S137 Conference Championships
Tonight's the night, to take home bragging rights! We sweat, bleed and play our guts out for this very moment! ... ... Well sort of...
Let's face it, we play tonight for the right to go to the playoffs where the real season starts. We play for that 1 more win that may improve our recruit vision and we play for that little gold trophy to be next to our resumes.
But seriously, throw all that out the window, because tonight we play for bragging rights!
There are many great games, but 1 game is really standing out...
Edinboro (12-1) vs (12-1) Bloomsburg
It started in season 133 when vhoward112 (Edinboro) and jms245 (Bloomsburg) took over the task of rebuilding both these programs. At the time, West Chester who is continuously a top 5 program, ran the board and controlled the conference. This season, both coaches field a fully groomed roster and both have over-come W. Chester to gain the opportunity.
Total team talent, I have Bloomsburg ranked #20 with a team core of 61.9 and Edinboro is ranked #32 with a core of 59.32. They both have a near equal number of Seniors at 12-13.
I like Edinboro's RB in Joseph Oliver who was a top 20 running back at the start of the season and vhoward112 does a nice job of utilizing him as his main play maker. Their Trips offense is difficult to defend against as W. Chester found out and Sr. QB Thompson has a 85 formation IQ! However, they lack weapons and are limited with 1 stud WR and their RB. Defensively, they are not quite as stout as Bloomsburg running a 4-3 scheme.
Bloomsburg has a nice counter to his RB in Larry Sweet, a SR. LB out of Florida with 73 speed, 81 tackling and 63 game instinct. While they don't have a lot of elite players, they do have a great offensive line with 70+ cores and stud level athletics across their backfield and wide receiver group.
They also have 3 senior defensive backs who will help make sure they have proper coverage playing in a Nickel pacakage versus that Trips offense.. Where this team lacks is formation IQ and with their JR QB Rodney Hill with only 70, it could pose an issue where he could throw an interception that leads to a quick score. So far he has thrown 417 attempts and only 3 intereception's but they have all came from top human opponents.
The difference -
Bloomsburg has the better match-up in the trenches with their offensive line. I think they find pass protection and rely on their 45+ average when they need to punt to gain better field position. They also have an advantage with their 3 senior defensive backs that they could position to have a good safety to cover RB Oliver. Edinboro is going to be waiting to take the ball away and play mistake free football on offense. Their consistency may give Bloomsburg issues and could lose the time of possession battle.
Predicition - This one is gonna be close! I think I'll watch the WIS Cast on this one! It's goes down to the wire with Bloomsburg kicker Thomas Wilson (96.2%) kicking the game winner.
Bloomsburg Wins 38-35