I have been publishing a Most Improved Teams list since 1999 and the list hit a home run that very first year. I pegged Hawaii as my #1 Most Improved Team and they were coming off an 0-12 record in 1998. The then “Rainbow Warriors” simply set an NCAA record for largest improvement ever by going to 9-4 in 1999!

This year there are 16 teams on my Most Improved List and these are all teams that had losing records last year but ones I believe will be bowl eligible this year. Last season I had 19 teams on the list and 13 of them were bowl eligible at the end of the year with 17 of them improving their record! Do you think it is easy picking teams with losing records that will have a winning record the next year?

I went back to 1992 and there have been 969 teams that had a losing season. Of those 969 teams only 279 had a winning record the next year which is 28.8%. That means if a team is coming off a losing season there is over a 70% chance that they will have another losing record the next year!

Over the last nine years 109 of the teams that have made my Most Improved List have been bowl eligible the next year. In that same nine-year span there have been 475 teams with a losing record and of those 475 only 129 have gone onto a winning record (above .500) the next season (27.1%). Of those 129 teams, 79 of them were on my Most Improve List. Now you do the math here but as you can see very few teams go from a losing record to a bowl the next year if they are not on my Most Improved list.

This blog is about the one that got away. Read more…

2010 was a memorable year for many of the teams and players in the Mid-American Conference. The ’10 season saw the conference send four of its teams to bowl games and both MAC Championship game participants Miami, Oh and Northern Illinois each won their bowl games. Both the RedHawks and Huskies also finished in the final AP Top 30 and Miami, Ohio had one of the greatest single season turnarounds in college football history going from a 1-11 record in 2009 to a 10-4 season last year which included a MAC Championship.

2010 was also a banner year for several MAC players including Toledo WR/KR Eric Page who was named 1st-Tm All-America by several different services after avg 31.3 yds per return with 3 TD’s. Page also had 99 rec (11.2) and 8 TD’s. Read more…

A lot of people ask me if I have a favorite team. I was born and raised and still live in Cleveland, Ohio. I was a fan of many teams as a child but now that I put out a National magazine, I cannot afford to be a fan of any team. I have to pick the teams where I think they will finish each year. I was doing a radio show last week and I was asked if I have a favorite team or teams. My response was a strong YES! The interviewer was surprised by that answer and also eager to hear which team I would pick. My answer was my favorite team each year is the team I pick #1 in the magazine and my favorite teams are the ones I have picked higher than all the other major magazines out there. I then said that each year I establish a list of my favorite teams for that year. I then give this list to my wife. I wear a shirt and tie to work every day during the week and my tie is always a college team. I wear polo shirts during the weekend and when not at work and they are always different college teams. The list I give my wife is the ones to buy that I will be wearing for the upcoming year as these are the teams I will be the biggest fan of for the upcoming season. I was then asked “What teams will your wife be buying ties and shirts of this year? That was a great question and I thought I would answer it in a blog. Read more…

For the next two weeks, I will be taking a look at the conference teams of the decade for 2000-2009. Factored into my analysis will be conference win %, conference and division titles, bowl games and bowl wins. I will also include BCS bowl wins, final AP rankings and number of national championships for the major conferences. There have been several teams who have changed conferences during that time and I will include them in the analysis for any season(s) they were affiliated with that certain conference. I will also be doing a breakdown of how the conference did in bowl games during the decade and I will emphasis the overall win/loss record, the number of BCS bowl wins, and the records against Non-BCS and ranked bowl teams.

While some conferences may have no-brainers as the top team, other conferences were very competitive over the past decade. Here is the schedule for the upcoming week with the conferences I will be analyzing on each date. Read more…

2009 was a memorable year for many of the teams and players in the Mid-American Conference. The ’09 season saw the conference send five of its teams to bowl games for a 2nd straight year and league champ Central Michigan ended the conference’s 14 game bowl losing streak by defeating Troy 44-41 in 2OT in the GMAC Bowl. The Chippewas also finished in the final AP Top 25 at #23.

Temple had one of its best seasons in school history by winning 9 straight games and made their 1st bowl appearance since 1979! Temple HC Al Golden was named MAC coach of the year as the Owls have improved their win total in each of his 4 seasons as coach. With Temple breaking their bowl drought, 11 MAC teams have now been to a bowl game since 2004! 

I was very pleased with the way the East Division played out in ‘09 as my magazine was the only magazine in the country to have Ohio winning the division. Every other magazine had the Bobcats projected 4th or lower! Frank Solich has done a great job here as the Bobcats were just 11-35 in the 4 years prior to his arrival. Since 2006, Ohio is 28-24 including 2 appearances in the MAC Title game! Read more…

The NCAA has granted a 6th year of eligibility for Kent St RB Eugene Jarvis exactly 5 months to the day after he suffered a season-ending injury at Boston College.

In 2007 Jarvis tied a school record with 5 straight yard games (old record Don Fitzgerald in ’66).  He went on to break Eric Wilkerson’s 1988 school record of 1,325 in a season with 1,669 (6.0!) while also leading Kent St in receiving yards (306, 13.3). Jarvis was the first Kent St RB to lead the MAC in rushing since Wilkerson did it in ’88. In 2008, he was the leading returning FBS rusher and missed 3.5 games with injury (missed just one prior) but he still rushed for 801 (4.9) and was the #2 rec with 273 (10.9). Last year before the injury he rushed for 158 yards (4.3).

Obviously this is good news for Kent St and there is no kid more deserving than him. Knowing Eugene like I do, he will come back this season strong and play with a lot of passion.

Read more…

Hawaii was starting their 3rd string QB, Bryant Moniz, a walk-on and they trailed Fresno St 42-3 mid-4Q before they got a TD with 7:25 left. The Warriors recovered an onside kick and got another TD with 4:42 left. Fresno St recovered the final onside attempt and finished the game at the Hawaii 22. FSU led 28-3 at the half despite only having a 249-171 yard edge as UH had a 43 yard FG blocked, Moniz was intercepted in the endzone and they also settled for a 33 yard FG. It was 21-3 when Hawaii fumbled a punt at their own 30 with 1:39 left in the half which set up a 17 yd TD pass from Colburn to West with :11 left.

Read more…