Michigan vs. Notre Dame Game to Make History in Week 2 of the 2011 Football Season

By Cabrone D. Brewer
Traditionally speaking, college football’s second week is monotonous. Many teams in the Associated Press Top 25 simply choose to rest and repair from strenuous summer two-a-days or play watered-down opponents to slide into the next week unscathed. But a couple of marque matches usually tend to find their way to the field — and this week is no exception.
With top-ranked Oklahoma taking the week off to prepare for a September 17 showdown with #5 Florida State and newly crowned #2 LSU playing in a sleeper against Northwestern State, recently leap-frogged #3 Alabama is left to search for more believers in the heart of Happy Valley. Taking on #23 Penn State in the second game of Joe Paterno’s 45th year, Alabama seeks to recover some of the ground they lost in the polls to LSU in always rowdy State College, PA.

Primetime players get ready. For the first time in history, Michigan will turn on the stadium lights for an epic battle with Notre Dame at the Big House. Fresh off a stunning defeat at the hands of South Florida, the Irish travel to Ann Arbor with an unsettling loss hanging over their heads as Michigan looks to play its first full-game of the season after last week’s lightning-shortened rout of Western Michigan.
In a rematch of last year’s Alamo Bowl, Arizona looks to exact revenge in Stillwater as the Wildcats go to war with 27-year-old quarterback Brandon Weeden and #9 Oklahoma State. The Cowboys return most of their offensive firepower from a team that rocked Mike Stoops’ squad 36-10 at the end of last season, making this one quite the uphill battle for Stoops and company.
A few other notable games scheduled this week: Head Coach Steve Spurrier leads #12 South Carolina and quarterback Stephen Garcia into Athens for an early SEC match against Georgia; #24 Texas, who started the season unranked for the first time since 1998, takes on a tough BYU side in Austin; Newcomers Colorado and Utah open Pac-12 conference play with Cal taking a trip to the mountains in Boulder and Utah battling it out in the Coliseum against USC; and #25 TCU looks to rebound from their opening weekend loss against Air Force.
As the season continues to gain momentum, continue to check our blog for more coverage.