San Jose State quarterback David Fales winds up for a pass vs. Stanford earlier this season. (Photo by Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images)
Week 5 is here and I got bored this week so I decided to do some predictions for the upcoming weekend. The Mountain West weekend doesn’t look too appetizing, but an interesting matchup will be Friday night with Utah State taking on San Jose State. Charles F Keeton vs David Fales. Otherwise.. meh.
Utah State and San Jose State start our week of football this week and they’re playing on the mothership, ESPN. Rake in that TV money, y’all! This should be a fun matchup just because Chuckie Keeton and David Fales get to lock horns on national TV. Both teams are coming off pretty disappointing weekends, USU losing to USC and SJSU losing to Minnesota. Both are games these teams will wish they had won. I have a hard time believing that USU will lose this one, that team is a very good team. SJSU is still without the services of Noel Grigsby.. I don’t think Fales can pull this out on his own. Aggies win by about 10.
UTEP and Colorado State.. this is a pretty unappealing match-up for a few reasons. I’m not in the minority here, but I wish UTEP was a Mountain West school. Their football program has been down, but they’d make a nice partner with the Front Range schools. UTEP has a couple of losses this year, and they’re scoring quite a few points, but they suffered an ugly loss to UTSA last week. The Rams are coming off of a strong effort vs Alabama.. hard to tell if Nick Saban took it easy on them or if the Rams were playing out of their minds or if AJ McCarron played the entire game on a broken heart. Regardless, hard to imagine CSU losing this one at home, Chris Nwoke is showing signs of life and Garrett Grayson hasn’t been bad himself. I think the Rams win by 15’ish.
My predictions kick ass.. they’re all going to end with ‘ish. Because I have no friggin’ clue what I’m doing, I’m just making guesses.. probably as educated as Chris Berman’s.
I still love Chris Berman though.
San Diego State and New Mexico State are playing this week’s pillow fight in the Mountain West. New Mexico State is the school we never wanted and San Diego State is the school that Craig Thompson is probably wishing would have stayed in the Big East (is that still a thing?). This game of winless teams looks pretty awful on paper but the Aztecs are going to pound the Aggies. I don’t think you all realize how awful New Mexico State is. Yeah, I know SDSU lost to an FCS teams (by a lot) and gave up a pair of TDs with just a few minutes left to Oregon State to lose, but this is NMSU we’re talking about. Aztecs win their first game, and probably by about 20.
UNLV at New Mexico.. I have no idea how this game is going to turn out. UNLV started the season with Nick Sherry at quarterback and you might as well have lit them on fire and watched them burn. Apparently Hauck was tired of his arse burning and made a switch to senior QB Caleb Herring and now the UNLV offense has life, Tim Cornett is running well, and the Rebels look like a decent football team. New Mexico on the other hand.. a loss to UTSA, OT win over UTEP, and loss to Pitt have me wondering how good this team is. Kasey Carrier is getting his yards, averaging over 100 a game so far, but Cole Gautsche isn’t helping him a lot on the rushing side. I gotta go with UNLV here.. they’re rolling. Rebs by 10.
Wyoming travels to San Marcos to take on Texas State.. no, not the same Texas State from Necessary Roughness. Wyoming quarterback Brett Smith is demolishing opponents right now. Texas State has a win at Southern Miss and Prairie View A&M, but a big loss to Texas Tech. TSU’s offense is barely moving right now and they’re giving up a lot more than that. Big day for the Cowboy offense, they roll in this one by 21.
Air Force and Nevada are locking horns this week. There’s a chance that Cody Fajardo could make a return to the Wolf Pack this week which would REALLY help them out. Air Force is coming off of a big loss to Wyoming. Nevada took down Hawaii last week. Air Force looked mostly lethargic last week but quarterback Jaleel Awini is the real deal. He can throw, he can run, but he doesn’t have much around him. I think the Wolf Pack take this one, probably by 7. It’ll be close, but Nevada’s at home.
Boise State and Southern Miss. Ohhhhhh boy. Southern Miss picked the wrong week to tango with Boise. They’re at home and they’re angry after a road loss to Fresno State last week. Basically, Southern Miss is traveling a long ways to get beaten by 30 or more points. Joe Southwick’s mustache is not going to stand for this nonsense. Plus, it looks like Jay Ajayi better be careful because there’s another back named Aaron Baltazar who had a strong effort last week, especially since Ajayi developed butter fingers. Sorry Golden Eagles, but you’re not winning.
Fresno State, welcome to the top 25, and your reward? A trip to Hawaii to pound on the Rainbow Warriors. Hawaii? Sorry about what Derek Carr is going to do to your defense. Hawaii simply just does not have the talent to compete in this game, despite the long trip the Bulldogs are making. Hawaii did something last week that would have made Steve Spurrier proud and played four quarterbacks last week.. in the same game. WTF is Norm Chow doing over there? That won’t cut it against Fresno and they’re going to win by about 38.