After Tommy Tuberville figuratively and literally walked out the door on the Texas Tech football program a month or so ago, it seemed like there truly was only one logical replacement for him: Former Tech quarterback and (at the time) Texas A&M offensive coordinator Kliff Kingsbury.    Sure other guys had bigger names or more […]

CBR’s ‘Way Too Early Top 10’ No. 9 Notre Dame Ask anyone around the Notre Dame football program, and they’d tell you no one is surprised the Irish found success under third year coach Brian Kelly…they were surprised how fast it happened however.  Most fans, media members and Notre Dame administration themselves had pegged the […]

(Although the 2012 season came to an end just days ago, it's never too early to look ahead to 2013 and that's exactly what Crystal Ball Run will do over the coming weeks with our 'Way Too Early' 2013 Top 10. Understand, these rankings are subject to change over the course of the off-season, and […]

It’s not often that we report on early declarations for the NFL Draft here at Crystal Ball Run (we leave that up to the NFL guys) but in terms of Texas A&M left tackle Luke Joeckel, we’ll make an exception. The 6’6 310 lb. Outland Trophy winner announced he would enter the NFL Draft Tuesday […]

There’s not really any way to describe Alabama’s 42-7 BCS National Championship beat down of Notre Dame on Monday night, other than to say this: The final score wasn’t indicative of how one-sided this game was. From start to finish, and in every way shape and form, the Crimson Tide were the better football team […]

Here are the Crystal Ball Run staff’s picks for Monday night’s BCS National Championship Game! Allen Kenney’s Take: I've tried to look for one notable edge in this game in either side, and I'm not finding any. The closest thing is Amari Cooper versus Notre Dame's secondary. From a more intangible standpoint, the quarterbacks are […]

We could go in a lot of different directions in the lead-up to Monday night’s BCS National Championship Game here at Crystal Ball Run. We could talk about the battle in the trenches between Alabama’s offensive line and Notre Dame’s defensive line or how Nick Saban plans on to defend Irish quarterback Everett Golson. The […]

Who knew the Big East had turned into the cradle of NFL head coaches? Ok, so that might be a slight exaggeration, but still, just one year after Greg Schiano left Rutgers to coach the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Syracuse’s Doug Marrone was named the Buffalo Bills new head coach on Sunday morning. The news was […]

While it’s easy to forget now, it was just seven years ago that the biggest story in the lead-up to Super Bowl XL was the race of the head coaches Lovie Smith and Tony Dungy. The pair were the first African-American coaches to ever go head-to-head with the Vince Lombardi Trophy on the line, and […]

Pittsburgh Panthers vs. Ole Miss Rebels Saturday, Jan. 5, 1:00 p.m. ESPN Legion Field (Birmingham, AL) Line: Ole Miss -3.5 Entering Saturday’s BBVA Compass Bowl, you really only need to know two things and two things only about this game: For starters, this will be Pittsburgh’s third straight trip to Birmingham for this second-tier, easily […]