Georgia Tech at Boston College

HOLLY (QUASI-RATIONAL): What do you call it when you’re picking a team for completely unsound reasons but they’re the better team anyway? I like Georgia Tech because I also like yelling, “BEEEEEEEEEEES!!” on a crowded sidewalk, but that doesn’t mean I’m wrong.

ORSON (RATIONAL) Tech by creeping strangulation. Even against Jacksonville State the flexbone moved with grinding, almost infuriating pace, like some kind of giant horseshoe crab filterfeeding its way down the field, except that this horseshoe crab could occasionally make huge leaps, so really, it’s like a tarantula in armor, but underwater, and…goddammit, just take Tech and Dwyer, and add in Tech’s defensive line to pressure BC’s suspicious passing game into mistakes. Money spent on the Tarantulaleapingcrab-Bot is money well spent.

Southern Miss at Auburn

HOLLY (QUASI-RATIONAL): Southern Miss is plucky, upstartish, moxiefied, and fresh from knocking off Louisiana-Lafayette. This will not save them. Auburn has the devil’s own luck when it comes to close games, but they don’t need it this week. (The chop blocks will continue, y’know, to stay limber.)

ORSON (QUASI-RATIONAL): Southern Miss to cover, but Auburn will pull this out despite some horrific staggers because, after Chris Todd puts them in danger of an upset he will save them from all evil by boldly handing off to Ben Tate and Brad Lester. If you have not seen Brad Lester run: he kicks up his knees to mid-stomach on every stride, making tackling him in close quarters as appetizing as bringing down an Emu at a full run. Emu knees for the win, since we’re so big on transmogrified animal metaphors today.

San Diego St. at Notre Dame

HOLLY (IRRATIONAL): Because I had a perfect record in picks last week until MY OWN SCHOOL torpedoed me, I’m allowing myself one PureSpite (patent pending) upset pick to meet my emotional need for suffering in others. The Irish are going down like sweet muffins. (Please?)

ORSON (IRRATIONAL): OH set forth the banners flying and send telexes to the relative potentates! Don your short tie, place your hat upon your head as a gentleman would, and catch the early train bound for South Bend to watch OLD NOTRE DAME and the floating, seventy-pound head of Tom Hammond plow one of the ten worst teams in all of college gridiron creation.

Note: not because Notre Dame is good, which we don’t know, or because San Diego State is bad. (Which they gobsmackingly are.) Mostly because we’ll do anything to get the mesmerizing head of O’Brien Tom Hammond off our television screen, and an early Notre Dame lead means clock running and a quick game.

Like Harvey Birdman if he were a Mexican street hustler/exotic dancer.

Oregon St. at Penn St.

HOLLY (IRRATIONAL): I’ve tried everything—hypnotherapy, electroshock, black tar heroin—but there’s absolutely no way, empirically, that I could care less about this game, barring Paterno cannibalizing an errant receiver on the sideline. Penn State. I mean, I guess.

ORSON (IRRATIONAL WITH CAPITALS WTF) Sometimes, you drop your pants and make the revolution happen. In a weekend where only the personal blood is on the line with Miami/Florida, you have to throw a few molotov cocktails around to keep things interesting. See, I’m a man of simple tastes. I like gunpowder…and dynamite…and gasoline! Do you know what all of these things have in common? They’re cheap!

Air Force at Wyoming

HOLLY (QUASI-RATIONAL): The Falcons had 508 yards of offense in their season opener (against something called “Southern Utah, but still, god bless the Mountain West). Wyoming had problems putting away Ohio (not the good one). Advantage: Air Force.

ORSON (QUASI-RATIONAL): Air Force runs the triple option with streamers and bells on it over Wyoming with gleeful ease. While we are not aware of any serious research on this issues aside from eyeing the box scores and saying, “Wow, you barely beat a Frank Solich Ohio team,” there is also the issue of critical escalator shortages in Wyoming, which just has to have something to do with their football difficulties as of late.

