Sporting News Season Preview: Michigan at #9. Slotted for Cotton Bowl.
It's that time of year for the full season previews to come out.
Sporting News just released theirs. I searched and did not see it posted already. Since a lot of the links are slideshows, I've tried to link directly to the relevant items.
- They have us ranked #9 overall...
- 3rd in the Big Ten behind OSU/PSU...
- and have Rashan Gary ranked #14 in the top 40 players overall.
Full Preview can be found HERE.
Other less important rankings is they have UM vs Minnesota as the #9 trap game... and have the Florida game at Jerryworld ranked as #2 game of the opening week... and finally, have Harbaugh at #5 coach in the game.
I saw there was a Spring Ball ranking. But not an actual season preview.
Surprised they think we'd be flat for that game.
Minnesota is sandwiched between football powerhouses Rutgers and Maryland so......
So many arm punts last year that were in their favor.
that PSU beats us this year. They also loose to OSU. To finish above us, we would have to lose at least 3. Ain't gonnna happen.
It's a night game in Happy Valley which is tough enough as is, and PSU might actually be good now. Look how much we struggled with an average Iowa team on the road, at night last year. We would've beaten that team by 30 if it was a noon game in A2
I think PSU is overrated too, but we're kidding ourselves if we try to argue it's anything better than a coin flip as to who wins
When was the last time we beat a ranked team on the road by double digits? The last major road win we've pulled off was beating #2 ND 47-21 back in 2006.
Even our good road wins since then have been very close. I guess we beat ND 28-24 in 2010. We beat Northwestern a few times?
I'm not trying to take a dump on the team I love, but we have not done much good on the road for well over 10 years.
They have given Ohio State, arguably one of the top 3 teams in the country over the last decade, absolute fits at Happy Valley at night. And they were not a world beater at any time during this span. It didn't matter.
August 1st, 2017 at 10:03 AM ^
OSU-PSU game was as flukey as they come. OSU was the better team and win that contest 90% of the time in a simulation.
August 1st, 2017 at 10:15 AM ^
Perhaps, but a bad PSU team also outplayed OSU in 2015 and lost in OT.
August 1st, 2017 at 10:17 AM ^
They won in Madison, but it was in overtime. I don't think people are writing off the PSU game; they're just saying it will probably be tough.
No need to even go back to pre-Jim days.
Harbaugh has an 0-2 record in road night games against teams with a winning record and neither team was a "world beater". Utah in 2015 and Iowa in 2016.
An Iowa team, I might add, that was demolished one week before we played them by PSU in Happy Valley.
Harbaugh's two night road wins are:
- vs. a 2-10 Rutgers team
- vs. a 6-6 Minnesota team, a game which we just barely won.
No matter what, PSU is not going to be even close to as bad as either of those two teams and their environment is about 100 times harder to play in than Minneapolis or Piscataway.
iowa was cold too...
August 1st, 2017 at 12:13 PM ^
We have an o-line that is not tested and a qb who I believe is not up to the task. Hope I'm wrong . . .
it's a night game argument. Is the field a different size at night or does PSU get more downs or players or timeouts to give them an advantage? It's the same game played at night in the same stadium, it's just under lights instead of sunlight.
Ask Ohio State, who has struggled tremendously at night against PSU, yet has had no problems with PSU in Columbus.
It is different.
I don't think PSU is great but you're all crazy for thinking it's not going to be a really tough road game. A team that loves to arm punt going against a team breaking in an entirely new secondary? I think we've got a great shot to win, but everyone thinking its going to be a cake walk is deluding themselves and will find themselves yelling at their TV a lot on 10/21
When was our last win on the road vs a top 25 team? How about in one of the largest and loudest stadiums in the country?......We've got a shot to win, but people thinking we're going to steam roll them are being willfully blind
August 1st, 2017 at 12:34 AM ^
did to Morelli...On PSU's first series, it'll be game over...
