2011 UH Cougar Watch-Playing Open Date

My University of Houston footballers are 6-0 for the first time since 1990, are 2-0 in the C-USA West Division and are getting a well deserved week off.

The 1973 Cougar squad also started 6-0 and only the 1979 SWC championship team and 1990 teams that started 8-0 had better pigskin season beginnings.

Even better is the news that they are already bowl eligible and the Big East is now casting glances their way as a possible expansion candidate.  

They also finally got some love in the polls for the first time this season.  They debuted in the ESPN/USA Today Coaches poll at number 22 and in the AP poll at number 25. It's also the first time since the 1989-91 season that the Cougars have been ranked for three consecutive seasons.  It also means that in the four season that Coach Kevin Sumlin has been at the helm of the program, they now have been ranked in three of them with their highest ranking coming in the 2009 season when they were ranked number 12 and in position to be a BCS buster team.

Signing Coach K to that contract extension in 2010 now looks like a genius move.

The Coogs return to action on October 22 at the Rob when they take on Marshall

2011 UH Cougar Watch-Can We Get Ranked Now?

After a week in which they were snubbed by the Big 12 for a invitation to join the league and snubbed by the AP and other college football pollsters despite having a 5-0 record for the first time since the 1990 season, maybe the University of Houston Cougars have finally decided to play with a chip on their shoulder last night and East Carolina happened to be in their way.  

This was UH's most dominating performance of the year on both sides of the ball.  The Cougar defense held East Carolina to three points and only 284 yards total offense as the NCAA's number 1 ranked offense went to work early and often and scored 35 first half points.   Case Keenum was 30 for 37 for 304 yards and 3 touchdowns before being given the rest of the night off .  Charles Sims had 9 carries for 84 yards and two touchdowns as the Cougars moved to 6-0 (2-0) on the year.

Here's what Coach K had to say about what I vented about early in this post. 



Next up is a well deserved open date before they face Marshall at the Rob on October 22 and try to keep this perfect season going.

2011 UH Cougar Watch-Critical Game With East Carolina

The last time the Cougars tangled with the East Carolina Pirates was in 2009 and it is not a pleasant memory for many of us in Cougar Nation. 

It was in the C-USA Championship Game and the then number 18 ranked Cougars came out on the short end of a 38-32 game in Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium after blowing them out earlier in the season.  


This one is in the friendly confines of Robertson Stadium and starts a critical month of three C-USA home games with an open date mixed in.  

The Cougars and Pirates are on different levels this year.   The Pirates played a brutal non conference schedule with BCS big boys South Carolina, Virginia Tech and North Carolina with their lone win being a 28-23 Conference USA one versus UAB. 

UH has raced out to a 5-0 start for the first time since 1990.  They opened the season by avenging last year's loss to UCLA and won their conference opener last week in a 49-42 shootout with UTEP. 

Despite their gaudy record, the Cougars can't sleep on East Carolina nor afford another slow offensive start.  The Pirates will bring their 'A' game because they want to prove they are a contender for the C-USA title, and if they can do it at the Coogs expense, even better.

If the Coogs want to kep their hopes of being a BCS buster alive they must match that intensity and keep winning. 

And we Cougar fans want to remind the offense that kickoff time for this game is at 6 PM CDT.

Repeat after me, score early, score often. 

Eat 'em up!

TCU Invited To Join Big 12 in '12

A not so funny thing happened to Texas Christian University on the way out of the Mountain West Conference to playing in the Big East Conference in 2012.  

The Big East conference lost two members to the ACC  and Texas A&M had enough of 'Big Brother's' burnt orange BS and SECeded.

After losing Nebraska to the Big 10, Colorado to the Pac-12, the Texas A&M  SECession, and Missouri putting out feelers to the SEC as well, the Big 12 finally decided it had enough of being picked on and replaced its commissioner Don Beebe with Chuck Neinas on September 22.

In addition to working on keeping Missouri in the league and looking at other candidates for expansion, TCU was extended a formal invitation to join the Big 12 conference and if accepted will be playing in the league starting in the 2012-13 school year.  

It's a conference move that makes sense, finally puts the Big 12 in the DFW television market and reestablishes some old SWC rivalries, especially a newly reignited one with Baylor. 

TCU alums have much hateraid for Baylor and blame BU for the Horned Frogs not getting into the Big 12 in the first place when it was founded in 1996.

Congratulation to TCU, you definitely deserve it and hope you guys have much success beating the hell out of Longhorn Elementary..  But hey Big 12, don't stop your Lone Star expansion with TCU.. There's a pretty good university here in H-town that deserves to be in a BCS conference as well, despite what the burnt orange flavored hateraid sippers have to say.

2011 UH Cougar Watch-Short Work Week For UTEP Game

My fave college football team for the third straight year opens C-USA play against their West Division foes the UTEP Miners in a critical Thursday night game in El Paso's Sun Bowl. 

It's not only the start of C-USA conference play for the 4-0 Cougars, once they get past this game UH spends the entire month of October at home with conference games at Robertson Stadium against East Carolina, Marshall, and the Bayou Bucket showdown with Rice

The Cougars are on the cusp of breaking into the Top 25 collegiate rankings as well.  They've been steadily  picking up support and picked up enough votes that put them at 26th in one poll and 28th in another. 

It's a far cry from the number 12 ranking they carried into the October 3, 2009 game and were thumped 58-41.  They returned the favor in a 54-24 beatdown at the Rob last season, but many of the players who were on that 2009 team haven't forgotten that butt kicking or the 'Overrated' cheers from the UTEP faithful ringing in their ears after it.

The Coogs would like to ruin UTEP's perfect 6-0 record in C-USA conference home openers but UH is keenly aware of the fact the Miners have trick plays in their offensive arsenal they will not hesitate to use.

“There will be a fake punt, a fake field goal, could be an onside kick, could be anything,” UH head coach Kevin Sumlin said. “One of the things in preparation that everybody knows, particularly when you go down there, is that (Price) will do anything. That’s how he’s been. That’s not a reputation, that’s a fact.”

The Coogs just need to stay focused, go into El Paso with their game faces on for this 7 PM CDT clash and get out of the Sun Bowl with a win.  

Eat 'em up!