For the first time in about 6 months, the KCCGD headquarters opened up the windows to let the weather in. The first signs of warm weather and great tempatures can mean only one thing. No, not the start of baseball, but the start of spring practice. The recruits are signed and the players that can practice are on the field. Start the clock, we have about 5 months to go before the start of another football season. In the meantime, check out this week’s Crib Sheet:
- Michigan head coach Rich Rodriguez was named in yet another lawsuit involving home deals. This shouldn’t affect his on the field coaching much this season. He’s still avoiding the hot seat, but if he turns out another poor performance, then these kind of lawsuits will be used as ammo against him.
- Meanwhile, the grounds crew and security detail for the Big House needs to get its act together. Someone broke into the stadium and lifted a big chunk of the ‘M’ in the middle of the field. What would you do with that? Make a jacket?
- Urban Meyer is back to Florida and is already spitting fire. He lashed out at Orlando Sentinel reporter Jeremy Fowler for reporting the comments that Deonte Thompson made about exiting quarterback Tim Tebow. It’s nice to see the fire is back so quick for Meyer, let’s hope he doesn’t drop 20-30 pounds because of it.
- Kansas coach Turner Gill is open to positions changes for the new football season and about 9 players have taken advantage of it so far. It’s time to rebuild the program and what better way to do so than with kids playing the positions they want. At least they’ll be more motivated.
- Another football player was stabbed to death. This time it’s Kendall Berry of Florida International University. This, of course, was a result of an argument and retaliation. Hopefully, they will find the guy that did it. When will players see enough of this and not get involved with off campus thugs. And a suspect has been arrested in the case.
- After much fanfare and celebration, the loved International Bowl is closing up shop. Well, there were really only around for about 4 years. The Big East team that ran over the MAC opponents will now face stiffer competition in the Yankee Bowl.
Another Monday and another mascot served up fresh for you KCCGD’ers out there. This week we come back to the Big 12 and talk about the mascots for a team that’s had quite the rocky offseason. Texas Tech’s offseason included sending a pirate of a head coach in Mike Leach to plank. Now we’ll switch from pirates to The Masked Rider and Raider Red. Both mascots serve their purpose on both sides of the mascot spectrum. They, along with new head Tommy Tubberville, must help pick up the pieces and start anew. Let’s find out where they came from and how much they can help.
Continue reading Mascot Monday: The Masked Rider and Raider Red →
So I’m just now getting back into the swing of things now that I’m back from the SXSW conference. The yearly Music/Film/Interactive conference can take a toll on your body and even though I got back Monday, I’m still feeling the effect. The drive there uses I-35 and actually hits up a couple of college towns. Big 12 wise, we sped through Oklahoma’s home in Norman and landed in Austin, the home of the Texas Longhorns. Which one is better? It’s not fair, really. The conference was in Austin and I only drove through Oklahoma. Now here’s this week’s Crib Sheet:
- Speaking of Texas, apparently they are hitting the eiquette skills as well as the plyometric skills down in Austin. If you are going to be a football dignitary, the I guess you would need to know how to flaunt elitist like chops. Do they really need to know how to hold a fork right when tearing into some ribs from the Salt Lick, however?
- Much ballyhooed recruit Bryce Brown has left the Tennessee program, due to either personal issues or the fact that Lane Kiffin left. So let the rumor mills begin again! First one out of the gate: Bryce’s brother left Miami and is heading the K-State. So that means there may be a chance Bryce will come play for Bill Snyder 2.0 and the Wildcats. I hope the second round of hype around Bryce is faster.
- Weakened and ill coach Urban Meyer returned to the Florida Gators and practice last week. If you remember he quit the team due to health reasons but then came back when he realized that he could get better. Or at least put on some poundage. This year will be a nice off year for Meyer so he can reload next year, both on football and his health.
- Just like when baseball’s Chicago Cubs shocked everyone and had its first ever night game a decade or two ago, now the Big House in Michigan will be doing the same. What better way to do so than against the Notre Dame Fighthing Irish? This should be a close game, with a new coach on one side and another almost on the hot seat.
