BYU Football: 5 Reasons Why BYU Can Not Look Past USF
It appears that many fans and media members have already put down BYU Football as the winner.
Southern Florida is not a very good football team. While that is true, they aren't as bad as everyone seems to think they are. On top of that, nobody knows how good the Cougars are with all of their injuries and having to play on the east coast.
Despite this, it seems that many, including many credible sources are marking this off as an automatic win for BYU. There are quite a few ways BYU loses this game.
1. Turnovers
The Bulls have been borderline awful on defense preventing other teams from scoring, but are actually ranked in the Top 10 in takeaways. The Cougars on the other hand have been awful with turnovers with nearly all of them leading to an immediate score. If this were to happen two or more times, that would close any talent gap that exists between the two teams. Think of the USC game except switch the roles and it is easy to see how a game could turn to an upset really quickly.
2. Banged up Players
Can we really assume that BYU is going to win when the starting quarterback, running back, linebacker and many other key players are all out with injuries? I'm not saying that BYU shouldn't be favored to win the game, but to write the Bulls off as an automatic win seems extreme with so many questions.
3. South Florida isn't Awful
This sort of goes into the preseason rankings and what is wrong with them, but losing to SMU is not looking like a bad loss anymore for the Bulls. Wisconsin is playing so good that nobody can score on them which makes that loss also look more understandable. The loss to Georgia Tech was tough, but honestly it was a close low scoring game that could have gone either way. Add that to a pair of blowout wins to true terrible teams UConn and South Carolina State and this team still looks bad, but not awful.
4. The State of Florida has been Awful to BYU
The Cougars are 0-7 all time in the state of Florida. Some of those games are memorable and painful including the Miami Beach Bowl, a tough loss in 2008 against Florida State after taking down Oklahoma earlier in the season, and a tough loss in 2014 against UCF. Obviously this curse is as fakeas the Max Hall curse, but it something worth noting.
Bottom line: The Cougars should win this game. They are better and more talented, but to write of USF is ridiculous and can lead to even more upset fans than there are now if they were to lose the game.