logos past R for now, and UConn will have to wait for the Us. Many of the changes are a result of the ratings being more volatile early in the season.

I think I figured out why I couldn’t load more than two files at a time in Freehostia’s new file manager: it only opens up a new line if you put something new in the first line, not any later lines. So if I change the file in the first line, I get a new line, but not if I put something in the line I would normally put it in. Which sucks.

College Football Schedule: Week 5

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All rankings come from the new C Ratings, out now. I’m going to do some reorganization later that will mean that link will always link to the current ratings; this will also involve improving access to last year’s ratings, and making some CSS changes. The asterisk still indicates lineal title holders (also updated). All times Eastern.

Top 25 Games
Alabama @ *Georgia 7:45 ESPN
*USC @ Oregon State 9 PM TH ESPN
Virginia Tech @ Nebraska 8 PM ABC
Mississippi @ Florida 12:30 R’com/Y’hoo
Wisconsin @ Michigan 3:30 ABC/ESPN
Weber State @ Utah 8 PM
Kent State @ Ball State Noon ESPN+
Illinois @ Penn State 8 PM ABC
Navy @ Wake Forest 3:45 ESPNU
#15 TCU @ #12 Oklahoma 7 PM FSN
Arkansas @ Texas 3:30 ABC
Western Kentucky @ #14 Kentucky 7 PM Gameplan
Central Arkansas @ #20 Tulsa 7 PM CBSCS XXL
#21 Colorado v. Florida State 3:30 ABC/ESPN
#22 Minnesota @ Ohio State Noon BTN
Troy @ #23 Oklahoma State 7 PM
Connecticut @ Louisville 8 PM FR ESPN2
Mississippi State @ #25 *LSU 7:30 ESPN2
Watchlist and Other Positive B Point Teams
Tennessee @ Auburn 3:30 CBS
Michigan State @ Indiana Noon ESPN
Houston @ East Carolina 3:30 CBS CS
Northwestern @ Iowa Noon ESPN Classic
Colorado State @ California 6 PM
Rhode Island @ Boston College 1 PM ESPN360
South Florida @ NC State 7:30 ESPNU
UAB @ South Carolina 7 PM Gameplan
North Carolina @ Miami (FL) Noon ESPN2
Oregon @ Washington State 6:15 FCS
Fresno State @ UCLA 3:30 ABC
This Week’s Other HD Games
Maryland @ Clemson Noon Raycom
Virginia @ Duke Noon ESPNU
Purdue @ Notre Dame 3:30 NBC
Big 12
Army @ Texas A&M 12:30 Versus
Big East
Pittsburgh @ Syracuse Noon ESPN+
Morgan State @ Rutgers 3:30 ESPN+
Pac-10
Stanford @ Washington 7 PT FCS
MAC
Northern Illinois @ Eastern Michigan Noon ESPN+
Western Michigan @ Temple 2 PM CSD.TV
VMI @ Ohio 2 PM CSD.TV
Buffalo @ Central Michigan 4 PM CSD.TV
Conference USA
Southern Methodist @ Tulane 8 PM TH CBS CS
Central Florida @ UTEP 8 PM CBS CS
WAC
San Jose State @ Hawaii 9 PT Gameplan
Bowl Subdivision
Arkansas State @ Memphis 2 PM CBSCS XXL
Cincinnati @ Akron 3:30 Gameplan
Marshall @ West Virginia 3:30 ESPN+
Louisiana-Lafayette @ Kansas State 3:30
Bowling Green @ Wyoming 4 PM mtn.
North Texas @ Rice 5 PM CBSCS XXL
Florida International @ Toledo 7 PM CSD.TV
New Mexico @ New Mexico State 8 PM Gameplan
Idaho @ San Diego State 8 PM
Nevada @ UNLV 7 PT mtn.

Did I waste this weekend or what?

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Posting the updated lineal titles now because I can. Looks like LSU will finally be defending against a half-decent team this week in Auburn. Georgia shouldn’t slouch either because for the second straight week a title defense is on ABC’s Saturday Night Football. USC has the week off and Missouri might as well, especially since they DO have a week off NEXT week. Three of the four title-holders’ next defenses are on national television.

