Monday, August 26, 2013

Flubber's College Pigskin Prime Cuts of the Week 2013: Week 1


Introducing Flubber's College Football picks, where we here at Double Tapered will pick one game of significance and one bonus game to watch during every week of the NCAA* College Football season.

The game of significance will typically feature a game Flubber deems as a possible upset, or has a high probability of a spread getting covered.  This is done using the foremost research in the various fields of science and you should not concern yourself with this matter any further.

Before we get started, play this video.  PLAY IT!

Week One's Game Of Irrational Importance


The first game of the year•, y'all!  Yay, football makes it's glorious return!  All bad in the world will surely die away as football fans crack open their meat smokers and cases of PBR in what can only be described as the most reassuringly pleasant orgy of sound in the entire world.  America exhales.

When: Thursday 8/29 at 5pm CT

Where: Columbia, SC

History: North Carolina leads the series 34-17-4.  South Carolina won the last matchup in 2007 21-15 in North Carolina.

Significance:  Battle of Charleston, SC, 1780.  The British launch a "southern strategy" meant to arouse Loyalist sentiment in the South in hopes of laying the groundwork for a Northern invasion to recapture the colonies.  This also happens during a time of instability within General George Washington's Continental Army in the North, and the Southern commander Benjamin Lincoln was left alone and largely responsible for the troops in the South.  Lincoln feels the brunt of the British attack when they first take Savannah, GA in 1779, chasing Lincoln to Charleston.  It was here he was held under siege in the command of a depleted Patriot militia.  He lobbied the South Carolina legislature and George Washington for reinforcements, but none were offered.  Lincoln was forced to surrender the town, giving the British a crucial port city to launch their Southern invasion.

Pick: Benjamin Lincoln and South Carolina take out their anger of Washington and the North's apathy on North Carolina; Southern politics are never the same.

Consensus Vegas Line^ (as of 8/26):  SoCar -11 1/2.  Oooo AIN' SHE A SEXY UPSET PICK!  You like that pick, don't you?  You would.  Always finding every reason to shit all over the SEC.  I'm sure you're all ready to explain how this is the year the SEC falls from grace.  That TCU dismantles LSU, that Murray State embarrasses Mizzou, that Vandy's James Franklin has been full of shit this whole time, that an ACC school hangs with their bigger, stronger, richer, larger, meatier, state schoolier, dare I say SEXIER SEC brethren?  No no no, this can't be.  You may say "but but the history," to which I declare "Scoff on your history!  And scoff on you!  College football lives and breathes on SEC schools and the rest of the country is just filler material in bad meatloaf.  If they would rather die they had better do it, and decrease the excess population!  I DON'T REMEMBER ASKING YOU A GODDAMN THING."

No, wait.  Hold up, you're right.  North Carolina covers.

The point over/under is 56 1/2 according the the consensus line.  These teams historically have not scored higher than 53 points since a 54 point output in 1974 (11 meetings ago), and you have to remember that football was much tougher and grittier back then.  Go with the under.  South Carolina 28-North Carolina 17.

Question to Ponder:  Who decided putting black in the Tar Heels jersey was a good idea?  It's 2013, my television is black; c'mon let's have some color.

What Else:  South Carolina's Jadeveon Clowney did this once:
Can I change my pick...?

One Bonus Game after the jump!