Dave from Carter-Finley

I hope everybody enjoyed the holidays. The holidays are always better for me when the Pack is in a bowl game and a bowl game win is the best so it was happy times in DFCF land. Best wishes to everybody in 2012. Before I move on here are my Belk Bowl thoughts and the final Pack the Caption of the 2011 season (photos by Ethan Hyman/N&O).

• State improved to 14-11-1 all-time in bowl games (has won 5 of past 6) and won bowl games in consecutive seasons for only the 4th time in school history.

• TOB now has a career 8-2 bowl record (2-1 at State).

• David Amerson added 2 more INTs to his already impressive season to set the ACC single-season INT record (13) surpassing UNC’s Dre Bly’s record set back in 1996. Amerson’s INT return for TD was the play of the game and the deciding score.

• Mike Glennon finished a pretty good season with 264 yards passing and 3 TDs earning himself Belk Bowl MVP honors.

• It was a Special Teams nightmare for the Pack … a botched punt (led to Louisville TD), allowed Louisville to convert a fake punt (led to Louisville TD), and allowed Louisville to recover an onside kick (State defense nullified). And we continue to have one assistant coach that’s dedicated solely to handling Special Teams … unbelievable! Hard to win a game after getting dominated like this on Special Teams, but we found a way to get it done.

• The key to the Pack’s season this year was the defense’s ability to force turnovers … 3 more in this game raised the season total to 39, good for 2nd best in the nation.

Hey Teddy ... it's the Boogeyman!!!

You complete me!

Interceptions: Easy as 1, 2, 3

Shake, Shake, Shake, Shake your booty

Guys, who pissed in the Gatorade cooler?

Also, ncsu01 does a great job of putting together highlight videos of NC State football games. Here’s his Belk Bowl highlight video:

Belk Bowl History:  First played in 2002, was previously known as the Continental Tire Bowl (2002–2004) and the Meineke Car Care Bowl (2005–2010) before Belk acquired the title sponsorship this year. Features a match-up between the #5 team in the ACC and #3 team in the Big East. The ACC leads the all time record 5-4 with the Big East team winning the last 3 in a row. NC State’s only previous appearance was a 14-0 win over South Florida in 2005. This is Louisville’s first appearance in this bowl.

Stadium:  Bank of America Stadium, Charlotte, NC (capacity: 73,778 … surface: grass). Home of the NFL’s Carolina Panthers and the ACC Championship Game.

Pack’s Opponent:  Louisville Cardinals (7-5) … 2011 Big East c0-champs. The Cardinals have made 15 prior bowl appearances in their history amassing a record of 7-7-1. They had a 9 consecutive season bowl streak from 1998 to 2006. Biggest bowl victory was in the 2007 Orange Bowl over the ACC’s Wake Forest. Last year they won the Beef ‘O’ Brady’s Bowl over Southern Miss.

Louisville Retired Numbers: #16 Johnny Unitas

Notable Louisville football alums:  David Akers, Bruce Armstrong, Deion Branch, Ray Buchanan, Michael Bush, Mark Clayton, Elvis Dumervil, Tom Jackson, Joe Jacoby, Sam Madison, Roman Oben, Ted Washington, Lee Corso (coach 1969-1972), and Howard Schnellenberger (coach 1985-1994).

Other notable Louisville alums:  Bob Edwards, Sue Grafton, Static Major, Mitch McConnell, Pervis Ellison, and Wes Unseld.

Head-to-Head Results: Louisville leads the all-time series with a 3-0 record. The most recent matchup was a 29-10 Louisville win in Raleigh back in 2007.

Head Coach: Charlie Strong (2nd season, 14-11 at Louisville … 14-11 career). A long time, very successful defensive coordinator that finally got his first shot at being a head coach at Louisville, named 2010 Big East Coach of the Year.

Players to Watch:

QB Teddy Bridgewater (#5, Fr.) the Rivals.com #2 rated QB last year that has lived up to expectations so far in his first year at Louisville. Was named the Big East Rookie of the Year and has been named to several Freshman All-American teams. Took over as the starter on Oct. 1, compiling a 5-4 record as starter and was one of the keys to the vast improvement of the Cardinals offense in the second half of the season.