I haven’t done a lick of work to set up the infrastructure for the college football rankings, which need to be up… next week. Yikes. AND I need to do, you know, actual productive things. AND I’m falling behind on my other plans for Da Blog as well. God I suck.

College Football Schedule: Week 3

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Everyone retains their titles this week (and by “everyone” I mean “the two teams that actually had games this week”) but that’s by no means guaranteed this week. Slight change to the schedule: Games on ESPN Gameplan with no other applicable item to put in the TV slot will be described as Gameplan, not ESPN360. All times Eastern.

Lineal Titles (all games on Saturday)
Nevada @ *Missouri 12:30 PPV
*Georgia @ South Carolina 3:30 CBS
North Texas @ *LSU 8 PM Gameplan
Ohio State @ *USC 8 PM ABC
This Week’s HD Games
North Carolina @ Rutgers 7:30 TH ESPN
Kansas @ South Florida 8 PM FR ESPN2
NC State @ Clemson Noon Raycom
Navy @ Duke Noon ESPNU
California @ Maryland Noon ESPN
Florida Atlantic @ Michigan State Noon ESPN2
Louisiana-Lafayette @ Illinois Noon BTN
Iowa State @ Iowa Noon BTN
Montana State @ Minnesota Noon BTN
Southern Illinois @ Northwestern Noon BTN
UAB @ Tennessee 12:30 R’com/Yahoo
Washington State @ Baylor 12:30 FSN
Michigan @ Notre Dame 3:30 NBC
Chattanooga @ Florida State 3:45 ESPNU
Auburn @ Mississippi State 7 PM ESPN2
SMU @ Texas Tech 7 PM FSN SW
Virginia @ Connecticut 7:30 ESPNU
Oklahoma @ Washington 7:45 ESPN
Wisconsin @ Fresno State 10:30 ESPN2
Other Games
Temple @ Buffalo Noon ESPN+
Ball State @ Akron 1 PM CSD.TV
Toledo @ Eastern Michigan 1 PM CSD.TV
Central Michigan @ Ohio 2 PM CSD.TV
Delaware State @ Kent State 2 PM CSD.TV
East Carolina @ Tulane 3 PM CBSCS XXL
Charleston Southern @ Miami (OH) 3 PM CSD.TV
North Dakota State @ Wyoming 3 PM
Oregon @ Purdue 3:30 ABC/ESPN
Penn State @ Syracuse 3:30 ABC
Georgia Tech @ Virginia Tech 3:30 ABC/ESPN
Air Force @ Houston 3:30 CBS CS
Arkansas @ Texas 3:30 ABC
UCLA @ BYU 3:30 VS.
Hawaii @ Oregon State 4 PM FSN/FCS
Western Michigan @ Idaho 5 PM CSD.TV
Middle Tenn. St. @ Kentucky 7 PM Gameplan
Memphis @ Marshall 7 PM CSS
Western Kentucky @ Alabama 7 PM Gameplan
Southern Miss @ Arkansas State 7 PM CSD.TV
Stanford @ TCU 7 PM mtn.
Rice @ Vanderbilt 7 PM
Alabama A&M @ Louisiana-Monroe 7 PM CSD.TV
Samford @ Mississippi 7 PM
Alcorn State @ Troy 7 PM CSD.TV
New Mexico State @ Nebraska 7 PM PPV
Missouri State @ Oklahoma State 7 PM FCS
Bowling Green @ Boise State 8 PM Gameplan
Arizona @ New Mexico 8 PM CBS CS
Utah @ Utah State 8 PM Gameplan
San Diego State @ San Jose State 8 PM CSD.TV
UNLV @ Arizona State 7 PT FSN AZ/FCS

OMG! It’s football season! Our lives have meaning!

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Who cares about those amateur college scrubs? THE league of record in America is the National Football League, and Da Blog and Morgan Wick’s football site is ready with complete team coverage there as well!

