Turtledroppings.com – Maryland Football And Basketball Blog

Well I’m sitting down here in North Carolina, aka the heart of ACC Country as I begin my vacation.  Up in College Park there are a bunch of kids in the exact opposite situation.  For tomorrow is the start of fall practice, and for all intensive purposes, the start of the season.  In a way I feel bad for those kids.  I mean we have had a relatively cool summer up to this point, and now with camp opening up, it is supposed to finally get hazy, hot, and humid.  But hopefully deep down, they are as excited about the 2009 season as the rest of us are.

So as I sit here waiting to head down to the beach, I was thinking what can I write about on Fall Practice eve?  And then it hit me, we have not done a season prediction yet.  We gave one out in the ACC/SEC interview, but have not done one here.  So I’m going to throw mine out there, and see if Chris or someone else wants to put there’s up as well.  Of course if the ACC/SEC interview is any indication, Chris and I will probably have the same answers. 

Cal- As much as I have invested in this trip, I am trying to set the bar low so that if we were to lose the game, it won’t ruin the whole vacation (yeah, that’s right, I have another vacation in 3 weeks, leave me alone I work really hard…mostly).  But I think we are going to be outmatched in this one.  I’d hate to open up the season 0-1, but when you do a home and home with a big school like Cal, hoping to take the series 2-0 is a little ambitious. 

JMU- I think we roll with this one.  Don’t get me wrong JMU is a strong program, not unlike Delaware in 2008 when we played, but I don’t see us going 0-2.  Even with our youth, I think we get this done.

Middle Tennessee State- If we aren’t fired up for this one, well then we’d deserve to lose.  Looking back this game kept us from a 9 win season.  Hard to believe.  It also was probaby one of the most frustrating games I have ever watched.  But all things considered, I think we get some pay back in 2009.

Rutgers- The Scarlet Knights are going to be looking for some revenge this year, but I don’t think they are going to get it.  In New Jersey, sure I’d worry about this one, but I think we are going to pull this out at home, which would be great because it would be our 3rd straight win in a row, which would really start to get some people excited about the year.

Clemson- You can’t count out beating Clemson in College Park this year, I mean after all we beat a very good Tiger team in Death Valley, but I think we are going to come up short.  I hate losing to Clemson at home because of all my family ties, so to prepare, I’ll just hit the tailgate beverages extra hard, just to be safe.

Wake Forest- Any ACC win is going to be hard fought, for us or our opponent.  And in this case Wake will have the advantage of playing at home.  I think that will make the difference.

Virginia- The ole Homecoming Game.  UVA is never a roll over, and have played us tough in Byrd the last few years.  I think that will continue, but I think we’ll edge them out, to move closer to a bowl berth.

Duke- We’ve been waiting for years to play Duke so we could take our gimme conference win all these other ACC teams have been enjoying, but now Duke has actually shown a little bit of life.  Led by QB Thaddeus Lewis, this will no longer be the laugher we had invisioned over the last few year, but a legitimate ACC game.  But in the end I think we’ll prevail.

North Carolina State- I can’t say I’d want to put a lot of money on this outcome, but I’ll be damned if good things don’t happen to us in Carter-Finely.  Throw in the fact that I haven’t really gone out on much of a limb yet, and I’m giving this one to the Terps. 

Virginia Tech- I don’t think I have ever watched a Maryland-VT game that I enjoyed.  Sure everything surrounding the game, such as the road trips and the tailgates have been top notch, but the results on the field have not been pretty.  I’d like to say 2009 will be different, but VT looks ready to make another run at the ACC Championship, and I don’t think our young Terps will be able to get in their way.

Florida State- This one used to be an automatic loss, not so much any more.  I think we’ll end up losing, but then in 2012 there will be an investigation where FSU players had a professor killed over grades, which Bobby Bowden will attribute to “Boys being Boys” and the NCAA will make Bowden and FSU give up their 2009 wins and in the long run, this will be a Terps win.  But for 2009, I’m putting it down as an L.

Boston College- Things could be tense in College Park for this one as we try to become Bowl Eligible. BC is supposed to have a down year, but I find that hard to believe.  This one will go down to the wire, but since I’m a Maryland fan, I’m going to give it to the Terps.

Let’s see, if I’m correct that puts us at 6-6.  My original prediction in the ACC/SEC interview was 7-5 so I wonder why I had a change of heart this morning.  One thing I do know for sure is that what I described above is NOT going to happen.  It never seems to work out that way.  We will lose a game we should win, and we will win a game we should lose.  Hopefully twice. 

If the above prediction holds true, this almost certainly would put us in the Eagle Bank Bowl in DC.  Not a fate we are all looking forward too, but there are a lot of good things about that bowl game.  One of which is that just about every Terps fan will be able to go, and therefore the tailgating will be just as intense as the regular season. 

So there you have it.  We can check back in November and make fun of me, but at least I’m putting it out there.  Anyone else want to take a stab?

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