West Virginia gets some separation in Big East

By Darrell Laurant  |   Thursday, November 06, 2008  |  Comments( 0 )

College Football
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Big East power rankings for Week 11:

1. WEST VIRGINIA (6-2, 3-0): After a sputtering start, the Mountaineers have slipped into cruise control. Last week, the young defense became the first this season to hold Connecticut's Donald Brown under 100 yards, and the offense can beat you with either the pass (Pat White, Dorrell Jalloh, Jock Sanders) or the run (White, Noel Devine). Bill Stewart's team has a tough opponent in Cincinnati this Saturday, but the game is in Morgantown.

2. PITT (6-2, 2-1): Even though the Notre Dame team the Panthers beat in overtime last Saturday wasn't quite the Fighting Irish of yesteryear, they were playing at South Bend and backup Pat Bostick was thrown in at quarterback. Nevertheless, Pitt put the game in the hands (and legs) of LeSean McCoy down the stretch, and the sophomore star came through in a big way. Like Rutgers' Mike Teel the week before, Notre Dame's Jimmy Clausen found the Pitt secondary porous, but the Panther 'D' stiffened when it had to -- like three times in overtime. The opening game loss to Bowling Green now seems like a long time ago.

3. CINCINNATI (6-3, 2-2): Apparently, UC's blowout loss to Connecticut earlier this season was an aberration. Last time out of the chute, the Bearcats delighted a raucous home crowd (many dressed in Halloween costumes) by turning Matt Grothe into a pumpkin, intercepting the South Florida quarterback three times in a 24-10 victory. Meanwhile, unheralded Tony Pike and John Goebel did star turns on prime-time ESPN, with Pike unveiling a grenade-launcher of a right arm and Goebel squirming and bulling for a solid 78 yards. George Selvie remains the dominant defensive end in the conference, but Connor Barwin and Corey Smith outnumbered him last week.

4. SOUTH FLORIDA (6-3, 1-3): The expression on Jim Leavitt's face midway through the Bulls' latest loss said it all. After one in a doleful series of USF penalties, Leavitt looked as if his dog had just been run over. South Florida still may have the most talent -- or, at least, the most future pros -- in the Big East, but that talent has come unglued at all the wrong times. Running back has become an issue, with Mike Ford in and out of the lineup with various injuries, and none of the array of fleet wide receivers emerging as a go-to option for Grothe. Selvie is back after an injury, and that helps, but Cincinnati's wide receivers made Pike look good and the Bulls look bad.

5. CONNECTICUT (6-3, 2-2): The comment was made in this space not so long ago that the Huskies might actually be better off with Zach Frazer playing quarterback instead of Tyler Lorenzen. Apparently not, because UConn has lost two of three since the big senior went down. At the risk of sounding redundant, Donald Brown can't do it all.

6. LOUISVILLE (5-3, 1-2): The is gut-check time for the Cardinals, who first lost star receiver Scott Long to a practice injury last week and then lost to Syracuse for the second straight year, making Orange back Curtis Brinkley look like Adrian Peterson in the process. Now, Steve Kragthorpe's men have Pitt, in Pittsburgh -- and if the defense offers the same holes to McCoy that it offered to Brinkley, this could get ugly.

7. RUTGERS (3-5, 2-2): The Scarlet Knights have gone from hoping for a major bowl to just scuffling to become bowl-eligible. If Teel's dominant performance against Pitt means that the senior quarterback has come out of his earlier funk, bowl eligibility could happen. Syracuse is apparently playing to keep Greg Robinson's job, but the Orange's young secondary should be no match for the Teel-Kenny Britt combination.

8. SYRACUSE (2-6, 1-3): See above.




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