Start with the NFL Lineal Title; as I said last week, it’s analogous to the college football lineal titles, but because of the NFL’s schedule structure there’s rarely more than one at a time, and never more than two. I need to explain something that I forgot to make clear last week: Split titles in the college football lineal title arise from teams going undefeated, or winning the BCS Title Game (which is why LSU gets a new lineal title this year despite not going undefeated). Obviously, it’s exceedingly rare for an NFL team to go undefeated, so what happens instead is that split titles are created when the title holder doesn’t make the playoffs. Obviously, that’s rather rare as well, and the Patriots nabbed the lineal title on their march to an almost-perfect season, so the Giants start the season with the title this year and will defend it against Washington tonight on NBC.

Speaking of which, starting Week 3 or 4, I’ll start my weekly SNF Flex Schedule Watch, which was perhaps the prime contributor of traffic to Da Blog last year, before it was taken over by webcomics. I correctly predicted the Week 12, 14, 15, and 17 games that were moved to primetime as part of NBC’s flexible scheduling, only missing Weeks 11, 13, and 16. I had thought I did the Flex Schedule Watch on Tuesdays last year, but it was actually a Wednesday feature last year so it’s a Wednesday feature this year.

There is a third concept that I used last year: the “SuperPower Rankings”, my experiment in creating a set of “super-power rankings” from the power rankings produced by the eight leading sports sites (ESPN, CBS, Fox, NBC, SI, Yahoo, USA Today, and Sporting News – Yahoo produced two rankings). It proved to be way too much work, so I’m not doing it this year, but I leave the concept open for someone else to pick up the gauntlet.

College Football Schedule: Week 2

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I haven’t updated the Web site with the new lineal titles yet; it’ll be updated by Thursday, probably Wednesday, but I need to write my NFL post first. No titles changed hands anyway, and now it’s Georgia and LSU most likely to lose their titles, though all of them are likely to retain for next week, when the titles are more likely to change hands, specifically when Georgia faces the other USC, and the first USC – off this week – faces Ohio State. All times Eastern.

Lineal Titles (all games on Saturday)
SE Missouri State @ *Missouri 7 PM PPV
Central Michigan @ *Georgia 3:30 SEC HD
Troy @ *LSU 8 PM ESPN360
This Week’s HD Games
South Carolina @ Vanderbilt 8:30 TH ESPN
Navy @ Ball State 7 PM FR ESPN
Georgia Tech @ Boston College Noon Raycom
Miami (OH) @ Michigan Noon ESPN2
Ohio @ Ohio State Noon ESPN
Connecticut @ Temple Noon ESPNU
Florida International @ Iowa Noon BTN
Marshall @ Wisconsin Noon BTN
Eastern Illinois @ Illinois Noon BTN
Southern Miss @ Auburn 12:30 R’com/Yahoo
BYU @ Washington 3 PM FSN
San Diego State @ Notre Dame 3:30 NBC
Richmond @ Virginia 3:45 ESPNU
West Virginia @ East Carolina 4:30 ESPN
Louisiana Tech @ Kansas 7 PM FSN
South Florida @ Central Florida 7 PM ESPN2
Murray State @ Indiana 7 PM BTN
Minnesota @ Bowling Green 7:30 ESPNU
Miami (FL) @ Florida 8 PM ESPN
Texas @ UTEP 10:15 ESPN2
Other Games
Eastern Michigan @ Michigan State Noon BTN
Northern Colorado @ Purdue Noon BTN
San Jose State @ Nebraska 12:30 PPV
New Hampshire @ Army 1 PM ESPN Classic
Furman @ Virginia Tech 1:30 CBSCS XXL
Oregon State @ Penn State 3:30 ABC/ESPN2
Mississippi @ Wake Forest 3:30 ABC/ESPN2
Cincinnati @ Oklahoma 3:30 ABC
Air Force @ Wyoming 3:30 CBS CS
Utah State @ Oregon 3:30 CSD.TV
The Citadel @ Clemson 3:30 ESPN360
Tennessee Tech @ Louisville 3:30 ESPN360
Eastern Washington @ Colorado 3:30
Sacramento State @ Colorado State 3:30
Akron @ Syracuse 3:30
UAB @ Florida Atlantic 4:00
Texas A&M @ New Mexico 5 PM VS.
Idaho State @ Idaho 5 PM ESPN360
Buffalo @ Pittsburgh 6 PM ESPN+
Western Kentucky @ Eastern Kentucky 6 PM CSD.TV
Western Carolina @ Florida State 6 PM ESPN360
William and Mary @ NC State 6 PM
Norfolk State @ Kentucky 6 PM ESPN360
California @ Washington State 6:30 FSN/FCS
Northwestern @ Duke 7 PM CBSCS XXL
Northern Illinois @ Western Michigan 7 PM CSD.TV
Tulane @ Alabama 7 PM ESPN360
Kent State @ Iowa State 7 PM
Arkansas @ Louisiana-Monroe 7 PM ESPN360
Maryland @ Middle Tenn. St. 7 PM ESPN360
Tulsa @ North Texas 7 PM
Texas Southern @ Arkansas State 7 PM CSD.TV
Northwestern State @ Baylor 7 PM
SE Louisiana @ Mississippi State 7 PM
Stephen F. Austin @ TCU 7 PM
Houston @ Oklahoma State 7 PM
Montana State @ Kansas State 7 PM FCS
Rice @ Memphis 8 PM CBS CS
UNLV @ Utah 8 PM mtn.
Texas St.-San Marcos @ SMU 8 PM CBSCS XXL
Texas Tech @ Nevada 9 PM CSD.TV
Toledo @ Arizona 7 PT
Stanford @ Arizona State 7 PT FCS
Weber State @ Hawaii 9 PT ESPN360

