The main course of college football's week one finally arrived after a long, lousy off-season that saw one of the most historic programs become shaken down to its foundation and one of the most prolific, exciting, and flamboyant players on one of the most prominent teams in the country was booted off the team. If you are like I am, college football just couldn't get here soon enough.

Week one's slate of games were, for the most part, warm-ups, or scrimmages that mean something, for most of the major conference programs. Beat-em-down, cupcake, rent-a-win, whatever you want to call them, that's basically what it was for week one. But, hey, at least college football is finally here.

Despite the lack of quality opponents that most teams faced, there are some impressions that can be taken from week one. Some teams surpassed expectations, others met them, and still others disappointed in their 2012-2013 debuts.

Week 1 Winners:

Alabama – The Tide rolled over the Big Ten's alleged “best” team in JerryWorld. Nick Saban had his team ready to play (like he almost always does) and they looked like the defending national champions they are in their complete dismantling of Michigan.

I was fortunate to sit down with Allen Kenney of the Crystal Ball Run to talk a little LSU Football earlier this week.  The Crystal Ball Run is Bloguin's primary College Football blog, and it has really taken off recently.  It's a VERY well done site and jam packed with content and quality writing every single day.  Allen and the rest of the guys do a great job.  

We actually recorded this podcast on Sunday night but I haven't been able to post it due to Isaac knocking out power and causing a big mess of things.  But as much of the state begins to pick itself up and get ready for the Tigers' season opener, this podcast could be a great way to prepare and get you back into college football mode.   Of course, all thoughts and prayers go out to those that have had their lives drastically altered by this storm.  

I've come a long way with podcasts.  They never used to be my thing, but now I've got one in my ear nearly every time I go running or work out in the yard.  And the Crystal Ball Run has one of the best around.  

Here is the link to the show over at CBR.  You can listen on the site or download from iTunes.  Hope you enjoy.   

My Bloguin friends over at College Football Zealots asked me to give some thoughts on LSU's upcoming season for their series of season previews they're putting together.  They've got LSU as their pre-season #3 team in the nation.  We talk about the Honey Badger's absence, Zach Mettenberger, and just about everything else before I give some predictions.

Check it out right here.

 

Tre'Davious White - The State's Top Player?

Now that the spring evaluation and summer camp circuit is complete, it was time to revise my recruiting rankings for the State of Louisiana.   A number of guys moved around, and we have three new players to the list that weren't on there in March for the initial list.  We also have a new player at the top of the list.  As always, the rankings are complete with evals of each player and video of the prospects whenever available.  I've also got a watch list of players who were considered for inclusion but just didn't quite make the cut.  

LSU is well represented on the list, as expected.  Eight of the top ten prospects in the state are verbally committed to LSU.  If I were doing rankings, I'd draw the line between four star prospects and three star prospects right in between #12 and #13 of this list.  

As always, the "SNS Top 21" can be found under the "Recruiting Pages" menu at the top of the site for you to reference at any time.

Here is the Link

It's time for the LSU Defense to eat again

Much like we did for the offense, we decided to take a roundtable discussion approach to previewing LSU's defense this year.  We've got the same panel together again:

Kris Brauner (@snslant) - That's me, I run this site
Jordan Grove (@LASportsDude) - Contributor here at SNS
Chandler Rome (@Rome_TDR) - Sports Writer at The Daily Reveille
Justin Goar (@tigertangents)- Contributor at Tigalaya.com and former contributor at CollegeFootballNews.com, SIOnCampus.com, and FoxSports.com


Kris:  After the 2010 season, LSU lost an All-American caliber player from each level of the defense in Drake Nevis, Kelvin Sheppard, and Patrick Peterson.   Everyone thought the 2011 defense would be badass, but I was skeptical that LSU could recover so easily from losing those guys.  I was wrong.   LSU's defense was beyond badass last year.   Now...here we are again.   LSU lost a pair of first rounders in Morris Claiborne and Michael Brockers, along with some other outstanding players in Brandon Taylor, Ryan Baker, and Ron Brooks.  Now, we learn they'll be without the Honey Badger too.  LSU can't possibly just recover so easily again from these losses, can they?  When you look at this group on paper, it looks like LSU will again have outstanding defense.   As in...Top 10 to 15 nationally good.  But can it match last year's incredible dominance, when factoring in the loss of the aforementioned players? 

It's finally here.  The pads are popping over on the Ponderosa and, alliteration aside, the team is getting ready for the 2012 season.  So we're going to get you ready for the season too.   After six days of fall camp, Les Miles has closed practice to the media indefinitely, so any tidbits that can be gathered from watching 20 minutes of drills will no longer be available. 

