Bummer

There is little need for an in-depth analysis of the Thanksgiving day loss to USC. When the team with the superior talent plays its "A" game, it usually wins. As much as people like to criticize the "star" ratings of the recruiting services, USC demonstrated what a team full of 4-star and 5-star recruits looks like. Could ASU have played better or done some things differently to pull of the upset? Sure. But if we played that game 10 times, USC would win at least 8 of the games.

The main thing that this game proved is how insane USC's loss to Stanford was. If they had won that game, they would be right at the top of the National Championship conversation.

I don't see this game as a setback for the program. "Reality check" would be a better term. We can't get to the next level until we get more studs on the roster. What happens next February on signing day will have far more impact on the program than what happened on Thanksgiving.

Turkey day football at Sun Devil Stadium

Despite my earlier prediction that it may be several months before the Pac-10 schedule is finalized, the conference actually announced the 2007 lineup a full eight months in advance.

This rare display of proactive behavior from the conference office doesn't change my opinion that Tom Hansen needs to go, but it's nice to see the conference, and ASU in particular, get a prime timeslot on Thanksgiving evening.

The ASU press release makes a couple of dubious claims. First, it asserts that "ASU will enjoy a national stage alone on Thanksgiving evening at 6 p.m." which is true only if you count college football. There will be an NFL game starting at the exact same time, although I guess you could argue that the NFL Network isn't exactly on the national stage.

The second claim that caused me to raise an eyebrow is: "ASU asked for (and received) an evening kickoff time for that date so that fans could have the opportunity for a traditional Thanksgiving meal and then attend the game." Hmmmm, methinks that ESPN had no interest in starting the game at any time other than 8p.m. Eastern, in order to avoid competing with the NFL games on CBS and Fox.

Anyway, exaggerated claims aside, this is good news for the program. A national TV audience is never a bad thing, and it spreads out the last five games of the season. Let's just hope that ESPN doesn't unleash its dreaded Full Circle coverage on us.

It's also worth noting that Oregon's game at au was moved to Thursday, November 15 so the rats will have 16 days to prepare for their defeat at the hands of the good guys.

Possible changes to the 2007 football schedule

According to the Trib's ASU football notebook, the ASU/USC game at Sun Devil Stadium, currently scheduled for November 17, could be moved to Thanksgiving, pushing the au game back to December 1.

I'd be all in favor of this move. We already know that the last five weeks of the schedule are brutal (Cal, @Oregon, @UCLA, USC, au) so adding a bye week could only help. Plus, the TV exposure would be significant.

According to a few posts on various message boards, there is some confusion as to whether the proposal is to move the game to Thanksgiving Day itself, or to the Saturday following Thanksgiving. Either would be OK from my perspective.

Keep in mind that in 2007 Pac-10 games will be split between ABC, Fox Sports Net and ESPN, so expect the conference to move several games to non-traditional slots.

Typically the pre-season selections for TV games are announced in May/June, so it may be several months before anything is confirmed.