Sports Watcher Labor Day 3-day Weekend Special for the Weekend of 8/30-9/1

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All times PDT.

Saturday
8-11 AM: College Football, Appalachian State @ defending 2008 BCS title holder LSU (ESPN Classic). Yes, it’s college football season again! Can lightning strike twice for App State?

12:30-3:30 PM: College Football, defending 2007 Boise State title holder USC v. Virginia (ABC/ESPN2). The move of the App State/LSU game could have opened things up for baseball, but this isn’t change, this is more of the same!

5:30-8:30 PM: College Football, Illinois v. defending Princeton-Yale title holder Missouri (ESPN). Once my C Ratings come out, everything is based on relative rating. Until then, you get this.

Sunday
10-12:30 PM: WNBA Basketball, Seattle @ Connecticut (ABC). I’m embarrassed to admit I don’t know whether this is a regular season game or an early-round postseason game.

12:30-3 PM: IndyCar Racing, IndyCar Grand Prix at Detroit (ABC). Normally road course races are a bit of a slog, but I was glued to my TV last weekend rooting for Helio Castroneves to break a lengthy winless streak at Infineon. Too bad it was relegated to ESPN2.

5-8 PM: MLB Baseball, LA Dodgers @ Arizona (ESPN2). Bumped to the Deuce by NASCAR.

Monday
11-3 PM: PGA Tour Golf, Deutsche Bank Championship (NBC). I didn’t realize until this week that the PGA Tour “playoffs” no one cares about had started. I had been thinking this was an important weekend for Sports Watcher with no real big events…

4-6 PM (potentially 4-9 PM on the West Coast): US Open Tennis, octofinal-round action (USA). The Labor Day college football game is mediocre v. mediocre in Tennessee v. UCLA, only of interest to masturbating “my c0nf3rence is teh rulz” spewers, and otherwise I couldn’t get tennis on here.

5-8 PM: College Football, Tennessee v. UCLA (ESPN). Mediocre v. mediocre. How exciting.

College Football Schedule: Week 1

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A new feature on Da Blog this year will be the weekly posting of the Division I-A college football schedule for the week, with information on how to catch games on TV from here. Starting Week 5, the list will be sorted by C Rating of the higher-rated team for all teams in positive B Points. Before then, of course, there will be no ratings to go off of, but I’ll still spotlight the lineal title holders (Princeton-Yale always goes first) and any games available in HD. Starting next week, it should go up on Tuesdays, at least that’s what I’m feeling right now. All times Eastern.

