College Football Week 4

   My how the mighty (or so we presumed) have fallen. 3 weeks into the college football season and the power of the BCS, the unquestioned might of college football, The SEC...no The SEC West has taken a credibility hit. I bet you thought I was about to talk about the USC loss to Stanford. Sorry but, no. What was once thought of as a more powerful conference than the AFC West in the NFL has a rather big black eye. All thanks to the little school that could....Louisiana-Monroe. The Warhawks swooped into Arkansas nearly two weeks ago and shocked the Pig People and all of college football. Then they took their act on the road again and nearly upset an Auburn team that seems to have lost its will to live (beware, coach Chizik....beware) So what do the Louisiana-Monroe Warhawks have to do with the real powers of the SEC West, LSU and Alabama? A whole lot if you are paying attention to schedule strength. Listening to sports radio this week and following Twitter, I have noticed a trend in the SEC media. Right now it is a mere "What if" scenario. But, I ask what if, "What if" becomes reality? What if LSU has a loss before playing Alabama, and Alabama takes a loss to LSU in Baton Rouge? If you heard Colin Cowherd this morning you know where I am going with this. You see, Alabama's strength of schedule has taken a  hit due to the Arkansas loss to UL-M. Not to mention the Hogs not showing up against Alabama. 52-0 was great for Alabama but, the Tide needed Arkansas to be a good win. Arkansas is now unranked. If Michigan losses to Notre Dame they fall out of the top 25 and there goes another Bama early schedule darling. Suddenly Alabama has a few wins over teams like Western Kentucky and the upcoming Florida Atlantic. Sure the Tide crushed Arkansas...so did Louisiana-Monroe. How hard can that be, right? Now the Tide look down their schedule and do not have a game against any of the powers in the suddenly resurgent SEC East. There are no Georgia's, no Florida's, and no South Carolina's. Auburn is a shell of its former self. Mississippi St. would be a nice win but, the Bulldogs will never be a team to crow about beating when you consider the National Media's view of them. Ole Miss is awful and Texas A&M will be canon fodder for the Tide. So now there is one team for the Tide to hang their hats on beating. They HAVE to beat LSU in Baton Rouge because a loss will not get the Tide back to the BCS. Not with that schedule. A win over LSU would give them a win over a hopefully top 5 team on the road. That would then give them a shot at the SEC East champ and another top 5 or 10 match-up. Alabama has to go undefeated to get back to the BCS title game. But, so does LSU. The Tigers have a tougher in conference schedule this year, having drawn Florida at the Swamp, and South Carolina in Baton Rouge. Not to mention the Tigers have crushed a Pac 12 Washington team that will give the Tigers a sort of measuring stick against the rest of the Pac 12. But, if LSU loses to Alabama, and or anyone else they may not have enough steam to get back to the BCS either. Granted LSU could lose early to Florida or South Carolina or God forbid a slip-up against Auburn or Texas A&M and then beat Alabama to catapult them right back into the BCS title game mix. But, what if their are two undefeated non SEC teams? Does a one loss SEC champ bounce over an undefeated Oregon? or an undefeated Oklahoma or West Virginia? Last year the answer was yes. This year....I think the voters would be hesitant to put the SEC in just because they are the SEC. The name and prestige may not be enough this year. The SEC needs to have an undefeated team or a 1 loss team that doesn't have to contend with multiple undefeated conference champs. Conventional wisdom says it will all work out. The ACC will not go undefeated. A strong Pac 12 and Big 12 will cancel each other out and there seems to be no real threat from a non BCS school like Boise St. Notre Dame deserves attention as well but, they still have Michigan, Oklahoma, and USC on their schedule so I think Notre Dame will have more than 1 loss. SEC fans need not thumb their noses up at everyone else this year because believe it or not there are other conferences as a whole right now who are better than the SEC from top to bottom. Yes, the SEC hands down has two maybe 3 of the best teams in the country but, you never know when a Louisiana-Monroe is going to come out of nowhere and throw a monkey wrench into the mix.

I give full credit for this blog to the Herd on ESPN Radio and reading tweets from Paul Finbaum. I just thought it would be an interesting thing to expand on.

Last week I was 12-3 with my picks. I am 36-8 for the season. Not to mention I called the upset of the week by picking Stanford over USC.

Boise St. 26 BYU 19

LSU 30 Auburn 17 (This game scares me...don't know why. It just does)

Oregon 37 Arizona 24

Florida St. 20 Clemson 17

South Carolina 27 Missouri 17

Notre Dame 24 Michigan 21

USC 38 Cal 17

Baylor 34 UL-Monroe 21 (I think the magic might be dying out by now)

TCU 33 Virginia 13

Alabama 49 Florida Atlantic 0

Texas A&M 56 South Carolina St. 0

Arkansas 27 Rutgers 21

Georgia 31 Vanderbilt 13

UCLA 28 Oregon St. 24

Upset of the Week:

Kansas St. 24 Oklahoma 20. (The Wildcats become the first visiting top 25 team to win in Norman since Bob Stoops because coach. Obviously not a huge upset but, pickings are slim this week)