Name a tougher opening game in the country than Cal traveling 3,000 miles to open a game in Neyland??? With a soph. qb that had never played a complete D1 game???
USC going into Jordan-Hare to play #6 Auburn (#1, in one poll), with sophomore Matt Leinart playing his first game in CF? The following year that same basic cast of Auburn players went on to run the table and get screwed out of a BCS title game shot...
How 'bout that one? See, Tennessee was only ranked 17th or 19th or whatever it was and they've gone on to show that nope, they really weren't much better than their initial ranking. The highlight of their season remains that mudhole they stomped into Cal.
On the other hand, well, USC went in and shut out Auburn. They...
won the game. They also killed this year's SEC leader in their own house, in their season opener, with USC's QB (among many others on the field that day) again playing
his first game.
In '04 USC opened up against Va Tech, in their own backyard...and won.
That's the part Cal still needs to learn. It's not good enough to schedule a tough roadie. No, you also have to win your tough roadies, otherwise you're just Troy or Rice.
One other thing about Tennessee and this notion that they haven't lost an OOC opener at home in 35 years. Great. Now, look over the list of teams they've played as their OOC home opener for those 35 years...
Duh. No wonder they haven't lost in 35 years. Who was supposed to beat 'em? (Besides Cal... :-) ) It's not like Tennessee's been scheduling Ohio St, Nebraska, ND and USC as their OOC home openers...
Lastly, I will give m2 credit for one salient point: Neither Ohio St nor Michigan have really played that tough of a schedule. Michigan's lone marquee wins came against ND and Wisconsin, both of whom might be considered highly overrated. Certainly, neither team owns a really good win thus far this season. Ohio St's lone marquee win came against a very spotty Texas team playing a redshirt freshman QB in his first real game.
This is still the definite #1 vs #2 matchup of the season and a game deserving of all the hype but yeah, it's not like either team's really been put to the test very much by their schedules this season.
Oh, and speaking of hype, have any of you people seen the ESPN ad for this game, the one with Brent Musberger doing a voice over against a backdrop of gathering stormclouds or whatever...
"In this new millenium
this is finally
the game of the century!", or some such nonsense...
Dude, last year's Rose Bowl?? Just this past January?
Remember? Pretty eagerly anticpited game starring a decent player or two from each side? Pretty big programs there? History on the line, and all the marbles too?
No Lloyd Carr, as far as the eye could see?
Remember that Rose Bowl match up there, ESPN? They really don't come any bigger than that, period, much less should we even be attempting to compare a mere regular season game to that one...
vs. 
