Post by elp525 on Nov 28, 2010 8:40:40 GMT -5
November 27, 2010
By Dave Hickman
The Charleston Gazette
Win, wait and watch.
That will be West Virginia's football assignment next Saturday before the Mountaineers will know if they have earned - or, quite honestly, backed into - a BCS bowl berth.
WVU's regular-season finale with Rutgers has been set for a noon kickoff, although the network that will carry it (ABC, ESPN or ESPN2) has yet to be determined.
Win that one, then West Virginia will have to wait until late that night and watch to find out if South Florida can knock off Connecticut. That game is scheduled for 8 p.m.
If the Mountaineers (8-3, 4-2 Big East) can handle free-falling Rutgers (4-7, 1-5), that will assure them no worse than a three-way tie with Pitt and Connecticut for the Big East championship.
It won't, however, get them the league's automatic BCS bowl berth, which is almost certainly the Fiesta on Jan. 1. Because UConn (7-4, 4-2) beat both WVU and Pitt (6-5, 4-2) during the season, the Huskies hold all the tiebreakers for the BCS berth if they beat South Florida.
So in addition to beating Rutgers, West Virginia needs South Florida to hand Connecticut its third conference loss and knock the Huskies out of the picture.
Then even if Pitt wins its finale against Cincinnati, WVU wins the tiebreaker because of Friday's 35-10 rout of the Panthers.
Cincinnati could have done West Virginia a favor and taken care of the issue Saturday, but fell to UConn 38-17 in East Hartford, Conn.
South Florida (7-4, 3-3) showed some definite signs of life Saturday when the Bulls scored late to tie the game and then beat Miami 23-20 on the road in overtime.
In seven meetings between the teams - including five since both joined the Big East in 2005 - Connecticut is 3-4 against South Florida.
The teams have played three times in Tampa and USF has won all three.
If West Virginia wins and doesn't earn the BCS bowl berth, it seems a virtual certainty that the Mountaineers would get the Big East's top non-BCS bowl berth, the Champs Sports Bowl on Dec. 28 in Orlando, Fla. In fact, even with a loss to Rutgers, that would seem to be a good bet.
By Dave Hickman
The Charleston Gazette
Win, wait and watch.
That will be West Virginia's football assignment next Saturday before the Mountaineers will know if they have earned - or, quite honestly, backed into - a BCS bowl berth.
WVU's regular-season finale with Rutgers has been set for a noon kickoff, although the network that will carry it (ABC, ESPN or ESPN2) has yet to be determined.
Win that one, then West Virginia will have to wait until late that night and watch to find out if South Florida can knock off Connecticut. That game is scheduled for 8 p.m.
If the Mountaineers (8-3, 4-2 Big East) can handle free-falling Rutgers (4-7, 1-5), that will assure them no worse than a three-way tie with Pitt and Connecticut for the Big East championship.
It won't, however, get them the league's automatic BCS bowl berth, which is almost certainly the Fiesta on Jan. 1. Because UConn (7-4, 4-2) beat both WVU and Pitt (6-5, 4-2) during the season, the Huskies hold all the tiebreakers for the BCS berth if they beat South Florida.
So in addition to beating Rutgers, West Virginia needs South Florida to hand Connecticut its third conference loss and knock the Huskies out of the picture.
Then even if Pitt wins its finale against Cincinnati, WVU wins the tiebreaker because of Friday's 35-10 rout of the Panthers.
Cincinnati could have done West Virginia a favor and taken care of the issue Saturday, but fell to UConn 38-17 in East Hartford, Conn.
South Florida (7-4, 3-3) showed some definite signs of life Saturday when the Bulls scored late to tie the game and then beat Miami 23-20 on the road in overtime.
In seven meetings between the teams - including five since both joined the Big East in 2005 - Connecticut is 3-4 against South Florida.
The teams have played three times in Tampa and USF has won all three.
If West Virginia wins and doesn't earn the BCS bowl berth, it seems a virtual certainty that the Mountaineers would get the Big East's top non-BCS bowl berth, the Champs Sports Bowl on Dec. 28 in Orlando, Fla. In fact, even with a loss to Rutgers, that would seem to be a good bet.