Lineal Titles (all games on Saturday)
Illinois v. *Missouri 8:30 ESPN
Georgia Southern @ *Georgia 12:30 ESPN360
*USC @ Virginia 3:30 ABC/ESPN2
Appalachian State @ *LSU 5 PM ESPN
Thursday (today)
UTEP @ Buffalo 7 PM CSD.TV
Northeastern @ Ball State 7 PM CSD.TV
Eastern Illinois @ Central Michigan 7 PM CSD.TV
Indiana State @ Eastern Michigan 7 PM CSD.TV
Vanderbilt @ Miami (OH) 7:30 ESPNU
Troy @ Middle Tenn. St. 7:30 ESPN+
Eastern Kentucky @ Cincinnati 7:30 CBSCS XXL
Hofstra @ Connecticut 7:30 ESPN+
Jacksonville State @ Georgia Tech 7:30 ESPN360
Charleston Southern @ Miami (FL) 7:30 ESPN360
NC State @ South Carolina 8 PM ESPN
Wake Forest @ Baylor 8 PM FSN
South Dakota State @ Iowa State 8 PM FCS
Oregon State @ Stanford 9 PM ESPN2
Friday
Temple @ Army 7 PM ESPN Classic
SMU @ Rice 8 PM ESPN
Saturday’s HD Games
Virginia Tech v. East Carolina Noon ESPN
Bowling Green @ Pittsburgh Noon ESPNU
Syracuse @ Northwestern Noon ESPN2
Youngstown State @ Ohio State Noon BTN
Coastal Carolina @ Penn State Noon BTN
Maine @ Iowa Noon BTN
Hawaii @ Florida 12:30 R’Com/Yahoo
Utah @ Michigan 3:30 ABC/ESPN2
Oklahoma State v. Washington State 3:30 FSN
Towson @ Navy 3:30 CBS CS
Delaware @ Maryland 3:45 ESPNU
Mississippi State @ Louisiana Tech 6:45 ESPN2
Northern Illinois @ Minnesota 7 PM BTN
Boston College v. Kent State 7:30 ESPNU
Alabama v. Clemson 8 PM ABC
Michigan State @ California 8 PM ABC
Washington @ Oregon 7 PT FSN
Other Saturday Games
Western Kentucky @ Indiana Noon BTN
Akron @ Wisconsin Noon BTN
Ohio @ Wyoming 2 PM mtn.
Southern Utah @ Air Force 2 PM
Villanova @ West Virginia 3:30 ESPN+
Tulsa @ UAB 4 PM
Illinois State @ Marshall 4:30
TCU @ New Mexico 6 PM VS.
McNeese State @ North Carolina 6 PM
South Carolina State @ Central Florida 6 PM
Northern Iowa @ BYU 6 PM mtn.
Louisiana-Monroe @ Auburn 7 PM ESPN360
Florida International @ Kansas 7 PM
Memphis @ Mississippi 7 PM
Western Michigan @ Nebraska 7 PM PPV
Louisiana-Lafayette @ Southern Miss 7 PM CBSCS XXL
Florida Atlantic @ Texas 7 PM PPV
Arkansas State @ Texas A&M 7 PM
James Madison @ Duke 7 PM ACC Select
Western Illinois @ Arkansas 7 PM
Southern @ Houston 7 PM
Chattanooga @ Oklahoma 7 PM PPV
Eastern Washington @ Texas Tech 7 PM
North Texas @ Kansas State 7 PM
Tennessee-Martin @ South Florida 7:30 ESPN+
Idaho State @ Boise State 8 PM ESPN360
UC Davis @ San Jose State 8 PM CSD.TV
Grambling @ Nevada 9 PM CSD.TV
Cal Poly @ San Diego State 9:30
Idaho @ Arizona 7 PT
Utah State @ UNLV 7 PT
Northern Arizona @ Arizona State 7 PT FCS
Sunday
Kentucky @ Louisville 3:30 ESPN
Colorado State v. Colorado 7:30 FSN
Labor Day
Fresno State @ Rutgers 4 PM ESPN
Tennessee @ UCLA 8 PM ESPN