Watching the conclusion of the Duke-Northwestern game on an internet GameTracker Saturday night caused me to think of the Vegas episode of Friends when Monica is cleaning up on craps, and Chandler tells her if she wins again they’ll get married. Everyone is yelling at her to roll and she says: “Shut Up! This just got interesting!”
So, the interesting question now is: Can Duke (1-2) beat Notre Dame (0-3) when they meet in
South Bend on November 17? Duke beat a reasonably non-laughable 2-0 Northwestern team, 20-14, in Illinois, and controlled the game almost throughout (they epitomized the “bend-don’t-break” defense in the 4th quarter, bending nearly in half and doing all but giving the game away).
Duke also hung with, and had a chance to beat UVA in Charlottesville a week ago. The Hoos probably aren’t very good either, but UVA did follow up by beating UNC on the road, and are now 2-1.
How good are these teams, relatively speaking? Well, per CBS Sportsline’s 120 Poll (for whatever it’s worth), Duke rocketed up to #102 after beating previous #56 Northwestern. UVA is #54, and that game was pretty even. Notre Dame? They’re now ranked #100. WOWZA. Even Syracuse is ranked higher, at #92.
Duke plays at Navy (#74) this weekend. Navy then plays at ND on November 3. While the season is long, and November is a distant two months from now, these games should give us at least some idea of how they all stack up against each other, and how much Charlie Weiss has brought his boys back from the brink they’re currently leaning over… or just how far they’ve fallen.
While Cuse, on the other hand, doesn’t play either Duke, ND or Navy, they do get UConn late in the season. That should give us some idea of where they stack up, as the Orange have thus far laid one nasty orange turd after another, getting shellacked by #36 Washington (12-42), #59 @Iowa (0-35) and #52 Illinois (20-41).
For those (Bob) that wouldn’t want to be excluded from this discussion: BC is currently undefeated and actually ranked highly in most major polls, in the #12-14 range. That will certainly be an interesting game, at ND on October 13.
Let the INTERESTING fun begin!
September 20th, 2007 at 9:49 am
How the mighty have fallen . . . the idea that anyone would actually ask the question in a public forum if Duke, Navy, or Syracuse were better than ND is beyond humiliating.
That being said, I still have (a very little) faith that Charlie Weis will turn this around. WE aren’t going to beat many teams, but we should be more competitive by the time the Eagles come to town and certainly, we should be favored in our last 4 games, including Duke and Navy.
That being said, not much else could go wrong this season . . . but losing to Duke or Navy would just about do it.
September 20th, 2007 at 3:17 pm
Borg, if you think CBS and the rest of the human polls are too subjective, you can take a look at some of the computer rankings.
http://www.collegefootballpoll.com/current_congrove_rankings.html
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/sagarin/fbt07.htm
I am a fan of them because the computers usually have BC (#14 AP, #12 Coaches, #11 Congrove, #10 Sagarin) higher and ND lower than the humans. Hmmm, go figure.
September 21st, 2007 at 4:08 pm
I just looked at Sagarin’s ratings.
Oh. My. God.
Duke #98. Notre Dame #113.
Both are behind traditional football powerhouses App State, No. Iowa, UMass, So. Illinois (what is this, basketball??), Richmond, Youngstown State, Delaware (hi David!), and McNeese State (I have no idea where that is). Yes - they’re all I-AA.
I’m sorry, Mike. I’m really not trying to rub it in. I’m just… shocked. I was half joking when I posted this article. Tounge-in-cheek. I really don’t think Duke has much of a chance to beat ND. But those numbers are simply… well… shocking.
I realize my school’s team still sucks, but I feel like we’ve just been invited to a bowl game or something. When Navy smacks us around tomorrow, I’m sure I’ll come back to earth, and get back to posting about the Nats and Duke BASKETBALL.