I know its early, but I feel compelled to share some christmas spirit with fellow Rxers. Take HAWAII +8
We all know that Cincy is more talented on both sides of the ball than Hawaii, and by virtue of it's Conference has played a tougher schedule than Hawaii of course. However Cincy has also received it's conference trophy as well as a guaranteed spot in a BCS bowl. The hard part is behind them, time to get a little R-n-R before the biggest game in the schools history right. I know the BCS bowls are about a month away, but I don't imagine that Coach Kelly would be too happy if any of his key players were seriously hurt in what will be basically a meaningless game for them besides notching another "W" to their already impressive wins column. Cincy has already proven that if the focus isn't there that they are beatable or almost beatable on the road to lesser opponents---check Akron, Uconn, and WV. Hawaii on the other hand, has also locked up a spot in it's almost annual Hawaii Bowl and finished 2nd place in the WAC to Boise St.--No big feats here, but this is a team that has improved steadily throughout the season, and has finally found a QB to replace Brennan in Alexander. The stars aligned last week with Cincy's 20 pt win over Syracuse and Hawaii's 14 pt. win over WASU-after being 28.5 pt. favorites. A game in which Hawaii probably should have laid the number down, but was thwarted by missed or blocked FG's, red zone blunders, and costly penalties all which led to an unimpressive victory----the perfect storm for linesmakers to overcompensate what should be a much closer line. Head coach McMackin truly does not believe in running up the score just to get brownie points, or for his QB to get "REPS" while up by 30 with 6 minutes left in a game. Hawaii will also be getting 2 of their best impact players back this week in RB/WR/PR Pilares and CB/WR/KR Mouton--both sat out but could have probably played if needed. The Main factor here is: MOTIVATION!!!----Hawaii has only had 1 other nationally televised game this season-a 20 pt. road loss to boise st., and they have not lived down last year's thrashing in the Sugar bowl. They get verbally assaulted by just about every sportsmediaperson or college football analyst when the topic of non-BCS conference schools playing in BCS bowls comes up. They have become the #1 argument against the likes of Utah, Boise St.(ironically both teams have already played in BCS games and won.), and Ball St. getting a shot at a BCS game. On top of all that, because the Hawaii Bowl has tie-ins with the Pac-10, and the Pac-10 stinks this year, there may not be enough bowl-eligible Pac-10 teams to provide a
suitor for Hawaii to play on christmas eve. So the contingency plan would be a Conf. USA team, and that would be a serious downgrade in opponent-if only by name. So for most intents and purposes this will be Hawaii's bowl game.----and a sidenote------last time Cincy played at aloha stadium, former UH QB timmy chang got slammed to the turf while downing the ball in a win on the last play of the game--inciting what would be the nastiest, ugliest, low down dirty brawl I've ever seen, even the coaches and fans got involved. The fans will be in full force on the rock. It's been awhile since Hawaii has been more than a TD homedog-whenever this happens you gotta pound it like rosie o'donnell at a $5 chinese buffet. Points won't be necessary.
We all know that Cincy is more talented on both sides of the ball than Hawaii, and by virtue of it's Conference has played a tougher schedule than Hawaii of course. However Cincy has also received it's conference trophy as well as a guaranteed spot in a BCS bowl. The hard part is behind them, time to get a little R-n-R before the biggest game in the schools history right. I know the BCS bowls are about a month away, but I don't imagine that Coach Kelly would be too happy if any of his key players were seriously hurt in what will be basically a meaningless game for them besides notching another "W" to their already impressive wins column. Cincy has already proven that if the focus isn't there that they are beatable or almost beatable on the road to lesser opponents---check Akron, Uconn, and WV. Hawaii on the other hand, has also locked up a spot in it's almost annual Hawaii Bowl and finished 2nd place in the WAC to Boise St.--No big feats here, but this is a team that has improved steadily throughout the season, and has finally found a QB to replace Brennan in Alexander. The stars aligned last week with Cincy's 20 pt win over Syracuse and Hawaii's 14 pt. win over WASU-after being 28.5 pt. favorites. A game in which Hawaii probably should have laid the number down, but was thwarted by missed or blocked FG's, red zone blunders, and costly penalties all which led to an unimpressive victory----the perfect storm for linesmakers to overcompensate what should be a much closer line. Head coach McMackin truly does not believe in running up the score just to get brownie points, or for his QB to get "REPS" while up by 30 with 6 minutes left in a game. Hawaii will also be getting 2 of their best impact players back this week in RB/WR/PR Pilares and CB/WR/KR Mouton--both sat out but could have probably played if needed. The Main factor here is: MOTIVATION!!!----Hawaii has only had 1 other nationally televised game this season-a 20 pt. road loss to boise st., and they have not lived down last year's thrashing in the Sugar bowl. They get verbally assaulted by just about every sportsmediaperson or college football analyst when the topic of non-BCS conference schools playing in BCS bowls comes up. They have become the #1 argument against the likes of Utah, Boise St.(ironically both teams have already played in BCS games and won.), and Ball St. getting a shot at a BCS game. On top of all that, because the Hawaii Bowl has tie-ins with the Pac-10, and the Pac-10 stinks this year, there may not be enough bowl-eligible Pac-10 teams to provide a
suitor for Hawaii to play on christmas eve. So the contingency plan would be a Conf. USA team, and that would be a serious downgrade in opponent-if only by name. So for most intents and purposes this will be Hawaii's bowl game.----and a sidenote------last time Cincy played at aloha stadium, former UH QB timmy chang got slammed to the turf while downing the ball in a win on the last play of the game--inciting what would be the nastiest, ugliest, low down dirty brawl I've ever seen, even the coaches and fans got involved. The fans will be in full force on the rock. It's been awhile since Hawaii has been more than a TD homedog-whenever this happens you gotta pound it like rosie o'donnell at a $5 chinese buffet. Points won't be necessary.
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