Tuesday Topics

Happy election day, everybody! Hopefully, you made (or will make) your way out to the voting booths and made your voice heard in this year's races. I am lending my online duties to CM Life today to help take care of all our election coverage tonight.

But first - football.

Speaking of voting, senior quarterback Brian Brunner's up for yet another National Player of the Week award: USA Today's. He currently leads the fan voting with a considerable lead over TTU's Graham Harrell, who won the publication's award. He certainly deserves credit, too, for throwing for 474 yards against the No. 1 team in the nation. That's not easy to do, obviously.

There's a couple of topics I'd like to get to for today's update. I'll probably update again tomorrow with some more coverage on Ball State-Northern Illinois tomorrow. Hopefully I can catch the last half of that game (night class).

Without further ado...

1. Is there a quarterback controversy? This was a topic brought up prior to CMU's game at Toledo, when some speculated that junior Dan LeFevour was in danger of losing his job to Brunner, who at the time led the team to big wins over Temple and Western Michigan. A little bit of that resurfaced this week because of Brunner's monster 485-yard performance at Indiana.

I seriously doubt there is a controversy. That's nothing against Brunner - his performance was spectacular in both the Indiana and WMU games, and as I mentioned to some co-workers earlier, he really could start on most MAC squads. I've always thought he had the talent to start this football team, just never really had the chance to do it because of how well LeFevour was playing. The only thing is, LeFevour has the job, and he hasn't done a thing to lose it. He played very well against Toledo and was 10-for-11 before going down at Temple. I just think with the way Brunner is playing as of late, there's much more incentive to rest LeFevour and make sure he's 100 percent before putting him back on the field. And should LeFevour struggle in any of the next three games, I'm sure coach Butch Jones would not have a problem with giving Brunner some snaps and seeing if he can get going.

It's certainly a good problem to have, because both of those guys can command the team as well as the other. That is why they're both captains. It is uncertain who will start against NIU, and it would not surprise me if they went with LeFevour or let him rest some more.

2. How is the MAC West race shaping up? A lot of that depends on the clash between No. 16 Ball State and Northern Illinois on Wednesday night. If the Huskies lose, they're all but done. With how competitive this group of teams is, a team with one loss or fewer will emerge as the MAC West representative at Ford Field.

If you are a CMU fan, you obviously want NIU to win so the Chippewas have sole possession of the division as the only undefeated MAC team. That would make a possible NIU loss the following week a little more bearable. But a BSU win sure would not hurt, either, because that would further open the opportunity to play an undefeated, ranked Ball State team at Kelly/Shorts.

Speaking of that game, chances are the MAC West is going to depend on that game the most. Ball State's not going to lose more than one MAC game, so it's really up to Central to beat the Cardinals and hold the tiebreaker should both teams end the year on one loss.

Then there's Western Michigan, which sits at 5-1 in the MAC. This team's in a real pickle. To win outright, it needs CMU to lose twice (tiebreaker) and Ball State to lose at least once before the two teams play at the end of the year. Whether that game plays a critical role obviously depends on what happens the next couple of weeks. That's the best we can do at this point. It's so wide-open, there's no telling who will represent the MAC, even with Ball State undefeated and ranked.