Kellen Moore and the Boise State Broncos are a fairly easy pick to be a potential BCS crasher in the college football betting season. But who are some other possible dark horses?
Boise State Broncos
Every year, the conversation around the water cooler stems around whether the Boise State Broncos can do enough against their weak schedule of opponents to climb the rankings and earn an at-large BCS bid. In the 2010-11 season, things will be very different.
The Broncos start the season in the top five of the rankings, which means they won’t have to come-from-behind in the rankings as much as they have in previous seasons. Beyond that, they’ve got a couple of credible opponents along the way in Virginia Tech in the first week and a home game against Oregon State shortly after.
The Broncos will crash the BCS and there won’t be any debate as to whether they deserve an invitation if they go undefeated; they’ll be in the Championship game.
South Carolina Gamecocks
While his old ball club is expected to win the SEC East, the ‘ol ball coach, Steve Spurrier, might have the SEC East winner with his new squad. Spurrier has his most talented edition of the South Carolina Gamecocks and with Florida retooling post-Tim Tebow, they might be ripe for the picking.
The Gamecocks have more talented players returning than any of the previous five seasons under Spurrier (all but seven starters return) and this could be the time for South Carolina to go from good to great.
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Wisconsin Badgers
The Ohio State Buckeyes may be the talk of the Big Ten, but this could very well be Wisconsin’s year to go to the BCS. While Ohio State and Iowa have a challenging non-conference schedule, the Badgers play at UNLV, home to San Jose State, home to Arizona State and home to Austin Peay. More importantly, the Buckeyes and Hawkeyes have to visit Camp Randall, which is never easy.
The Badgers return a whopping 18 starters, including the Big Ten offensive Player of the Year, John Clay. This team is loaded and they could be a major BCS factor all season long.
Auburn Tigers
While the national media questioned the hiring of Gene Chizik in 2009, he has the Auburn Tigers as a potential BCS dark horse in 2010. The Tigers prolific offense will be led by a hot-shot quarterback, Cam Newton, and the entire team is laced with talented seniors. The fast break offense was very effective last year and it should only be better in 2010.
But the best reason to like the Tigers might be the fact that they have eight home games on the schedule. They only have four road games – three of which are very winnable against Mississippi State, Kentucky and Mississippi.
Would anyone be really surprised if they were playing Alabama for the SEC West on the final day of the year? Don’t be.
Arkansas Razorbacks
One of the biggest reasons to bet against the Alabama Crimson Tide repeating is because of the improvements of Auburn and Arkansas, so keep a close eye on the college football odds this season.
Arkansas in particular is scary because they have a savvy head coach in Bobby Petrino, they have one of the best quarterbacks in the nation in Ryan Mallett and they return almost the entire offense.
Better yet, they won five of their last six games to end 2009 and we all know that a hot finish to one season can springboard a coming out party in the next.
Circle the date September 25. That’s when Arkansas hosts Alabama and it could be very well be the Crimson Tide’s first loss in over a year.