WR Eli Rodgers (#82, Fr.) a high school teammates of QB Teddy Bridgewater so has made a smooth transition into the Cardinals offense. Is the second leading receiver and will have to step up in the Belk Bowl because leading receiver Michaelee Harris will miss the game due to injury.

LB Dexter Heyman (#46, Sr.) is a stat-sheet stuffer for the Cardinals defense. He leads the team with 83 total tackles (52 solo), 15.5 TFL, and 3 INTs. He also has 4 sacks and a forced fumble.

DB Hakeem Smith (#29, So.) is a playmaker in the Cardinals secondary. Is 2nd on the team with 81 total tackles (57 solo) and leads the team with 3 forced fumbles. He also has 4 TFL, 1 INT, and 1 fumble recovery.

Offensive Summary: The Cardinals offense is full of young guys that have gotten better and better as the season has progressed. They were held to 17 or fewer points in 4 of their first 6 games, but conversely have scored 27 or more points in 4 of their last 6 games. Louisville is 50/50 run pass so I expect us to throw a variety of coverages and blitzes at them to put pressure on the young guys and force them to do what we want.

Defensive Summary: The key to the Cardinals success this season has been their suffocating defense. The unit ranks no lower than 25th nationally in run defense, scoring defense, sacks and total D. They are somewhat susceptible to the pass so combine that with TOB’s recent comments that, “bullets are cheap, keep firing,” and I fully expect us to throw the ball a lot in this game.

Keys to the Game:

1. Motivation … With most bowl games it simply comes down to which team wants to be there more. We spent a lot of energy and emotion just qualifying for this bowl game so hopefully there’s still some of both in the tank to help us win this bowl game.

2. Shake off the rust … When we take the field at Bank of America Stadium it will have been 31 days since our last game. There’s going to be some rust, but hopefully we can shake it off quickly.

3. Turnovers … The key to our season has been our ball hawking defense. The 36 turnovers we forced this year was 2nd best in the country and our +14 turnover margin was 5th best. We’re 7-0 when forcing 3 or more turnovers and 0-5 when forcing 2 or less.

Prediction: All indications are that this will be a very physical, low-scoring contest that will come down to which team can limit their mistakes and best take advantage of their opportunities. Louisville is a young up-and-comer with something to prove in this game so I’m more than a little worried about this one.

Per the official NC State press release … “NC State has accepted a bid to play Big East Co-Champion Louisville in the 2011 Belk Bowl at Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte on December 27. Kickoff is scheduled for 8 p.m. and the game will be televised by ESPN.”

For somebody that lives in Charlotte (so even home games are a road trip), I’m excited that I get a game in my city. I’ll have more on all the bowl stuff later. For now I’m trying to plan sleeping arrangements and parties for my Raleigh friends that are staying with me. This matchup isn’t going to be one of the marque bowl games, but that’s not going to stop my crew from having a big ol’ time. Go Pack!

Nebraska has officially accepted an invitation to join the Big Ten today.  The Big Ten is looking to make a much bigger splash than this so expect them to continue adding schools.  Eventually Notre Dame will get off their high horse because they won’t have a choice and join the Big Ten as well.  With the Big Ten growing bigger and the Pac-10 wanting to do the same for all intents and purposes the Big 12 is now dead.

The next conference on the chopping block is the Big East and then the ACC.  Everyone knows that the SEC is going to want to answer the Big Ten so the ACC needs to be very worried.  Instead of being the conference that’s scrambling to survive the ACC needs to be proactive and beat everybody else to the punch.  I said yesterday that I didn’t like the super conferences, but now it is very evident that’s the way things are going.  The quicker John Swofford and his cronies figure that out and start doing something about it the better off the ACC will be.

