Ten Teams That May Surprise in the 2010 College Football Season

The 2009 college football season had its share of surprises and upsets. This season won't be any different than the last.

We all know about the defending champion Alabama Crimson Tide, about schools like USC, Oregon, Oklahoma, Ohio State and a cast of others that will do exactly what we expect them to do.

But who will those surprise teams be in 2010?

Who are those teams that will step up into the lime light and do what no one expected?

The following list is my top ten teams that will surprise, shock, and do the unexpected during the 2010 college football season.

Stanford Cardinal

The 2010 Stanford Cardinal will be without All-American running back Toby Gerhart and they don't really have a leading candidate to replace the fan favorite. Stepfan Taylor, the backup to Gerhart last season, and Tyler Gaffney will most likely share time unless one impresses the coaching staff enough to win the job outright.

They return eight starters on offense, including quarterback Andrew Luck, who had 2,575 passing yards and 13 touchdowns in 2009.

Defensively the Cardinal return seven starters but are lacking at linebacker and that could play a huge role in their 2010 season.

Stanford won't have any time to rest on their laurels as they have a heavy first half of their schedule with games against Wake Forest, UCLA, USC, Notre Dame, and Oregon all in the first six weeks of their schedule.

In 2009, Stanford won four of those five games with the exception to a seven point road loss to Wake Forest 24-17 in the second week of the season.

Stanford could easily win five of those first six games and be well on their way to challenging Oregon for the Pac-10 crown.

Houston Cougars

Though it wasn't the start Houston and head coach Kevin Sumlin wanted, their recruiting class and the 2010 season shows a lot of promise for the future.

According to The Associated Press, Sumlin dismissed freshman kick returner A.J. Dugat and sophomore offensive lineman Ari Tatum for reasons only known to him and the rest of the team.

Houston will have their starting quarterback, Case Keenum, back for his senior season after a 2009 season saw him throw for 5,671 yards and 44 touchdowns.

Unfortunately for Keenum and the Cougars, the season finished on a low note as they dropped their final two games to East Carolina in the conference championship game and Air Force in the Armed Forces Bowl.

Though the Cougars have one of the most prolific offenses in the nation, it's their defense that needs a lot of work. The Cougar defense ranked 111th in the nation giving up 442.7 yards per game.

Coach Sumlin may have given that defense a boost by signing defensive tackle Matangi Tonga and linebacker Sammy Brown, who was ranked the number two junior college outside linebacker in the nation. Both are junior college transfers.

Tennessee Volunteers

When Derek Dooley was hired by Tennessee, a lot of fans said the same thing I did: Who?

Dooley wasn't Tennessee's first choice, but he seems to have worked out just fine.

After the departure of Lane Kiffin, Dooley hit the ground running and was able to put together a top ten recruiting class when it was all said and done.

One of the players he was able to land was wide receiver Da’Rick Rogers, who was ranked as a top ten player nationally.

Rogers looked like he was headed to Georgia, but Dooley came in and Rogers felt like he could be better groomed at Tennessee, eventually signing with the 'Vols on signing day.

Tenneesee's 2010 schedule has them playing seven of their 12 games at home, including games against Oregon, Florida, and defending national champion Alabama.

Texas Longhorns

After a 13-1 season, you wouldn't think Texas would be picked to be a surprise team in 2010.

But after losing quarterback Colt McCoy, linebacker Roddrick Muckelroy, their best defensive lineman Lamarr Houston, and safety Earl Thomas, Texas definitely has some holes they need to fill during spring practice.

Texas, unfortunately, got a glimpse of their future at quarterback a little earlier than they anticipated. True freshman Garrett Gilbert replaced Colt McCoy after McCoy went down with a shoulder injury in the first quarter of the BCS National Championship Game against Alabama.

Though Gilbert looked like a deer in the headlights in the first half, his poise in the second half made a lot of Texas fans sit up and take notice of a quarterback that Mack Brown is already calling "very good."

Two prospects that could fill needs right off the bat on defense are linebacker Jordan Hicks, named the best linebacker prospect in the nation as well as the 16th best overall, and defensive end Jackson Jeffcoat, who chose Texas over Houston where his father is an assistant.

The Longhorns could be set up for another run at the BCS, playing eight of their 12 games at home, including games against Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, and Texas A&M.

SMU Mustangs

When was the last time you ever thought a list like this would include the SMU Mustangs?

In June Jones' first year at the helm, he not only took SMU to their first bowl game in 25 years, but they beat a good Nevada team convincingly.

Fast forward to 2010 and SMU is the talk of the college football world. Well, not exactly, but Jones and company are getting high praise for their recruiting class.

Jeremy Crabtree of Rivals.com told Yahoo Sports, "SMU is definitely back. Ignore where the Ponies are ranked in the Rivals.com team rankings, because even though SMU is ranked in the 70s, this class is honestly much better than that.”

If that wasn't high enough praise, Jones himself said, "I haven’t had a class like this in any of my 10 years in college football.”

That's a high compliment especially knowing the kind of players he brought in while head coach at Hawaii.

Freshman Kyle Padron will most likely be the starter at quarterback when the 2010 season opens. The same Kyle Padron that tore up Nevada in the Hawaii Bowl for 460 yards and two touchdowns en route to a 45-10 beatdown of the Wolf Pack.

Notre Dame Fighting Irish

Brian Kelly didn't have a lot of time to put together his first recruiting class at Notre Dame, but did do an adequate job with the time he did have.

What Notre Dame will have to deal with is the losses of quarterback Jimmy Clausen and wide receiver Golden Tate, as well as offensive linemen Eric Olsen and Sam Young.