W. Virginia at E. Carolina

HOLLY (QUASI-RATIONAL): Pat White is a machine. And he’s getting smarter. [SFX: CHCH-CH-CHCH. Metal skulls and glowing red eyes appear on the horizon.] He also piloted much of last week’s offense on the strength of his passes instead of his twinkle toes. East Carolina’s no Villanova, but neither are the Mountaineers the Hokies. West Fuckin’ By-God Virginia FTW.

ORSON (QUASI-RATIONAL): East Carolina–not Eastern as we usually insist on calling it for Junior Corso points–enjoyed the privilege of facing Sean Glennon at quarterback last week. This week, as our colleague pointed out, they will be facing Pat White, who is to Sean Glennon at qb Jennifer Lopez’s 2000-level back-bumper is Lara Flynn Boyle’s buttular concavity: an entirely different species capable of performing witchcraft, serving as an air-traffic controller without wearing a headset, and currently serving as Minister of Culture in several African nations. Couches, ignite!

J-Lo, Stuff Magazine, the frilly rumba panties: Pat White’s that kind of quality at qb.

Arkansas vs. UL-Monroe

HOLLY (IRRATIONAL): Bobby Petrino makes this face when his team is in trouble that looks like he’s trying to clench a hot lump of coal in his ass. We get to see that face a lot. But not tomorrow. Hawgs (sp?).

ORSON (QUASI-RATIONAL) Arkansas big, but ugly, in the kind of way someone can become filthy wealthy, garner massive success, and still purchase a PT Cruiser because “It’s campy.” No sir, it is not. It is a Geo Metro covered in extra plastic. We may have found our metaphor for this year’s Arkansas team, a big, drive blocking lummox of a team going through it’s first week of kung-fu class under a very unpleasant and demanding sensei. Pain training continues.

Miami (FL) at Florida

HOLLY (QUASI-RATIONAL): Gators over ‘Canes, again just for showing up to the stadium. Reformed MIA, you begin to bore me with your “suspensions” for “violating team rules.”

ORSON (IRRATIONAL BLIND HOMERISM): Florida, if only because Miami’s got 13 freshmen on the two-deep and nary as senior to be found. Still, we’ll believe they’re dead when flames go out and we see the bones. Shame has no date of expiry:

Stanford at Arizona St.

HOLLY (IRRATIONAL): Programming note: I’ll be pulling for Arizona State the rest of the season, if only to prevent any more shots of Rudy Carpenter in HD looking like the subject of a botched-kidney-operation reality show. (Fridays on FOX.)

ORSON (RATIONAL) Arizona State, since Stanford’s all blitz-wacky and Arizona State spent the better part of the offseason running screens and quick hitters to keep Rudy Carpenter from peeing his very favorite kind of urine, blood. Lyle Moevao was pressured into grievous mistakes by the Cardinal, but he also made some dunderheaded ones himself that Rudy Carpenter will not make under pressure. Remember: Rudy Carpenter doesn’t make too many mistakes, mostly because he spends the majority of his games lying on his back holding in the tears.

Texas at UTEP

HOLLY (IRRATIONAL): Aww, hey there, Colt! Sleep well? What’s that? You want to play like a quarterback this season? Good on ya. Hook ‘em.

ORSON (QUASI-RATIONAL): Texas by miles and miles and miles and miles. Unless gunfire from nearby Juarez wanders over and nips any of the Longhorns’ starters, we’re looking at one of the more lopsided, gutted, bombed-out and depleted matchups of the weekend. UTEP, who at one point claimed to have “Carson Palmer’s brother” playing qb, lost to Buffalo this past weekend. When you put both Buffalo and Texas on the Winnar bench, you truly have diversified the degrees of suck in your possession.

Really, don’t even tune into this one. You think you like to see people on fire, because it’s funny in movies and stuff. Then you really see it, and well…it’s funnier. We mean not at all. Yes.