Pick Six Week 12

The standings live here as always.  BlueBarron gave the proper sacrifices to the Ctrl+F deities and has returned to the top 20.

This week Southern Miss and Florida State drop out of the polls.  Georgia Tech returns as one replacement and Virginia enters the poll for the first time since 2007.  It will come as no surprise to you that Virginia was not a very popular pick this year.  Only 2 people selected Virginia as their unranked team.  What may come as a surprise is that MaizeAndBlueWahoo was not one of the two.  Instead he chose Boston College.  I wonder if he’s regretting his decision to choose all of his most hated teams.

Individual Ballot Analysis

Brooklyn Blue is on a 3-week stay at the top of the leaderboard.  This week he has 105 points.  The perfect ballot has changed slightly with the losses by Oklahoma State and Clemson.  With 119 points this week, the perfect ballot is LSU, Stanford, Arkansas, Michigan State, Southern Cal and Houston.

There are four people tied for last place who all have the worst possible score.  They’re only getting points from Oklahoma and TCU for a score of 21 points.

Judging Your Picks

It has been a long time since MGoBlog has been able to claim that it’s readers had better than average skill at predicting the outcome of this college football season.  This week a completely random ballot and the average MGoBlog ballot are both earning 54 points.

Games To Watch

There are a ton of good games to watch this weekend.  It might just be the best weekend in college football.  The top team from every group is playing in a game that is at least somewhat tough.

• #1 LSU (leader of Group A) vs. #3 Arkansas (leader of Group C)
• #4 Stanford vs. #22 Notre Dame
• #8 Houston (leader of Unranked) vs. Tulsa
• #11 Michigan St (leader of Group D) vs. Northwestern
• #10 Southern Cal (leader of Group E) vs. UCLA

While the last two games may not sound that tough, Northwestern picked off Nebraska earlier this season and they’re playing at home.  Teams don’t just walk into the vaunted Ryan Field and expect an easy victory.

USC is far and away the best team in the Pac-12 South but they’re ineligible to go to the title game.  Right now UCLA is a game ahead of Utah but Utah has an almost guaranteed victory over Colorado on Friday.  That means Saturday night UCLA will know they are playing for their spot in the Pac-12 title game.

Thanksgiving

Since it’s Thanksgiving I’d like to share what I’m thankful for.

I’m thankful for Georgia and Virginia Tech quietly putting together good seasons.  I’m also thankful for Stanford getting back into the top 5.

I am not thankful for Arizona State.  They have forever disappointed me with their losses to UCLA, Washington State and Arizona the last three weeks.  That is about as far from a murder’s row as you can get in the BCS.

What are your non-Michigan thanks?