Three and Out - Week Eight

(1) Sorry that I missed last week, but I did go down to San Marcos to catch the Lamar game. We made the decision to do a live game thread rather than a Twitter play-by-play since they only had one seat in the press box for us. I'd like to hear what your thoughts were on that.


As far as the game went, I was loving it at 35-0 but not completely satisfied with 46-21. Fran has raised my expectations that much. Lamar is what UTSA hopes they can be next year and once they put in West Virginia transfer Jeremy Johnson at QB they became what I anticipate Texas State will see in the WAC in 2012. I spent Friday night watching San Jose State eek out one of the ugliest wins I have ever seen, but after watching Saturday's game either team would have beaten the Bobcats by 28. These boys have a long way to go still but everyone should be happy with 5-2. They have a very winnable roadie against Southeastern Louisiana and then home dates against Northwestern State and Prairie View A&M following that. I don't think it's unreasonable to believe the Cats will be 8-2 when they head to Conway to battle Central Arkansas.


(2) Expansion and realignment nonsense? Here ya go. We have it straight from Karl Benson's mouth that North Texas and Louisiana-Lafayette are his targets, and he's really not interested in adding AFA or Boise if they don't bring football. He likes where the WAC currently is, as much as he can frankly. Benson is looking for that eighth football school and believes the CUSA/MWC merger will bring fruit to his search. He loved the enthusiasm shown in Bobcat Alley and other tailgating sections. When I caught him in the press box at halftime and asked him what he thought of Texas State football gameday, he said it was one of the best stops of his career.


Line of the day: I ask him if he was happy to see San Jose State beat Hawaii Friday night. "Well, it's a conference game so I am impartial but I usually don't stay up until 11:30 watching football games." Then we all started laughing.

While he would like a team like Montana or Montana State to break loose, it was made very, very clear to us that UNT and LaLa are who he is after, and he has a plan to get them during "realignment madness".


Let me tell you what else I am hearing about. The Big East is trying to get Temple in. A move Villanova is adamantly against. It's looking like Boise State, Air Force, Navy, Central Florida, Houston and SMU are going to get invites there. East Carolina and Temple are backup plans if Boise and AF decline (as expected). Navy is still on the fence but the other three will join in a heartbeat.

Conference USA's old TV deal required a championship game, but it's rather unclear how TV and the merger will affect that yet. If Boise and Air Force stay while Houston, SMU, UCF, and East Carolina go then that's an eighteen team league. If there's two nine team divisions in the league, they can basically play eight or nine (with a crossover game) conference games a year and have a championship game. I believe that is the direction Banowsky and Thompson are headed. Banowsky will take over the Big 12 after Neinas while the merged conference will stay under Thompson's leadership and eventually will be for all sports.

Oh yeah, this saved the WAC if you didn't notice. There are way too many teams to worry about now for some of these leagues. This also ensures an undefeated WAC team will get extremely favorable pub as a BCS buster if the situation ever arises. They'll be the ultimate underdog. At least we can stop worrying about if the conference is going to exist in 2012. I now think it's possible to get North Texas or La-La after reading all this crap and talking with Mr. Benson, and I am no sunshine pumper. The WAC is still a regional brand while the Sun Belt is about to be completely overshadowed by this new league. It's a good thing to join the weakest league in the country in 2012. I think Texas State might be able to win the Potato Bowl in 2013 and get some serious momentum for the future.

(3) Around the Top 25:

LSU 27, Auburn 10

Wisconsin 24, Michigan State 21

Stanford 35, Washington 28

Around the state:

Texas A&M 42, Iowa State 19

Oklahoma 55, Texas Tech 45

Houston 49, Marshall 24

Rice 26, Tulsa 24

SMU 34, Southern Miss 31

UTEP 29, Colorado State 27

TCU 41, New Mexico 7

LA-Monroe 33, North Texas 21


Around the WAC:

Utah State 31, LA Tech 20

Nevada 35, Fresno State 28

Hawaii 28, NM State 17