If this doesn’t get our boys’ blood boiling, nothing will. The initial Coaches Poll came out today and our beloved Fighting Irish were ranked tied for #29 with South Carolina. Ahead of ND are such football “powerhouses” as Hawaii, TCU, and Rutgers. Also ahead of ND are six ’07 opponents (from highest): USC, Michigan, UCLA, Penn St, Ga Tech and Boston College.
This is both good and bad. The good news is that the low ranking should serve to motivate the troops to some degree. Nothing like a little disrespect to put some bite back into the dog (see Holtz ’88). On the other hand, if we happen to be pretty good this year, it’s a loooooooong way to climb up to a Top 10 slot and possible BCS bowl scenarios.
Well, like all ND fans, I’m hoping that we surprise everyone and win it all!!! Back to reality though … I’m thinking that the tough early schedule (Ga Tech, at Michigan, at Penn St, at UCLA), combined with breaking in a new QB, will make going 9-3 a monumental achievement this year. 10-2 would be MIRACULOUS. Nope, 2008 will be the year that it all comes together for ND … when all this young talent has some maturity and seasoning and the schedule is more to our favor. 2007 will be fun … with speed bumps … the boys should be playing at a high level by season’s end. And I think the new Defensive Coordinator (Brown) will start making a big difference ON THE FIELD.
Only 4 weeks ’til the opener vs Ga Tech!!! Yikes!!!
Wally
If the Irish can pick up some early wins, say go 3-1 in their first four games they will quickly rise in the polls based on the schedule. There is something to be said about being the hunter. Hopefully Charlie can use that motivation with this team. Looking forward to it.
Kinda interesting – ND is not ranked in the top 25, yet four of the Irish games (PennSt., Michigan, USC, & BC) are ranked in the top 5 most difficult ticket to purchase by tickets.com.
Casey
ps. JD – check out this link: https://www.littlestevensundergroundgarage.com/play/archive07.html
ND is getting even less respect in the inaugural AP poll. The Irish come in at like #40. They received something like 11 votes in total.
So here’s yet another instance of the polls lacking integrity and displaying a bias against ND: In this initial AP poll, Boise St is ranked #24, Hawaii #23 and TCU #22. Now, ask anybody this question: “If ND plays either of these teams on a neutral field, who wins?” I think most, or at least a decent majority, would say that ND would win. I know ND is breaking in a new QB, but so is Boise St. ND has had two great recruiting classes in a row. Many of these players will be on the field in ’07. So if folks honestly and objectively think ND would win, then they should be ranked slightly ahead of or tied with those teams. I’m trying to be objective and I can’t help but see ND winning 7 out of 10 games vs these teams.
What we have with the polls are people factoring in the schedule and forecasting the W-L record, which is not solely an indication of how good or bad a team is. Before playing a single game, ND is getting penalized in the polls for scheduling Michigan, Penn St, UCLA and USC in their first 7 games … those first 3 are road games, and yes, ND will not be favored in any of them. Meanwhile, those other 3 teams (Hawaii, TCU, Boise St) are predicted to each go 11-1 or 10-2 because they play in a crappy conference against weak competition and have maybe 2-3 tough games the whole year (against eachother). Does that mean they’re the 21st best team in the country? Nope.
Wouldn’t it make sense not to have any polls until each team has played at least 3-4 games? That would get rid of a lot of the bias in both directions.
Wally