Week 6: Hate week?

A blog that I follow religiously is from a guy I've traded emails with, but never met.  He spent years writing about his favorite team to hate; The Nebraska Cornhuskers.    As a matter of fact, on message boards I frequent he goes by the handle of huskerh8er.  He pulled the blog down pretty much and now just rails on college football in general except for this one special week of the year.  It's Husker week and it's becoming more and more of a rivalry between 2 fan bases that are growing to detest each other.  Nebraska fans love calling themselves the "classiest fans in college athletics", but c'mon.  30 years of golf clapping after you've annihilated some hapless foe by 50 points was easy.  They absolutely had one of the great runs in athletic history, and they don't want to let it go.  Everything was A OK for them in the Big 8 when they were loading up with Prop 48's, very few other teams had ever heard of steroids, and St. Tom Osbourne was more than willing to look the other way when one of his star players decided dragging his girlfriend down a flight of stairs sounded like a good idea.  Kindly old Dr. Tom produced such model citizens as Lawrence Phillips, currently serving a 20 year prison sentence after running down 3 kids with his car following a loss in a pickup football game.  Another sterling example would be Christian Peter, arrested 8 times during his college career for such boyish pranks as threatening to kill a parking attendant, public urination and grabbing a coed by the throat.  He was also accused of rape twice against a freshman coed but was never charged.  Nebraska however wound up paying the woman a $50,000 settlement in 1995.
In short, Tom Osbourne is a fraud that decided to take his ball and go home after the Big XII was formed and Texas led the charge to level the playing field by limiting the number of Prop 48's a school was allowed to recruit.  (although it really led to an advantage for them as they knew it would)    He consequently served a couple of terms as a United States congressman and would have become governor had not enough citizens come to their senses.  So, to fill his thirst for the spotlight he returned to Nebraska as the Athletic Director after the failed Steve Pederson/Bill Callahan experiment.  He hired one of the candidates from Pederson's original search in LSU defensive coordinator Bo Pelini and stocked his coaching staff with long time Osbourne cronies.  If you spend any time around Nebraska fans you know that one of their favorite sayings is "order restored".  This means that they feel it's their birthright to have a dominant football program and they love trashing teams and fans that they don't feel are "worthy" of any success.  They used to hate Colorado and K State fans, but now most of their venom is directed at Missouri guys since we've occupied the title game appearances the last 2 years.  I work with a few Husker fans and actually consider them to be pretty good people, but even they have that sense of entitlement that's usually reserved for kansas basketball fans.    If the Tigers pull out a 3rd straight win on Thursday night, you can expect a number of rabid Nebraska folks to simply walk into the machine shed, close the doors and fire up the combine.
Last week was my worst of the season as I went 5-4 straight up and a miserable 3-6 on the season.  I'll hope for a better showing this week.  We start out Thursday night in Columbia as the nation turns it's attention to the Nebraska/Missouri matchup.  Both teams are ranked in the top 25 and the atmosphere will be electric.  I expect the Huskers will attempt to control the clock with Roy Helu carrying the ball and keeping Blaine Gabbert, Danario Alexander and the troops off the field.  Missouri has been susceptible to good running attacks as witnessed in the game against Nevada a couple of weeks ago.  However, if the hicks fall behind they could be in trouble as Zac Lee and their receiving corps looks very mediocre.  Right now the forecast is for rain which could play into Nebraska's hands.  However, there is no way I'm picking against my team in this one.  Missouri opens as a 3 point dog.  I think they cover and win 137-4 as Coach Pinkel takes pity in the 4th quarter and has backup quarterback Jimmy Costello take 2 knees in our endzone for safties. I thought it might be worse, but as of now, it sounds like I'll be watching during a downpour as they are calling for 5 inches of rain that day.
And if you needed another reason to dislike Nebraska, remember this?The biggest hit by the huskers all night.
In other games around the conference, 3-1 Baylor travels to 2-2 Oklahoma in the conference opener.  The Sooners open as a 24 1/2 point favorite.  The Sooners watched their national championship hopes go down the drain last week in Miami.  They've got offensive line problems and Sam Bradford doesn't seem all that interested in getting back to play behind the OU version of swiss cheese.  I believe that the Sooner conference championship game streak stops at 3 this year, but I do think they have enough left in the tank to cover against the Robert Griffen-less Bears.  OU wins 38-10.

Colorado (1-3) @ Texas (4-0, 1-0 in conference)  The Buffs found a way to cover against West Virginia in the last 3 seconds last week.  Don't look for a repeat though.  Texas is rolling and looking to cover for a possible slip in a couple of weeks at the Red River Shootout.  Horns win 52-10.
Iowa State (3-2, 0-1) travels to lawrence to battle the fighting Manginos (4-0) Saturday.  The Cyclones fell short of an overtime bid last week at Arrowhead when their extra point was blocked.  They absolutely have a better coach this year and could reach a bowl within a couple more seasons.  It's not going to happen this year though and the beaks win their conference opener 42-14 and Todd Reesing parties down after the game.
K State (3-2, 1-0) travels to Lubbock to face the pirate and the Red Raiders (3-2, 0-1)  Bill Snyder has the Wildcats playing better ball and they are up to their old special teams excellence.  I still don't believe the Snyder magic works again, but it's impossible that he's making some sort of chicken soup out of the chicken shit that Ron Prince left him.  Josh Freeman made a huge mistake not spending his senior year in Manhattan learning how to actually play quarterback.  K State covers the 17 point spread but falls 31-21.
Oklahoma State (3-1) opens as an 8 point favorite and travels to College Station to play the Aggies, also 3-1.  A&M was exposed last weekend by the Razorbacks of Arkansas and will continue a tailspin this week falling 41-13.
Going out of conference, Auburn (4-0, 1-0) travels to the above mentioned Razorbacks, (2-2, 0-2).  I'm no where near sold on Gene Chizik as a head coach, but I'm not sold on Bobby "the snake" Petrino either.   Auburn opens as a 3 point favorite.  I think they do a little better and win 27-21.
In another Big 10 barn burner, Ron Zook and the fighting Illini (1-3, 0-2) open as a 4 point dog to Michigan State (2-3, 1-1)  The Zookster has benched "Juice" Williams for this game and elected to start Eddie McGee, which he should have done the last 2 years.  Unfortunately for Illinois, I think Zook has already lost his team.  The Spartans win and cover, 27-20.

Oregon, (4-1, 2-0) opens as a 6 1/2 point favorite traveling south to face the Bruins, (3-1, 0-1) in Los Angeles.   If you're one of the folks that decide to stay up, if for no other reason than the UCLA eye candy, I think this is going to be a good game.  In the end though, I think Rick Neuheisels coaching ability comes through and Oregon pulls out a 38-31 win.  Oh, and as always, this is an excellent idea to show a photo of some of Southern California's finest.
Good luck to your team this week unless you happen to root for Nebraska or kansas.