The problem with how Penn State is looked at is that it is too one sided. They really do not have a very good defense and lost there two top lineman and there best DB is out for the year. They will have an extremely large number of points scored against them and will struggle with teams who have really good defenses and can apply pressure. A team who loses by 39 points to anyone should not win the Big Ten. If they suffer any type of injury in there offensive backfield they will finish around .500 and healthy there season will still disappoint the faithful and Matt Millon and that will make me happy.
Except they actually won the Big Ten.
The comparison is still a poor one.
2011 Michigan did not beat anyone of note. At all. We had an easy schedule in a very weak Big Ten (we did not play the conference champion, Wisconsin Badgers either), with 8 home games and 4 non-conference games (none of which were on the road and none of which were against Top 25 teams; ND finished 8-5 and fell out of the rankings by the end of the season).
We had zero wins over teams that finished the year in the top 20, with the two best being over #21 Virginia Tech and #24 Nebraska. Neither of Michigan's losses were to top 10 teams either.
2016 PSU beat two bonafide Top Ten teams in Wisconsin and Ohio State. In addition, two of their losses were to other bonafide Top Ten teams in Michigan and USC. The other was by 3 points, on the road, early in the season with injury problems showing.
August 1st, 2017 at 11:50 AM ^
I want to just beat OSU. So fucking sick of losing to those fuck tards. I really could not care less about which bowl game we attend.
Until we win, forget about multiple 5-stars from out-of-state. I just reviewed the ESPN top 50 (see below). OSU is loaded and we have virtually nothing in the top 100. If we hadn't given away the 2015 MSU game and OSU last year, those numbers would be much different. Our OSU record makes me want to vomit.
I think I may speak for a few other people when I say I get tired of people saying "Just beat Ohio State" in otherwise useful threads. Yeah buddy, we get it. We need to beat Ohio State. We can discuss other things in the meantime since the OSU game isn't for a few months yet
Hey, no politics!
there is a BIG team and a PAC 12 team both in the playoff this year, the committee will do everything possible to match them up in Pasadena. Sporting News has Ohio and USC both in the playoff but only USC in the Rose Bowl. Doubt that would happen unless the seeding would completely prohibit it. They split up Oregon and Ohio State in 2014 but Ohio State was so clearly the fourth seed (based on the regular season) that it couldn't happen. I think if there is a possibility for a traditional Rose Bowl matchup with the Playoff structure it will happen.
The seeding is more important than the "Rose Bowl tradition" to the committee. If USC is #1 and (Big Ten Team X) is #2 or even #3, there is no way they mess with the seeds to get the matchup.
When creating semifinal matchups, 1 v 4 & 2 v 3 is king. Everything else is secondary.
think they would tinker with seedings a little bit if it wasn't really transparently for that purpose and did not result in a substantial mismatch. With the games being back on New Years Day this year (and frankly with the semi-finals the last two years being about as exciting as a dentist appointment), the ratings for a traditional Rose Bowl matchup would be absolutely killer. So I guess I am saying that your right, they would not do anything crazy, but if they could have an Ohio State or Michigan v. USC I think they would tweak the seedings to do it. They have switched teams from 2 to 3 or 3 to 4 in previous years for no real discernible reason and nobody has really asked any questions.
The Trojans are rapidly becoming "Notre Dame West" as being the team most likely to be overranked to start the year and fall furthest from pre-season media projections.
Nobody is as good as Notre Dame when it comes to being ranked pre-season but actually being bad at football. Nobody.
Also I'm patiently awaiting when the McGrone puns hit your username.
"Nobody is as good as Notre Dame when it comes to being ranked pre-season but actually being bad at football."
Sparty's 3-9 beat out ND's 4-8 last year in the "bad football" category. However, Sparty was ranked 12th in the preseason poll while ND was ranked 10th.
I am still giving Sparty the edge here.
I'd give Sparty at least a split title on the 2016 Disappointments Cup, but it's hard to beat Notre Dame's Disappointments Shares in the modern era.
It will be hard for MSU to catch up since they won't be ranked again pre-season for the next...ever?