2009 Midseason Report & Picks - C-USA

The best Conference USA players, coaches, surprises of the midseason and more. Scroll down for predictions for every team and every game.

2009 CFN C-USA Midseason Look

- CFN Midseason All-America Teams 2008 | 2007 | 2006

2009 CFN Midseason Reports  
- ACC | Big East | Big Ten | C-USA | Pac 10 | SEC 

Coming Friday: Midseason All-America Team, MAC, M-West, Sun Belt, WAC

East  UAB | UCF | East Carolina | Marshall | Memphis | Southern Miss
West  Houston | Rice | SMU | Tulane | Tulsa | UTEP  

Scroll Down For Predictions For Every Team For The Rest Of The Season 

Offensive Player of the Midseason
Case Keenum, QB Houston

Defensive Player of the Midseason
Marcus McGraw, LB Houston

Ten best C-USA players of the first half
1. Case Keenum, QB Houston
2. Darius Marshall, RB Marshall
3. Joseph Webb, QB UAB
4. Donald Buckram, RB UTEP
5. G.J. Kinne, QB Tulsa
6. Marcus McGraw, LB Houston
7. Emmanuel Sanders, WR SMU
8. Mike Bryan, LB Tulsa
9. Duke Calhoun, WR Memphis
10. Jeremy Williams, WR Tulane

Biggest Surprise – Houston
Everyone knew Houston was going to be good; just not Big 12-good. If not for the head-scratching loss to UTEP on Oct. 3, the Cougars would have had a strong case for being the highest ranked of the non-automatic qualifiers. Still, they’re a healthy No. 17 in the first BCS standings, thanks to wins over Oklahoma State, Texas Tech, and Mississippi State, and the heavy favorite to cop a Conference USA title. Houston has leap-frogged Tulsa and East Carolina as the league member with the highest Q rating on a national scale.

Biggest Disappointment – Rice
Sure, the expectations were lowered in the first year after QB Chase Clement and WR Jarett Dillard, but 0-7 after winning 10 games in 2008? Even by Owl standards, it’s been a far more abrupt fall from grace than anyone anticipated. Rice has reverted back to the tail end of the Ken Hatfield era, routinely getting blown out and rarely even being competitive. The Owls are 114th in scoring offense and 120th in scoring defense, which is unacceptable for a school that seemingly had some momentum after last year’s bowl win.

The C-USA Champion will be ... Houston
The East is mediocre and the balance of power resides in the top tier of the West. The Cougars are the conference’s clear-cut most talented team, but must prove it on the Nov. 7 visit to Tulsa. Since the Hurricane is unbeaten in the league and Houston has that one smudge in El Paso, there’s absolutely no margin for error at this point. As long as QB Case Keenum is in the huddle, there’s isn’t a defense left on the schedule that’s going to stop the nation’s top-ranked offense.

Best Game of the First Half

at Houston 29 … Texas Tech 28
Case eenum ran for a four-yard score to cap off a 16-play, 95-yard drive in the final five minutes, and the Houston defense held on as a final Texas Tech Hail Mary was broken up. The two offenses combined for 1,063 yards of total offense, but Texas Tech was only able to managed a 24-yard touchdown catch from Tramain Swindall in the second half. It was still good enough to be up late as Houston didn’t go for two points after a one-yard Bryce Beall run, and was down eight after the Swindall score, and only managed a 21-yard field goal on a deep third quarter drive. Baron Batch ran for two first half scores for the Red Raiders.

Worst Game of the First Half

at Texas Tech 55 ... Rice 10
Taylor Potts threw seven touchdown passes with two in the first quarter and three in the third, including three to Lyle Leong from seven, eight, and 27 yards out. Tramain Swindell caught scoring passes from 30 and 26 yards out in the fourth, with the last one coming from Steven Sheffield. Rice was never in the game, failing to get into the end zone until early on the fourth, when down 41-10, John Thomas Shepherd connected with Taylor Dupree from three yards out. The Red Raiders rolled up 560 yards of total offense to 257 for Rice.

Coach of the Midseason – Houston’s Kevin Sumlin
While June Jones is making impressive progress in Dallas, this choice is an elementary one. Sumlin promised to bring championships to Houston when he was hired, and who’d want to doubt him these days? He’s taken what he inherited from Art Briles and retrofitted it into a Top 25, nationally-relevant program. In just the first six games of 2009, Sumlin has already beaten Mike Gundy, Mike Leach, and Dan Mullen, putting his name in the hat for national Coach of the Year honors.

Player who'll step up in the second half – Tulsa QB G.J. Kinne
With half a season as the starter now behind him, Kinne is ready to explode in October and November. He’s actually been pretty good up to this point, dancing outside the pocket for first downs and distributing the ball to his myriad receivers. Although the first half numbers didn’t conjure up images of Paul Smith or David Johnson, that could change as the playbook opens up in the next six weeks. Accurate and efficient with his throws, he’s only had one game, the visit to Oklahoma, in which he’s thrown an interception.