My proposal:

Add Pittsburgh and UConn tomorrow.  This will expand the conference’s footprint to the North, strengthen the basketball side of things (let’s face it basketball is the ACC), put us in the state where ESPN is located which can never be a bad thing, add two very good academic institutions (I don’t care about that stuff, but it’ll give the ACC presidents something to brag about), and give BC (UConn) and Maryland (Pitt) a natural rival.  Most importantly it will tell the current members that the ACC is not going anywhere and we plan to be a major power in the land of college athletics which would hopefully convince everybody else to stay put.

Of course a team or two could still leave, but even then the ACC would be much better prepared to handle the defections than if they were to take place the way it stands now.  I want Pitt and UConn because I think those are the two schools that bring the most to the table.  If other schools need to be added in the future my list would look like this in order of who I like the most:  1. Syracuse  2. Louisville  3. Rutgers  4. West Virginia  5. South Florida  6. Central Florida  7. Cincinnati  8. Kansas  9. Memphis  10. Temple  [Sorry ECU you don't make the top 10.]

In other non important news, Boise State has joined the Mountain West Conference.  What you say?  Boise State is going to have to play an actual college football schedule now?  Oh well.  Those undefeated seasons were nice while they lasted I guess.

I’ve been purposely avoiding the big elephant sitting in the corner of the college football room.  That elephant being conference expansion.  The expansion rumblings coming out of the Big Ten are getting louder and louder by the day.  It is definitely going to happen, it’s just not clear as to how many schools they plan to add.  Everything I’ve been reading, though, says they plan to expand to at least 14 teams with their preference being a 16 team super conference.  There are even some reports circulating around the internet that the Big Ten has already offered expansion spots to Missouri, Nebraska, Notre Dame, and Rutgers.  Some other schools that have been reported to be on the Big Ten’s radar are Texas, Pitt, Maryland, UConn, and Syracuse.

If the Big Ten does expand to more than 12 teams surely the SEC will expand to match them so both conferences will keep their big dog statuses.  The SEC expansion talk hasn’t gotten anywhere near the media attention that the Big Ten expansion has because the SEC is happy where they’re at.  The have the luxury of just sitting back and seeing how things unfold.  Speculation has been all over the place as to who the SEC might target if they do choose to expand.  Some think they would go further west and look at schools like Texas, Texas A&M, Oklahoma, and Oklahoma State.  Others think they would strengthen their southern base with some combination of schools like Florida State, Miami, Clemson, Georgia Tech, and North Carolina.

I can’t see the future (and if I could I would be living in a huge mansion in Las Vegas instead of wasting that power on this stupid blog), but I think the SEC would combine those two trains of thought by adding Texas, Texas A&M, Florida State, and Miami.  Those four schools would fit in well performance wise making the SEC the power football super conference and they also would add some big TV markets (a.k.a. MONEY) which in the end is what this conference expansion is all about.

The reason I’ve been avoiding this conference expansion talk so far is because I was hoping that it would go away.  I just don’t like the idea of 16 team super conferences because in the end all it’s going to be is two mini 8 team conferences that send their champs to play each other.  At least for football purposes, this is a football blog so what do you expect, you will only see the teams from the other division once every eight years.  I guess that helps correct unbalanced scheduling which is the main gripe about 12 team conferences, but if you’re never going to consistently play the teams from the other division what’s the point?  Call me a hater, but I don’t like it.

With the Big Ten and SEC the main players calling all the shots, all the other conferences are left to sit back and hope for the best.  It’s not like the ACC can be proactive like last time when they raided Boston College, Virginia Tech, and Miami from the Big East.  If it does go down like most people expect (16 team super conferences) then it looks like it will again be the Big East that suffers most as the ACC would probably look to Big East schools like UConn, Syracuse, Louisville, West Virginia, Cincinnati, and South Florida to try and keep up with the Joneses.  The timetable for conference expansion has definitely been moved up from what the initial reports were saying so it will be very very interesting to see how this whole thing plays out over the next several months.  DFCF will be here to pontificate his thoughts throughout the whole process so make sure to check back when the shit hits the proverbial fan.