With only only 3 days 2 hours and 33 minutes left until opening kickoff, I think about what the end of my much-too-short summer will be like. Beach? Possibly. Mall? Maybe. Sitting in front of the TV watching football from 10 am to 11 pm on the last Saturday? Definitely.

With the onset of college football aproaching, Saturdays take on a new meaning. Instead of call up some friends and chill for the day, it becomes shower, get dressed in my Wisconsin Badgers apparel and eat breakfast as I watch College Gameday (which now begins at 10 instead of 10:30 woohoo!) and relax on the couch for an entire day of football. Being a Wisconsin fan and not living in Wisconsin becomes a problem when they're not on TV and I must miss 20 minutes of an early SEC game looking for the radio that I seem to have misplaced since the last time I used it exactly one week ago.

Anyway, on to the predictions!

The obvious highlight game of this Saturday is Notre Dame vs. Georgia Tech. Many people call this a landmine game for Notre Dame, but being the first game of the season, they will be prepared for Georgia Tech and take out the Yellow Jackets 41-17.

Being the first week, there are only a few competive games but here are the big ones

Cal at Tennessee. Cal is a great team with great players, but can't overcome the Tennessee atmosphere - Tenn. 34-28
Florida State at Miami. The Monday Night game will showcase Miami's potential and speed - Miami 31-10

Now the rest of the top 25 (AP)

THURSDAY
#24 Arizona State 52 Northern Arizona 10

SATURDAY
#1 Ohio State 38 Northern Illinois 17
#3 Texas 48 North Texas 0
#4 Auburn 27 Washington State 17
#5 West Virginia 42 Marshall 10
#6 USC 30 Arkansas 17
#7 Florida 28 Southern Miss 3
#8 LSU 41 LA-Lafayette 10
#10 Oklahoma 24 UAB 7
#14 Michigan 38 Vanderbilt 6
#15 Georgia 49 Western Kentucky 14
#16 Iowa 41 Montana 0
#17 Virginia Tech 39 Northeastern 0
#18 Clemson 24 Florida Atlantic 10
#19 Penn State 34 Akron 13
#20 Nebraska 37 Louisiana Tech 7
#21 Oregon 31 Stanford 17
#25 Texas Tech 56 Southern Methodist 10

SUNDAY
#13 Louisville 49 Kentucky 14
#22 TCU 24 Baylor 17

and finally...WISCONSIN 35 BOWLING GREEN 10!

Although there won't be any upsets in the first week, the closest maybe be Ohio State - Northern Illinois and USC - Arkansas

HAVE A WONDERFUL OPENING WEEKEND!

This being my first blog post, I've decided to start with the absolute most important part of college football: the polls (just kidding.) Seriously, in my opinion college football polls are important because of the structure of the BCS, yet quite irrelevant to football itself. Anyway, I do enjoy creating football polls simply becuase I love the sport. Preseason polls should be a representation of a teams overall talent level and chemistry. Unfortunately this isn't what is normally portrayed through the polls. Instead, a teams schedule may influence some people's rankings. Teams shouldn't be placed depending on how well they are "projected" to do, but instead on the interpretation of the overall talent.

So now because you've probably skipped over that extremely important paragraph, here is my 2006 preseason Top 25

1. Notre Dame
2. Ohio State
3. West Virginia
4. LSU
5. Auburn
6. Texas
7. USC
8. Florida
9. California
10. Florida State
11. Oklahoma
12. Penn State
13. Louisville
14. Michigan
15. Georgia
16. Miami (FL)
17. Iowa
18. Virginia Tech
19. TCU
20. Clemson
21. Tennessee
22. Nebraska
23. Arizona State
24. Texas A&M
25. Utah

5 Others in consideration: Boise St., Michigan State, Oregon, Texas Tech, Wisconsin

Check back often as I plan to post a few more times before opening kickoff on August 31.