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GoBSU.com
Ball State Football Preview 2006 (08/19/2006) |
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GoBSU.com researched 34
computer and print media sources and compiled averages of
their pre-season MAC guesses. Guesses is of course a very
accurate assessment of what these are as none our media
resources can foresee critical injuries or the rise of
unheralded newcomers which always plays a huge factor in
determining the outcome of the season. Additionally most
coaches have surprises waiting for their opponents that
they naturally don't want to share in the pre-season. It
should not be a surprise that historically these
pre-season guesses have not proven to be overly accurate
at the end of the season.
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While the raw pre-season
numbers our media resources provide historically are
flawed, the written analysis some of the resources provide
for each team can be fairly valuable. For
the Ball State Cardinals the opinion of the majority of
the resources that provided analysis is that the key to
the season will be the play of the offensive and defensive
lines. This could be viewed as a fairly generic assessment
as that is always a true assessment for any football team.
This does however seem to be the key for Ball State as
four of the five starting offensive linemen and most of
their backups are listed as sophomores or freshmen. Many
of these returning sophomores and freshmen played
significant minutes in 2005 when BSU quarterbacks were
sacked 43 times and the Cardinals only mustered an average
of 110 yards rushing per game. The defensive line, while a
veteran group, rarely was able to pressure opposing
quarterbacks and only recorded ten sacks in 2005 with half
of them being recorded by Blair Kramer who graduated.
Additionally the defense allowed opponents to rush for an
average of 202 yards per game including a whopping 414
yards rushing game by Ohio University.
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The majority of our media
resources who provided analysis do go on to say
however, that if the offensive and defensive lines
can improve significantly in comparison to their 2005
performances, Ball State will contend for the MAC
Championship.
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| MAC
East |
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Akron |
1.50 |
1 |
3 |
24 |
72.56 |
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Miami |
2.47 |
1 |
5 |
6 |
73.56 |
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Bowling
Green |
2.79 |
1 |
6 |
2 |
75.83 |
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Ohio |
3.59 |
1 |
5 |
2 |
96.72 |
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Kent State |
4.85 |
2 |
6 |
0 |
109.33 |
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Buffalo |
5.88 |
5 |
6 |
0 |
116.00 |
| MAC
West |
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Northern
Illinois |
1.29 |
1 |
2 |
24 |
47.72 |
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Toledo |
1.85 |
1 |
5 |
10 |
50.83 |
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Central
Michigan |
3.62 |
3 |
5 |
0 |
80.67 |
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Western
Michigan |
3.74 |
2 |
5 |
0 |
82.56 |
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Ball State |
4.65 |
2 |
6 |
0 |
94.67 |
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Eastern
Michigan |
5.88 |
5 |
6 |
0 |
100.06 |
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GoBSU.com would like to thank and
credit the following resources from which we gleaned information
for this preview.
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Athlon
College Football, ATS
Consultants, Blue
Ribbon College Football Yearbook, Lee
Burdorf's Football Ratings, CBS
Sportsline, College
Football News, College
Football Poll.com, D1A
Football, Mike
DeSimone's College Football Ratings, Doc
Lawler's College Football Rankings, Dokter's
Entropy College Football Ratings, DPD
Dogs, EFI
College Football Rankings, GamePlan,
The Gold Sheet,
Jim Howell's
College Football Power Ratings, Comprank,
Lindy's, The
MAC News Media Association, MAC
Report Online, Massey
Ratings, Sonny
Moor's Computer Power Ratings, PerformanZ
Rating, Northcoast
Sports, Pigskin
Index 2006, PiRate
Ratings, Jeff
Sagarin's College Football Ratings, Southern
College Sports, The
Sporting News, Sports
Illustrated, Street
& Smith, Surefire
Scouting, UCS College
Football Rankings, Vandelay
Sports
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Helmet graphics from The
Helmet Project.
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