Big Games

Get the batteries for your remote changed because on Saturday there are some big games.

MONTANA

The #5 Montana Grizzlies (12-1) are hosting the #10 Weber State Wildcats (10-3) Saturday at noon in Missoula. This is the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) quarterfinals. The game will be televised. The Griz will need to come out ready to play.

In Helena, the #1 Carroll College Saints (12-0) will be hosting the #7 Lindenwood Lions (11-1) at noon Saturday. The winner goes to the NAIA National Championship. This game will also be televised. Will the forfeit the Saints received last week help or hurt them?

Major College Football

Before the Montana teams play, viewers can get ready by watching the first part of the Navy (7-4) vs. Army (3-8) game: You can throw out the records. The game starts around 10:00 am Montana time.

Probably the biggest game of the day is No. 1 Alabama (12-0) vs. No. 4 Florida (11-1) for the SEC Championship. The game starts at 2:00 p.m. Montana time, so us fans may have to click between three games. The winner probably gets to the National Championship game. Both beat LSU and Georgia. This will be a good one. Florida lost by one point to Mississippi. Florida has been down this road before, so will the nerves get to Bama? Forrest Gump may attend the game, I hear.

At 6:00 p.m. Montana time, the Missouri Tigers (9-3) and the Oklahoma Sooners (11-1) play in Kansas City for the Big 12 Championship. The Texas Longhorns need Missouri to beat Oklahoma to have a shot at the National Championship game. The Sooners have owned the Tigers for many years. Can Mizzou play the perfect game and send the BCS into another nightmare? Being a Mizzou fan, I’d like to see it, but the Tigers have not played too many perfect games this year. M-I-Z-Z-O-U

#5 USC (10-1) will play UCLA (4-7) at 2:30 Montana time. USC may run up the score to try and get into the BCS Championship game. A few things will need to fall into place for USC to have a chance at a National Championship game, but stranger things have happened!

That’s it. Better check those remotes!

3D HD

The folks who run the NFL seem to always be thinking of new methods to draw people to their product. The NFL is far and above Major League Baseball and the National Basketball Association in their marketing strategies. The attendance at games and viewers on TV show the NFL marketers are hitting on all cylinders.

Tonight it’s the inaugural 3D broadcast. Yes, 3D and in HD. The Oakland Raiders play the San Diego Chargers.

So if you live in Boston, Los Angeles or New York, you can watch the game in 3D. Better get your tickets, because the game will be shown in one theater in each city.

For regular viewers who have the channel, the game will also be telecast on the NFL Network.

Will 3D work for the NFL? Only time will tell. I think it would be great to see a live NFL game on a theater’s big screen.

It looks like Fox Sports will telecast the BCS Championship game to selected theaters in 3D, too.

Football Roundup

Big 12

If you are a follower of Big 12 football, this season has been interesting. Last year, Missouri and Kansas from the Big 12 North fought it out finishing fourth and seventh in the final AP poll. Of course, Oklahoma and Texas were in the mix finishing eighth and tenth.

This was the year of the Big 12 South, with Texas, Oklahoma, and Texas Tech all finishing 11-1. Texas beat Oklahoma. Texas Tech beat Texas. Oklahoma beat Texas Tech. Since they were tied, the tiebreaker was the BCS standings from Sunday and Oklahoma was the winner by .0128 and is therefore the Big 12 South champion. Oklahoma will play Missouri (Big 12 North Champion) for the Big 12 Championship on Saturday.

The Big 12 will probably have seven teams heading to a bowl game. The SEC, home of Alabama and Florida, will probably send eight of their 12 teams to a bowl game. These are the best two conferences in all of college football.

BCS

It’s a mess. It seems every year there’s a nightmare with major college football. The whole system is crying for a playoff. Alabama, Oklahoma, Texas, Florida and USC are the top five teams according to the BCS. Alabama and Florida play Saturday. The winner will undoubtedly go to the BCS national title game. If Oklahoma beats Missouri, they should be there, too (although they lost to Texas on a neutral field). I feel your pain Longhorn fans.

Two Montana Teams

Montana still has two teams still in the mix for a national championship, the Montana Grizzlies and the Carroll College Saints.

Carroll (12-0) will host the Lindenwood Lions (11-1) on Saturday in Helena. Lindenwood is located near St. Charles, Missouri, just a few miles from St. Louis. The winner of the game will advance to the NAIA Football Championship on Dec. 20 in Rome, Georgia.

After starting slowly, the Montana Grizzlies came from behind to beat Texas State 31-13 in Football Championship Subdivision playoffs Saturday. The Griz (12-1) will host the Weber State Wildcats (10-3) on Saturday in the quarterfinals. Weber State beat the Griz earlier this year 45-28. This should be a good game.

Pro Football

When your team has only won one game this year, every victory is sweet. The Kansas City Chiefs beat the Oakland Raiders on Sunday, 20-13 for victory number two on the year. YES!!

The Denver Broncos put a good game together to beat the New York Jets. We just never know which Broncos team will show up for a game. Next week the Broncos host my Kansas City Chiefs. The Chiefs beat the Broncos earlier this season in KC. The Chiefs have lost seven in a row in Denver, but the Broncos have lost three straight home games. The Chiefs defense is ranked 32 and the Broncos 28. We might have a shootout!

We are getting down to crunch time with only four games left before the playoffs. The Giants are a very good team and so are the Titans. The Steelers are putting it together. Tampa Bay and Carolina are looking good. Baltimore has a good team. The Chargers are done. Washington and Dallas are on the outside looking in at the playoffs. Dallas has a tough road as all their remaining games are against teams with winning records. The Colts have a pretty easy schedule for the remainder of the year with only one game left against a team with a winning record.

Detroit, Cincinnati, St. Louis, Seattle, and KC are officially out of the playoffs. CBS has a great website for the playoffs. You can see it here.