7 out of 8 for little FAU? I'll take it
I get excited on opening day of snook fishing season. I get excited on opening day of the NASCAR race season. But I REALLY get excited on opening day of the college football season.
We Floridians are fortunate to have three perennial college football powerhouses in Miami, Florida State, and Florida that have a legitimate chance to win the national championship each and every year. We also have dozens of other NCAA 1A schools that play well-executed and extremely competitive football and are a treat to watch. One of those, Florida Atlantic University (FAU), is entering its first year of top-division NCAA football after just a few years of the program's existence. And that is why I'm commenting today.
A preseason poll has selected little FAU, my alma mater, to finish seventh in the eight-team Sunbelt Conference. Since this is FAU's first year in the "big league," and since they have scheduled some tough non-conference teams, I will be very happy indeed with a seventh-place finish. In addition to playing conference champion North Texas, FAU must battle with conference foes Troy, Middle Tennessee, Louisiana-Lafayette, Louisiana-Monroe, Arkansas State, and Florida International.
But the real beatings will come in the first three games at the hands of non-conference Kansas and Oklahoma State (Big 12), and Minnesota (Big 10). Coach Howard Schnellenberger believes that you can't get better unless you play good teams -- this is, of course, assuming that your players survive such competition. What's more, Coach Howard has scheduled the University of Florida for 2007 -- at the Gator Swamp in Gainesville. What was he thinking?
So I am quite content for FAU to be projected seventh. That means they will win at least one game more than their in-state and conference rival FIU. Hey, you've got to look for even the smallest glint from the bright side, don't you?