Saturday surprises

Going into last weekend, the big match-up that everyone was looking forward to in college football was the Miami Hurricanes against the Florida State Seminoles. \nCould the No. 1 ranked Hurricanes defeat their first tough opponent? Could the Seminoles prove they were still a team to be reckoned with despite their youth and inexperience? Could Miami end the 54-game unbeaten streak FSU held on their home turf? \nThe answer to all these questions was a definitive yes in favor of Miami as they defeated the thirteenth ranked Seminoles 49-27 in what was believed to be THE marquee match-up of Saturday's games (how it wasn't IU-Illinois I don't know).\nAll that this game, and many others like it this past weekend, proved, is that college football rarely works out like you expect it. Sure, some times the teams you expect to win it all do, but oftentimes there is one or two surprise teams in there at the end. \nLast year, no one expected Oklahoma to be one of the top teams in the country, let alone win the national title, but that is exactly what they did. Anyway, if you need a better example, just look to a week before last at the IU vs. Wisconsin game. I'm pretty sure Wisconsin still doesn't know what happened. \nIn action from the past few days, a whopping seven teams who were ranked higher than their opponents lost, the most interesting being the formerly ranked No. 2 Florida Gators. The Gators, who behind sophomore and former Bloomington South High School quarterback Rex Grossman, looked to be steamrolling to a spot in the Bowl Championship Series title game. Now, who knows where they might end up? They could win out, or they could lose another two games. You just never know in college football.\nThat is what's great about the game. It's true that oftentimes you can tell who the winner will be and who the loser will be in certain games; for instance when Nebraska lines up against Baylor, there is a pretty good chance its going be Nebraska coming out on top. What makes myself and many others out there tune their TV sets to whatever college game is on week after week is the chance that we can see one of the greatest upsets in college football history happen. \nAnd there are always those Cinderella teams that come out of nowhere to spice up the national landscape with an amazing start, such as No. 10 Fresno State this year. Not even ranked in the preseason, they have defeated powerhouses such as Colorado, Oregon State and Wisconsin, on their way to a 6-0 start. \nWill they be able to keep it up? The thought here is yes, with only a match-up with 5-1 Rice looming in two weeks as a hurdle towards an undefeated season and possible BCS bowl. \nCollege football is a great game, because nothing is ever as it seems. Just when you expect things to go one way, they go the complete opposite. And for every game that you think will be close but isn't, such as No. 7 UCLA's trouncing of No. 8 Washington 35-13, there are games like Auburn upsetting No. 2 Florida 23-20 on a field goal with 10 seconds remaining in the game. So you better watch next week, because you don't want to miss the magic happening.