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Emerald Bowl

Maryland vs. Oregon State

San Fransico, CA

December 28, 2007

8:30 PM                                                                                        

“Dez Nuts!”

                                                            -Bob W.                                             

THE INTRO: 

First of all, about the picture, before I get a bunch of letters (sometimes I like to pretend I have fans) reminding me that the Emerald Bowl is about Almonds and not jewels, I already know.  But do they even have Emerald Nuts on the East Coast?  I’m not really sure, but the first thing I think of with the Emerald Bowl is the green rocks.  So that’s what I’m going with.

But enough about that.  We are in a Bowl Game!!  Now granted, being excited about that is not exactly setting the bar high when over half of D I teams make some type of bowl, but this year was tough.  The injuries the suspensions, the heart breaking losses and the head scratching wins.  It was quite the roller coaster, and considering what we lost in the winter of 2006-2007 and the injuries that started on August 6^th, 6-6 is quite an accomplishment. 

So that brings us to San Francisco where we will meet up with the Oregon State Beavers (oh crap, I just remembered, I have to work on a bowl preview as well, I think I did that last year for Purdue, so I’d better do it again).  Oregon State, to put it mildly isn’t as happy as we are to be in the Emerald Bowl, and I can’t say I blame them.  If you finish 8-4, you generally expect to go to a higher bowl (I think it was the Sun bowl they wanted, I’m not sure where the hell that even is, but I’m guessing somewhere further south than San Francisco).  So either one of two things is going to happen on December 28^th; one OSU will be so pissed that they will come out with something to prove, or two, they will not be prepared and get rolled.  Just like Tennessee in the 2003 Peach Bowl, which ranks as my all time favorite Maryland memory, even if I DID get engaged that weekend (I kid cause I love!). 

Well before I use up all my bowl preview material, I guess I’d better get on to the weather.  As anyone who has ever had a conversation with me knows, I am really excited to be doing a forecast for somewhere other than the East Coast.  I love the East Coast, but the weather is, well the same weather we’ve been having since I was born, but out West, now that’s something different.  Do you know in Los Angles they have ski resorts in the same county as beaches?  Can you imagine?  The west coast weather is so variable unlike Maryland, where if it’s hot in Ocean City, I’m pretty sure it’s hot in Denton, Baltimore, Frederick, and Cumberland, though Cumberland will probably be a few degrees cooler, but you get the point. 

Now on to San Francisco, they are famous for the fog rolling off the Pacific.  They are pretty much at the same latitude as us, but the difference is that their weather is influenced by the Pacific Ocean.  Going back to Weather 101, water heats and cools more slowly than land, so therefore in the summer the air above the Pacific is cooler than it is on land, and in the winter the air above the Pacific is warmer than the air on land.  Since weather in the US moves generally from west to east, it keeps San Francisco rather mild. Now that is a rather elementary simplification of the process, but it’s a quick and easy way to explain why San Francisco is warmer than us in the winter, but colder than us in the summer. 

On the east coast only rarely, like hurricanes or other coastal storms, does the Atlantic affect our weather, you usually see it during a coastal winter storm where the warm air over the ocean fights the cool air over land and you can see a rain snow line running parallel to the coast.  That explains why it may rain in say Elkton, Maryland, but in Elkton, Virigina (near JMU) it will be snow.  But again this may be a bit over simplifying things, since elevation also plays a part, but you get the idea.

Well I’d better just move on, this is getting pretty boring, pretty quick. It’s time for the BOWL FORECAST!!!!

THE HISTORY:

Here we go, the history for San Francisco is pretty boring really.  The average high is 55 F and the average low is 42 F.  Now granted that is probably warmer than College Park for this time of the year, but seriously, is there much difference between highs in the upper 30’s and highs in the mid 50’s?  In both scenarios you’re still going to be wearing a jacket. 

The record high for San Francisco is 71 which occurred in 1967 (all those hippies must have been sweating) and the record low is 29 which happened back in 1930.  As you can see the difference between the historical high and historical low is only 42.  In most of the country on some extreme days you can probably see a degree difference that big in one day.  The small margin between highs and lows is another characteristic of the Mediterranean Climate with which SF is a part of.  Though it is probably nice to not fry in the summer and freeze in the winter, this Mid Atlantic kid likes his summers with elderly killing heat, and winters with homeless freezing cold.  It keeps things interesting. 

