the tindog coffeehouse

I wondered at the beginning of this year’s college football season how accurate EA Sports’ NCAA College Football 09 for the Wii was at predicting the outcomes of the real games. Each week, I played the game as the University of Texas versus their scheduled opponent for the week and then compared that score to the real score.

A few of the Wii scores were fairly close to the actual ones (Florida Atlantic, Rice, Texas A&M) while others were way off (Arkansas, Missouri, Baylor), margins of error probably not too different than what you’d get from ESPN and other “expert” prognosticators.

Which brings us to the final Texas game of the season, the Fiesta Bowl. It’s been yet another wacky season thanks to the BCS computers, biased voters, and controversial Big 12 tie-breaking rules. Heck, it even involved competing fleets of airplanes over Austin and Norman as the Red River rivals taunted each other by air.

But while Florida and OU are busy trying to justify why each of their 1-loss teams are more deserving of the National Championship than undefeated Utah, the Longhorns are happy to settle the score with the Ohio State Buckeyes. UT and OSU have met twice before, in 2005 and 2006. The Horns won the first with Vince Young on their way to a National Championship, then lost the second with Colt McCoy — that game only being Colt’s second game of his college career.

A lot has changed since 2006, however. Colt is now a Heisman runner-up, and the Horns are a dropped pass and missed tackle away from a perfect season. Ohio State, meanwhile, has two losses for the season, both to teams who squared off against each other in the Rose Bowl. Texas had one of the toughest schedules in the nation, while the highest ranked opponent beaten by Ohio State was No. 18 Wisconsin, and even that was only a 3-point victory. (It should also be noted that Wisconsin went on to get thumped by Florida State in the Champs Sports Bowl.)

Now some might argue that a team’s regular season schedule isn’t always an indicator of how well they’ll do in the bowl game, and that’s true (just ask Alabama). So how well have Texas and Ohio State fared in recent bowls? Well, the Buckeyes have been to the National Championship game the last two years, but they lost both times. Texas, on the other hand, has won its last four consecutive bowl games, two of which have been against Big 10 teams.

And this year should make it number five, with Texas beating the Buckeyes 20 to 7, according to the Wii.

As always, I’ll update the blog after the game with the real score.

And as always, Hook ‘Em, Horns!

Real Score: 24-21.

Wow, what an incredible game! Frustrating, of course, for most of the game, but the final two minutes made up for it. It was very fitting that the final touchdown was made by Quan Cosby, who, like Vince Young, can say the final play of his college football career was a game-winning touchdown made in the final moments of a BCS game. Coupled with Brian Orakpo’s sack seconds later, you couldn’t have asked for a more fitting ending to the season.

The Longhorns finish the season 12-1, and while they likely won’t end up as national champions, they have nothing to feel bad about. Keep in mind that most people looked at their schedule this year and expected them to finish the regular season 9-3 or 8-4, maybe 10-2 if they were lucky. Yet, they were nearly flawless.

I just want to say I’ve had a lot of fun this season doing these prediction posts. If anything, it’s given me an excuse to play video games once a week. Maybe, I’ll do it again next season just for grins.

Of course, right now that seems like an eternity away.