Replacing Clausen at quarterback will be Dayne Crist, who is coming off ACL surgery but Kelly says he should be ready to go for spring practice. Crist is hoping he'll have Michael Floyd as his version of Golden Tate, but after Floyd was cited for underage drinking in an incident in his home state of Minnesota, his future will depend on the university's decision.

Coach Kelly told ESPN.com, "I've had a chance to sit down with Michael. We reinforced to him that making good choices is going to be paramount to his success in this football program."

Though most of their defensive unit will return for the 2010 season, they will lose safety Kyle McCarthy who posted triple digit tackles in each of his last two seasons.

It's a defensive unit that needs a lot of help to stop the run, giving up 170.3 yards per game, including giving up a combined 1,052 rushing yards to Stanford, Pitt, UConn, and Navy, all of which had a strong rushing attack.

The Irish have a favorable, though not easy, schedule in 2010, playing eight of their 12 games at home. Though a few of those games include teams like USC, Michigan, Purdue, and Stanford, so Kelly's first season won't be a cake walk.

Michigan Wolverines

It hasn't been the easiest tenure in coaching history but Rich Rodriguez is hoping to put the losing seasons (and the NCAA investigation) behind him and focus on the 2010 football season.

The Wolverines needed a lot of help defensively after a 2009 season saw them give up 27.5 points per game 393.3 yards per game, including 171.9 rushing yards per game (second to last in the Big Ten).

So Rodriguez and his staff tried to fill those positions on the recruiting trail signing 27 recruits, 17 of which were on the defensive side of the ball.

Tate Forcier will be going into his sophomore season, giving him more experience, especially having been the Michigan starter as a true freshman.

Though he didn't have the greatest season, throwing for 2,050 yards and 13 touchdowns, he'll have a better understanding of the playbook and better poise in his second season.

Where Michigan also needs to improve is on their running game. Their leading rusher, senior Brandon Minor, ran for just 502 yards last season averaging just 55.8 yards per game.

The Wolverines are hoping they plugged that hole with running back Stephen Hopkins, who ran for a combined 5,010 yards and 61 touchdowns through his final three high school seasons.

Auburn Tigers

Going into coach Chizik's second year at the helm of the Auburn Tigers, his 2010 recruiting class turned out to be in the top five including ten four-star recruits.

Auburn loses six starters from last year's squad including quarterback Chris Todd and running back Ben Tate, two players that Chizik and company will try hard to replace.

One of the recruits that could plug the quarterback hole is Cameron Newton, a junior college recruit from Binn Community College. A name some might be familiar with, as he was Tim Tebow's backup for two seasons before being kicked off the team after burglary allegations surfaced in 2008.

Newton transferred and led Binn to the Junior College National Championship in 2009. He threw for 2,833 yards and 22 touchdowns, as well as adding 655 yards and 16 touchdowns on the ground.

As far as replacing running back Ben Tate, Auburn will look to incoming recruit Michael Dyer, a five-star recruit from Little Rock, AR who broke almost every state rushing record in 2009.

The offensive line should be a strength for Auburn as they return four seniors who have at least two years of playing experience.

Where the Tigers need to improve is on defense, coming in dead last in the SEC in points per game allowed (26.9) and tenth in rushing defense (161.7 ypg).

Washington Huskies

Can anyone remember the last time a Washington recruiting class had 30 commitments? Neither could anyone else, including head coach Steve Sarkisian.

Not only that, but no one could remember the last time Wahington beat out both Michigan and USC for a recruit, but that also happened. Saftey Sean Parker, from Harbor City, CA, picked Washington over the Wolverines and Trojans on signing day.

The Huskies return 18 starters from last season, including quarterback Jake Locker and tailback Chris Polk, who will miss spring practice after undergoing shoulder surgery.

There's no question that this Huskies squad can put up points, averaging almost 30 a game (26.1), but defensively they're second to last in the Pac-10 in points per game allowed (26.7) and rushing yards per game allowed (148.8).

This Washington team has already shown improvement from 2008 to 2009. After not winning a single game in 2008 (0-12), the Huskies finished 5-7 last season. A drastic improvement to some, but enough of an improvement to know there are great things to come for this squad.

Texas A&M Aggies

The Aggies and head coach Mike Sherman had an impressive 15th ranked recruiting class, even though they lost out on both linebacker Corey Nelson and wide receiver Jarrett Fobbs.

Nelson changed his commit from A&M to Oklahoma while Fobbs decided on LSU at the last minute.

Although the Aggies would have liked to have both of those commits, they will still have players that fit their system.

Going in to the 2010 season, the Aggies will return eight starters from last season's 105th ranked defense, a defense that will change to the 3-4 next season. Sherman says this team can compete better in the Big XII with this style of defense.

Heading up that project is new defensive coordinator Tim DeRuyter who has a track record of success at Ohio, Nevada, and Air Force. He'll have a big task on his hands to fix a defense that ranked dead last in the Big XII, giving up 431.3 yards per game and 32.7 points per game.

Returning to the offense is quarterback Jerrod Johnson, who led the conference's best offense in 2009 with 465.3 yards per game and averaged over 30 points per game (33.9).

Johnson has shown drastic improvement from 2008 to 2009, increasing his touchdown totals from 21 in 2008 to 30 in 2009 as well as cutting down his interceptions from 10 in 2008 to just eight last season.

He finished the 2009 season with 3,579 passing yards and added 506 rushing yards, combining for 38 total touchdowns by season's end.