The Bottom Ten and PSU Schedule

Before the season started, many people (myself included) were a little upset that three of the four teams on our out of conference schedule managed to make ESPN's Preseason Bottom Ten.

For those of you not familiar with the Bottom Ten, it doesn't necessarily represent the worst 10 teams in D-1a, but it's often pretty close. Even though Wyoming's band uniforms often make the list, this ranking can often be used as a fairly good gage of what the public perceives as teams that "really suck ass".

Now that the final Bottom Ten is out, I thought I'd do a quick reflection.

Preseason Bottom Tenners On PSU's 2007 Schedule:

Florida International Airport
2006 Record: 0-12
2007 Preseason BT Ranking: #1
Score vs PSU: L 0-59
2007 Record: 1-11
2007 Final BT Ranking: #3
Recap: Ah, FIU. They were horrible last year. Then this happened. They suspended and removed twenty-something of their already not very good players, but managed to actually win a game this season. One game, against North Texas. But one game is a step up and I'm happy for them. I don't really have anything else to add here. They finished 170 in Sagarin's Rankings, meaning they were beat out by 50 D1aa squads. That's bad folks. Ok, I'm done kicking this school while they are down.

Teample
2006 Record: 1-11
2007 Preseason BT Ranking: #3
Score vs PSU: L 0-31
2007 Record: 4-8
2007 Final BT Ranking: unranked
Recap: Anyone who watched this team play PSU had to leave wondering how the hell the Owls managed to shut themselves out. This is essentially what happened. They where in the red zone several times in the first half only to turn the ball over or miss field goals. I was actually very impressed with the Temple team even though the stadium had a high school junior varsity feel to it when you realized no one was there. Anyway, Temple started MAC play for the first time this season and managed a very respectable 4-4. They had ranked UConn by the balls before the Big East refs literally game the game away. All in all I was very impressed with Temple and I think they have turned things around.

Buffalo
2006 Record: 2-10 (one win against Temple)
2007 Preseason BT Ranking: #4
Score vs PSU: L 24-45
2007 Record: 5-7
2007 Final BT Ranking: unranked
Recap: Like Temple, MAC member Buffalo turned things around and finished 5-3 in conference play, good enough for 5th place. Buffalo and Temple use to own the bottom two spots for a long time, and it wasn't until they played the Nittany Lions that they really turned it around. Coincidence? Yes.


Relevant New Additions to the Bottom Ten Final:

Notre Dame
2006 Record: 10-3
2007 Preseason BT Ranking: unranked
Score vs PSU: L 10-31
2007 Record: 3-9
2007 Final BT Ranking: 'waiting list'
Recap: For a recap of Notre Dame's season, go to any MSM site and click on any link, it will be about Notre Dame.

Minnesota
2006 Record: 6-7
2007 Preseason BT Ranking: unranked
Score vs PSU: n/a
2007 Record: 1-11
2007 Final BT Ranking: #8
Recap: We didn't play Minnesota. We didn't play Northwestern either. These two schools were the two worst in the Big Ten. No one gives a shit. The SOS police will see Minnesota and will hold that against us anyway, so it's important to note how bad they are.

Final Thoughts... Penn State, even in the dark ages, had almost always managed to beat the second tier teams. Dominate them, really. It wasn't until we started Big Ten play that things usually got out of hand. Even this year, with a very average team, we shut out two of these schools and dominated Buffalo the entire first half. We let the hype get to us for the ND game, but after we settled in the Emu was give about 1.3 seconds a snap to get rid of the ball.


I don't really know what the point of this post is. This is too bad because I just spent a lot of time on it. I suppose I was worried going into the season that playing three of the worst five teams in D1-a was going to hurt us, then we lost to Michigan and Illinois and it didn't really matter anymore. I don't like crappy games, they are a waist of time. The game ends up on the Big Ten Network and I spend $75 on beer and wings because I had to go to the bar to watch the game. Nothing sucks worse than paying $5 for a Miller Light. I guess that's all I'm saying.