THE FORECAST:

Well good news from the Almanac.  It looks like there will be stormy weather in the bay area, but it should all clear out prior to the game.  The actual game day weather they are calling for is for fair weather.  Now here is usually where I mix in my own experience and gut feelings to adjust the forecast, but I have to admit, I have no idea on this one, so we are going to play it close to the averages and go from there.  So here we go:

The forecast for the December 28^th “Emerald Bowl” (I didn’t even have to make up a name this week!) is looking at some cool, but overall pleasant weather.  The high should be in the mid 50’s, we’ll say 54, and the low should be in the lower 40’s.  We’ll say 43.  It will be a night game, even though the kick off will only be 5:30 local, so game time temps should drop down into the upper 40’s possibly.  The winds, gosh I don’t know, is it usually windy in San Francisco?  I guess I’ll say they will be a little on the breezy side with 5-10 mph, and the sky will be mostly sunny and clear.  No chance of precipitation for this one.  So overall I’m saying High 54, Low 43, mostly sunny, with just a slight breeze.  To put this into perspective, this is almost the exact same forecast I did for the NC State game. 

And just like the NC State game, you may want to keep a hat and some gloves handy.  You may need them, you may not, but I am putting the hat and gloves warning at code YELLOW. 

The game day sunrise for San Francisco on December 28, 2007 is 7:23 AM.  The sunset should be around 4:58 PM. 

As for the moon, it will be a waning gibbous at 90% full.  It will set at 10:42 AM, and then rise again at 10:23 PM.  I guess neither the sun nor the moon are very interested in watching this one. 

THE EARTHQUAKE REPORT:

I think it is safe to say that we aren’t going to have any snow or Hurricanes for the Emerald Bowl, but I can’t just leave this space blank.  So in order to fill up some more room, I am going to debut the first ever Earthquake Report!  Now I don’t want to cause any panic, but I looked up San Francisco Earthquakes and found that they had 30 in the bay area between the time of 12-08 and 12-10!  Of course I don’t think you can feel any of them, but still, not something I want to think about.  So I guess there is actually a pretty good chance of getting an earthquake while you’re out there, but he chances of feeling it are pretty low.  So for our earthquake meter, I’m going with a 5.  Should be fine, but don’t let your guard down, after all you are in California. 

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THE X-FACTOR: 

Just to show you some extremes that could happen and have happened on this particular date in weather history. 

• 1839 - The third storm in two weeks hit the northeastern U.S. It brought two more feet of snow to Hartford, CT, and Worcester, MA. Whole gales swept the coast causing many wrecks. (David Ludlum)
• 1897 - The temperature at Dayville, OR, hit 81 degrees to establish a state record for December. (The Weather Channel)
• 1924 - Iowa experienced it coldest December morning of record. Morning lows averaged 25 degrees below zero for the 104 weather stations across the state.
• 1955 - Anchorage, AK, was buried under 17.7 inches of snow in 24 hours, a record for that location. (28th-29th) (The Weather Channel)
• 1958 - Albuquerque, NM, received 14.2 inches of snow to establish a 24 hour record. (28th-29th) (The Weather Channel)
• 1987 - A winter storm produced heavy snow in the Upper Mississippi Valley and the Upper Great Lakes Region. Up to twenty inches of snow buried southern Minnesota, and 20 to 40 mph northwesterly winds produced snow drifts six feet high, and reduced visibilities to near zero at times in blowing snow. There were a thousand traffic accidents in Michigan during the storm, resulting in thirty-five injuries. (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data)
• 1988 - Strong winds behind a cold front claimed three lives in eastern Pennsylvania, and injured a dozen others in eastern Pennsylvania, southern New Jersey and Maryland. Winds gusted to 87 mph at Hammonton NJ and in the Washington D.C. area. (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data)
• 1989 - Squalls continued to bring snow to the Great Lakes Region, with heavy snow reported near Lake Superior and Lake Ontario. Syracuse NY received 8.5 inches of snow to push the total for the month past their previous December record of 57 inches. (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data)
• 2003 - A severe snow storm hit northern California and southern Oregon. As much as 2 feet of snow fell along Interstate 5 closing a 150-mile stretch of the interstate, stranding hundreds of travelers. Winds from the storm caused power outages to more than 200,000 customers in California and Oregon. One man died of a heart attack after helping other drivers. (CNN)
• 2004 - Los Angeles (downtown) broke a daily rainfall record for the month of December (5.55 inches). This was the third wettest calendar day in Los Angeles since records began in 1877.

***This is a disclaimer to remove all responsibility on myself if this forecast is wrong.  Being that it is very difficult to predict the weather greater than 48 hours in advance, the odds of needing this disclaimer are about 100%.  However I do believe this forecast will be pretty close to what we can actually look to expect.