Halle-knute-ia!

by Knute Lombardi
October 13, 2006
Exlusive to TrueAggies.com/UStateAgs.com

 

Howdy sportsfans.

What a week. I'm not sure Aggie fans have have come back to earth yet, Utah fans have shut off the car engine and opened the garage door and BYU fans are starting to agree that Bishop Bronco really is the chosen leader of the Lavell Edwards Stadium 1st Ward.

Let's hand out some awards shall we?

The "Glory days well they'll pass you by" Award:

To Chuck Long. Remember when he was a big armed QB at Iowa and finished second only to the immortal Bo Jackson in the Heisman race? And what a perfect name for a QB. Chuck. Long. Now he may be thinking of changing his name to Butt Kicked because that's what's happening to his SDSU squad every week. You think he ever thinks about secretly suiting up and playing QB for his team? I guess not behind that line he doesn't. Ouch.

He "Devil Went Down to Fort Worth, he was looking for a soul to steal" Award:

Congratulations Gary Patterson, the piper is outside, he says he wants his money. After last year's meteoric and unlikely rise, TCU has come back down to earth…hard. I postulated that Patterson had made a deal with the devil in this column last year and now it appears that Ol' Scratch, fresh off finishing up the Kurt Warner deal is calling in his chips. The Magic Merry Go Round ride has come to a halt, please step off and exit to your right and come see us again soon. That said, TCU is still good enough to finish 3rd in the horrid Mountain Worst conference.

The "Wayne's World Excellence in Broadcasting" Award:

And the winner is…Mountain West commissioner CRAIG THOMPSON!! His gutsy move to remove his conference from any semblance of television coverage was a clearly a strategic move to hide from anyone who may actually care that his conference is TERRIBLE. That Commish is crazy like a fox! And the production values of the games all 16 of us can see rivals anything a local high school can put out. Where did the 500 million bazillion dollar contract money go? It clearly didn't go back to the mtn. I'm sure I'll be eating my words in a few years when the mtn is a media goliath worthy of respect nationwide…just like the conference it covers thinks it is.

The "Grab 'em by the Cajones and Drag Them to Victory" Award:

Congrats to Riley Nelson and the USU defense who share this award. When the snap sailed over punter LJ3's head for a Fresneck safety, my first thought was "there it is. The adversity that will make the Ags pack it in and turn a close game into a blowout ala the Idaho game one week prior. But with the Aggie defense playing inspired ball all day and the USU QB tossing touchdown passes to his own team that didn't happen. Riley Nelson won the heart of Aggies everywhere when he tossed not one but 2 game winning TD's in the final minutes of the game. He took that team on his shoulders and willed them to a victory. He wasn't perfect, but his 2 TD passes (one called back) to Kevin Robinson were and the team rallied around the freshman. Why should that be a surprise? The team is all freshman and sophomores anyway, it's not like Coach Guy was going to lose the team by putting a Frosh in the driver's seat. He handed the reins to one of them, and they responded.

The "Monkey isn't Dead but he may be Comatose" Award:

To the Ags as whole. They got that much needed first win. Now can they kill the monkey completely and get a road win for the first time in 68 years?

The "Ho-Hum" Award:

To BYU and Utah for not giving me anything interesting to talk about by taking care of business. At least I think they did, I couldn't find the game on TV anywhere. If a team plays on TV and no one can see it, does it still count?

On to The Ol' Crystal Ball!

Utah @ Wyoming

I think Utah is good enough to go on the road and beat Wyoming. Aren't they? Brett Ratliffe hasn't been sacked this year but he's still been erratic. Which Ratliffe shows this week? Now that Utah is back to playing the bottom feeders, they should start rolling off a string of impressive that will have tongues wagging about a great BYU/Utah match-up. A match up that BYU will win. But that isn't the game at hand. Wyoming has shown some flashes but "IT" just isn't there for the Cowboys…yet (or again. Take your pick).

Utah 28, Wyoming 17

USU @ SJSU

Did I mention how astonished I was to see USU come back and take a game rather than curl up and die? There are some players on that team; Marcus Cross, Derrick Cumbee, Paul Igboeli to name a few. What about an offensive line that was taking a lot of the blame for the Aggies problems "No one can be a successful QB behind that line" was a common refrain. I think they were vindicated some Saturday. Thing is, that was Saturday and 1 game. Can the Aggies build on that against a 3-1 San Joser team? I think so, here's why: Fresno is a not-as-bad-as-it-looks 1-4 team with losses to #20 Oregon by 7, 4-2 Washington by 1 and 4-1 CSU by 8. The teams Fresno has played (minus USU) are a combined 15-7. Conversely, SJSU's opponents are a combined 9-14 and their wins have come against a 1AA Cal Poly team (who is 5-1 by the way), 0-5 SDSU and 0-6 Stanford all at home. SJSU is putting up points but they can be beat. Will the Aggies show improvement and pull off a road win or will they become another team in the group I just mentioned that sports dorks like me will point to trying to prove SJSU isn't as good as their record?

I say USU has some mojo going now. But everytime I throw them some love, they prove me wrong. Here's hoping I won't be a jilted lover this week.

USU 21, San Jose 20

That's all sportsfans! Enjoy the games.

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As always, you can email feedback, or comments and suggestions to Knute at knute@aggies.com

Knute