Best performance so far – UTEP RB Donald Buckram almost single-handedly ending Houston’s drive toward a perfect season and a BCS bowl berth. The No. 12 Cougars had already beaten Oklahoma State and Texas Tech, so a trip through El Paso was just a formality, right? Uh-uh. Buckram enjoyed his 15 minutes of fame on this night, garroting the Houston D for 262 yards and four touchdowns on 32 carries. The Cougars produced 664 yards of offense, yet it still wasn’t enough to overcome one of the nation’s best individual efforts of the first half.

Top Freshman – Memphis DT Dontari Poe
One of the few bright spots for the Tigers this season, Poe is the type of player that a defense can be built around over the next three seasons...literally. At 6-5 and 350 pounds, he’s more than your typical space-eater on the inside. Surprisingly light on his feet, he can power opposing linemen off the ball or shoot the gap and make a stop behind the line. A starter since the season began, he’s made 19 tackles, five tackles for loss, two sacks, and forced three fumbles.

Coach who needs to have a big second half – Memphis’ Tommy West
Go ahead and feel free to answer Marshall’s Mark Snyder, UCF’s George O’Leary, Tulane’s Bob Toledo, or UTEP’s Mike Price, who all need to finish strong. West is feeling an unusually high degree of heat, however, courtesy of his team’s 2-5 start and general malaise in all but the UTEP win earlier in the month. The Memphis administration expects bigger things down the road from its football team, meaning straddling the .500 mark and contending for second-rate December bowl games is no longer fulfilling job requirements. No bowl berth, naturally, is the kind of thing that could land the coach a pink slip.

Player who needs to have a big second half – East Carolina QB Patrick Pinkney
Where’s the quarterback who was so efficient in big games during the Pirates’ league championship run a year ago? He’s been ineffective all season, missing receivers, making poor reads, and throwing more picks than touchdowns. This is not what East Carolina anticipated when he was granted a sixth year of eligibility in the offseason. Getting back to and winning another Conference USA crown will require Pinkney to start making more plays through the air, taking some pressure off backs Dominique Lindsay and Brandon Jackson, and that quality defensive unit.

Best remaining conference game – Houston at Tulsa, Nov. 7
It’s the annual shootout between two of the league’s most potent offenses to decide the West representative in the conference title game. Considering how poorly the play in the East has been all year, this duel will probably determine the eventual league champ as well. With Case Keenum on one side and G.J. Kinne on the other, defensive stops will come at a premium, much the way they have over the last couple of meetings between these schools. Keenum’s longshot Heisman bid could get a boost at Skelly Field.

Team Mid-Season MVPs & Predictions

East 

UAB - Midseason MVP: QB Joe Webb, Sr. .
predicted wins: Florida Atlantic
predicted losses: at Marshall, at UTEP, at Memphis, at East Carolina, UCF
predicted record: 3-9

UCF - Midseason MVP: RB Brynn Harvey, Soph..
predicted wins: at Rice, Marshall, Tulane, at UAB
predicted losses: at Texas, Houston
predicted record: 7-5

East Carolina - Midseason MVP: WR Dwayne Harris, Jr. .
predicted wins: at Memphis, UAB, Southern Miss
predicted losses: Virginia Tech, at Tulsa
predicted record: 7-5

Marshall - Midseason MVP: RB Darius Marshall, Soph.
predicted wins: UAB, SMU, at UTEP
predicted losses: at UCF, Southern Miss
predicted record: 7-5

Memphis - Midseason MVP: WR Duke Calhoun, Sr.
predicted wins: UAB
predicted losses: East Carolina, at Tennessee, at Houston, at Tulsa
predicted record: 3-9

Southern Miss - Midseason MVP: RB Damion Fletcher, Sr.
predicted wins: Tulane, at Marshall, Tulsa
predicted losses: at Houston, at East Carolina
predicted record: 7-5

West 

Houston - Midseason MVP: QB Case Keenum, Jr.
predicted wins: SMU, Southern Miss, at Tulsa, at UCF, Memphis, Rice
predicted losses: None
predicted record: 11-1

Rice - Midseason MVP: LB Andrew Sendejo, Sr.
predicted wins: None
predicted losses: UCF, at SMU, Tulane, UTEP, at Houston
predicted record: 0-12

SMU - Midseason MVP: WR Emmanuel Sanders, Sr.
predicted wins: Rice, UTEP, Tulane
predicted losses: at Houston, at Tulsa, at Marshall
predicted record: 6-6

Tulane - Midseason MVP: WR Jeremy Williams, Sr.
predicted wins: at Rice
predicted losses: at LSU, UTEP, at UCF, at SMU
predicted record: 3-9

Tulsa - Midseason MVP: QB G.J. Kinne, Soph.
predicted wins: at UTEP, SMU, East Carolina, Memphis
predicted losses: Houston, at Southern Miss
predicted record: 8-4

UTEP - Midseason MVP: RB Donald Buckram, Jr.
predicted wins: UAB, at Tulane, at Rice
predicted losses: Tulsa, at SMU, Marshall
predicted record: 5-7