Rather than go through a traditional position by position breakdown of the team or opponent by opponent breakdown of the season, we decided to do something a little different this year.  Jordan and I got together with some friends for a roundtable discussion about various topics concerning this team.  We figured that four opinions and viewpoints are better than one or two.  Here are the participants in this roundtable discussion:

Kris Brauner (@snslant) - That's me, I run this site
Jordan Grove (@LASportsDude) - Contributor here at SNS
Chandler Rome (@Rome_TDR) - Sports Writer at The Daily Reveille
Justin Goar (@tigertangents)- Contributor at Tigalaya.com and former contributor at CollegeFootballNews.com, SIOnCampus.com, and FoxSports.com

So here we geaux:  The first installment of our roundtable series, discussing LSU's offense for 2012:


Kris:  The four year ping-pong match between Jarrett Lee and Jordan Jefferson has come to an end.  Does that mean we'll finally see some consistency schematically?  Common sense tells us that with a clear #1 guy at quarterback in Zach Mettenberger, a pro-style pocket passing type, the 2012 offense will resemble that of the first half of 2011 when Jarrett Lee was at the helm.  In my opinion, that stretch was the best that LSU's offense has looked since 2007.  Things were simple, and the offense had an identity.  LSU trotted out a physical running game with some play action sprinkled in, and they wore teams down with their depth.  They also absolutely refused to turn the ball over.  So we're going to see something awfully similar in 2012....True or False?

Eric Reid (photo via 247 Sports)

I've been reading all of the updates from the various media outlets that have been attending the first week of LSU's practice, and I've been able to sift through them and put together a few thoughts.  

• Jarvis Landry is ready to break out in 2012.  Every day, every site is in agreement that he is one of the most impressive players on the field.  He's catching everything, and we already know how physical he is.  On a field full of stars and future NFLers, he is one of the top performers every single day.  

• Anthony Johnson has dropped about 20 pounds since last year and says he let the hype around his recruitment get to him a bit.  At the same time, Sam Montgomery has gained almost 30 pounds from last year, bulking up to around 260 pounds in efforts to become a more complete defensive end.  The guy looks like the Incredible Hulk.  

Pompano Beach, Florida cornerback Rashard Robinson committed to LSU on Tuesday evening.  Robinson has been leaning to LSU for quite some time, but it was believed that LSU's coaching staff wanted to get a closer look at him at their July camp prior to formalizing an offer.  Robinson came and competed for three days, turned in a blazing 40 time, and performed well overall.  LSU reaffirmed their offer to Robinson before he left campus.   Robinson wanted to return to campus with his family, and he apparently did that on Tuesday.  His family apparently liked what they saw because Robinson is now LSU's 22nd commitment in the Class of 2013.  

Robinson is a legit 6'2" with great length and blazing speed.  However, he's very thin right now at just 165 pounds.  So he'll need to add some bulk and strength before being ready for the SEC, but he has time to work on that.  As a tall corner, he'll immediately remind many of Tharold Simon, and that's a pretty good comparison for his game.  With such long legs, it's tough for Robinson to keep up with shorter, shiftier receivers in the middle of the field.  But like Simon, he should be tremendous on the outside.  He can use his long arms to jam receivers, and then he can turn and run with any of them.  If they do get by him with their initial quickness, he has the top end speed to recover and the arm length to make plays on the ball.  Despite his very lean frame, Robinson also shows off some big-time physicality and toughness. 

LSU appears to be on the verge of another quarterback to the roster in Penn State transfer Robert Bolden.  Bolden will be a junior this fall and would add depth and experience to the position which currently has very little of either.   

Bolden was part of the Signing Class of 2010 and was highly thought of coming out of high school.  Rivals.com rated Bolden as the #2 dual threat quarterback in the nation and the #136 player overall.  He was rated ahead of Zach Lee who signed with LSU but left to play pro baseball.  Bolden was the first true freshman to start a season opener at Penn State in 100 years and was a part time starter during his two years there.  Those things don't mean a whole lot today, but they do provide an indication of Bolden's raw talent.   

The great Big East experiment is one year away from kicking off its inaugural season. Syracuse and Pitt have chucked up their deuces and are playing their swan song season this year before leaving the Big East for the ACC in 2013. Their leaving expedites a process that will signal another shift in conference affiliation.

This new Big East will see former member Temple re-join for 2012 in all sports while Houston, SMU, Memphis, and UCF join for all sports in 2013. Boise State and San Diego State are set to join that same year as football only members with Navy joining for football only in 2015. The Big East is also still hoping that Air Force and/or BYU will have interest in joining to round out the Western contingent.

The new Big East is a conference based on hope, good faith, desperation, and boldness. It's an admirable strategy to add some of the biggest, previously non-BCS markets and teams but despite all of this, the conference is still a house of cards. Four of the most preeminent members – Louisville, UConn, Cincinnati, and Rutgers – have openly courted membership into other major conferences,  mostly the ACC and Big XII. Chances of defection(s) remain quite high as the instability of a hybrid conference remains turbulent.

So what would happen if one, two, or all of the most prominent members depart for greener pastures? What then, especially for the schools out West that left stable, albeit less affluent, conferences?