With Tennessee's loss to UCLA I had to follow my own rules and remove them from my poll, but given the way the game went I decided UCLA deserved to be in. So, here's my final ballot this week:

Rank	Team	Delta
1	Oklahoma	--
2	Southern Cal	--
3	Georgia	--
4	Florida	1
5	Ohio State	2
6	Missouri	2
7	LSU	1
8	Auburn	1
9	Texas	1
10	Alabama	15
11	Wisconsin	--
12	Oregon	--
13	West Virginia	--
14	Wake Forest	1
15	Texas Tech	1
16	Brigham Young	--
17	Arizona State	--
18	Kansas	1
19	South Florida	2
20	Utah	3
21	Florida State	1
22	South Carolina	4
23	California	3
24	UCLA	2
25	East Carolina	1

Dropped Out: Clemson (#6), Virginia Tech (#18), Tennessee (#20), Illinois (#24).

On to the news. . .the AP poll ranks Wake #20. . .Wake will try to keep Ole Miss from "running wild,". . . and Chip Brinkman is pretty happy about scoring two touchdowns last week.

I've finally got some of that analysis ready, even if it isn't in the form I originally intended to put it in. Hopefully you'll find it interesting, so check back later in the day (hopefully it will be up by noon, but who knows with my track record this week).

Read More...

I received an email yesterday from a reader, John, who asked the following question:

Do you feel the following (2) statements are mutually exclusive.

1. WF wins the ACC football title
2. The ACC is recognized as one of the top football conferences in the nation

I do not think the two statements are eternally mutually exclusive, but right now they probably are. For one, Wake's rise to national prominence is new, and national perception is still that Wake is a "weak" team and program. Wake doesn't have any history of beating big names outside the ACC, and that presents a major hurdle. Even beating Louisville two years ago wouldn't have fixed that, and wins over Baylor, Ole Miss, and Vanderbilt this season won't do a whole lot of good either.

In order for the two statements to be true, I think we need to add two conditions:

First, Wake will have to have beaten a perennial top-10 team who is in the top 10 that year. That could be Oklahoma, USC, LSU, Ohio State, or someone like that. They would also have to win their BCS bowl (Orange, National Championship, whatever). Those two wins could come at the same time or be separate, but both are necessary.

Also, someone else in the ACC will have to finish in the top 15 (and it would help if they also played in a BCS bowl). Even if Wake wins the ACC and the Orange bowl, it won't mean the ACC was any good that year. It would mean Wake was pretty good, but not the ACC as a whole. In order for the ACC to be considered good there's going to have to a second very good team. Hopefully Wake would be undefeated, and the second team would only have lost to Wake.

For now Wake isn't going to be able to do it on its own, and we'll be waiting for at least next year for this to happen - Clemson and VT already blew it.

What do you think? Are these two statements mutually exclusive? What would have to change for both to happen? Leave a comment and let me know.

Read More...

Two Wake Forest starts have received awards for their performances last weekend. Riley Skinner was named offensive back of the week, and Marcus Tracy was named College Soccer News player of the week. Congrats to both!

I joined the ACC Nation guys for their "beat the blogger" session this week, and also got to talk about last Thursday's win over Baylor. Listen here.

In the news today. . . wait for it . . . I'm sure it's here somewhere . . . nope, I guess not. As far as I can tell, absolutely no one wrote anything about Wake today. Funny how that happens.

At least I'm here, right?

Remember that analysis of the Baylor game I've been promising? Well I went back through the whole game and made a big excel spreadsheet of all the different things Wake did, planning to show you some interesting things like play type and formation by down and distance, summaries of what made scoring drives work, who made good plays and who didn't, and all kinds of other fun stuff. Only problem is, I'm having trouble getting Excel to cooperate and give me the types of summaries I want. I'll keep working on it and hopefully get it up today. At this point I'm past making any promises though.

I've got a brief commentary on the state of the ACC coming later in the day, and hopefully the Baylor report I mentioned. Then we can hopefully turn our attention to Ole Miss (and I guess Hanna) on Wednesday.

Read More...

Time to get to work on my Blogpoll ballot for week one, so take a look and let me know what you think. I'm trying to convert to a résumé system of balloting as soon as possible, meaning that anyone who lost in week one is not going to be in my ballot. After that I looked at quality of win and still to a large extent my perception of what these teams are capable of. Obviously much more subjective, but still all we have to go on.

Leave a comment and let me know what you think:

Rank	Team	Delta
1	Oklahoma	--
2	Southern Cal	--
3	Georgia	--
4	Florida	1
5	Ohio State	2
6	Missouri	2
7	LSU	1
8	Auburn	1
9	Texas	1
10	Alabama	15
11	Wisconsin	--
12	Oregon	--
13	West Virginia	--
14	Wake Forest	1
15	Texas Tech	1
16	Brigham Young	--
17	Arizona State	--
18	Kansas	1
19	Tennessee	1
20	South Florida	1
21	Utah	2
22	Florida State	--
23	South Carolina	3
24	California	2
25	East Carolina	1

Dropped Out: Clemson (#6), Virginia Tech (#18), Illinois (#24).

Read More...

The soccer team jumped out to a good start this weekend, beating VCU 2-1 on Friday and blanking Florida International 3-0 yesterday. Marcus Tracy had game winning goals in both games, Austin da Luz has a goal and an assist, Evan Brown has a goal and two assists, and Lyle Adams has one goal. Akira Fitzgerald has started well in goal, allowing one score and coming up with six saves. I look forward to seeing the team, 2-0 and ranked #1 in the nation in action first hand Friday night against UCLA.

Deacons Direct has a report on the Deacs who made final rosters in the NFL (sorry if there's something new at the top - can't link directly to posts on DD yet).

Dan Collins checks in with an early week report on how the guys are feeling about the Baylor win and their early thoughts on Ole Miss.

Here are some quotes from Art Briles following Thursday's loss.

Ron Green thinks it's already time to look towards basketball season in the ACC. Thanks, Ron, but I'm still having fun here.

Heather Dinnich showing Wake some love...not that she wouldn't do it anyway, but at this point she doesn't have much choice.

Late this morning I should have my week 1 blogpoll ballot up for your consideration, and this evening I'll have a detailed breakdown of the Baylor game ready as well.

Read More...