- Nick Saban is your first ever Bobby Bowden national collegiate coach of the year. The Over the Mountain Touchdown Club is in Bowden’s home town of Birmingham, Alabama. Not much surprise here. The coach that wins the national title for the school in the home state of the award title’s name. Zlam Dunk.
- Expansion or not, the Pac 10 may be looking into instituting a conference title game. Commissioner Larry Scott mentioned that when going over all expansion possibilities with CBS Sports. There’s an NCAA rule that states you need to have 12 teams to have a conference title game. So if they do want to do it without expansion, then they need to change that rule.
In continuing with our homage to March Madness Mascots, this week’s entrant supports a team that recently ran over the the Duke Blue Devils. This blog is all about football, but we’re not so naive enough to wonder what that accomplishments. So in reward for achieving that impressive feat, we are going to be looking at the University of Maryland’s Testudo. We’ll take a look at the bronze buddy and the fabric counterpart in this trip down mascot lane. We’ll find out first and foremost, just what the hell a Testudo is along the way. So poke your head out for Testudo!
Continue reading Mascot Monday: Testudo →
Hey, I trucked down to SXSW here in Longhorn Country and Austin, Texas. So who would’ve thunk that we would actually be diligent enough to post another Crib Sheet? Well, we did. Here’s this week’s shortened Crib Sheet:
It’s March Madness and we like to see some of the big time basketball programs represented here on Mascot Monday. So needless to say, this week’s entry is doing pretty darn well. What makes it even more interesting is that the football team was considered the worst ever until recently. The Temple Owls are slowly coming back to prominence in sports. Their mascot, Hooter T. Owl, flaps along with them at every step. So sit right back, burn some midnight oil, and stay up late to the hoots and tweets of Hooter T. Owl and Mascot Monday.
Continue reading Mascot Monday: Hooter T. Owl →
Okay it’s not as exciting as signing day or the first day of summer practice, but it’s enough to get us here at the KCCGD excied for some more college football! This week’s Crib Sheet dives into cracks and pulls up some loose change and football news. It doesn’t matter, it’s great to see the kids on the field getting ready for another season. We’re saving the change for stadium popcorn. On to the Crib Sheet:
- We’re heard stories about college players getting arrested for drug and/or alcohol related crimes, but we haven’t heard the story about other players removing student newspapers that feature such crimes on the front page. Welp, it happened in Texas and the coach is backing his players for the removal. Is it suppression of free speech? Or is it a team rallying together? We don’t know, but we do that a campus full of students walked into class that morning without a crossword puzzle to distract them and that’s just wrong. At any rate, the coach later apologized.
- Dan Beebe told everyone to chill about the permanent championship homes for the Big 12. At least not until June. It looks as though the rumor was Football in Jerryville, Baseball in OKC, and Basketball at the Sprint Center in KC. Maybe he’s holding out for more money from Jerry Jones, but my guess is that the Big 12 can get more from each city in the Big 12 area when putting the location up for grabs each year.
- The Notre Dame athletic director, Jack Swarbrick, let slip the possibility that the Fighting Irish may have to join a conference and lose its independence if expansion happens all around them. This could be a bad thing for the Irish and a great thing for the conference that nabs them.
- Coaches in Texas and Maryland get a one year reprieve from the new rule that limits successors in waiting to recruit for the team. The gates are open, boys, take as much as you can before the clock runs out!
- Speaking of Notre Dame and Maryland, they will be playing each other at FedEx field in 2011. The Notre Dame Fighting Irish will be the home team. Huh? FedEx field is IN Maryland. Okay now we see why this independence is going away for the Irish. That’s just ridiculous.
- President Barack Obama honored the Alabama Crimson Tide at the White House this week for winning the BCS National Championship. It must be be tough for a Big 10 guy to honor an SEC team, but hey, he’s a politician and he rolls with the tide.
http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=4980678&campaign=rss&source=NCFHeadlines
We’re gearing up for a road trip this week. If you are down in the Austin, Texas area for SXSW for the next 2 weeks, be sure to drop us a line. The contrast between the home of the Texas Longhorns and the leader Big 12 South versus Kansas City and the epicenter of the Big 12 North should give us plenty of fodder to chew on for the next couple of weeks. We’re taking no breaks, however, and this week’s Mascot Monday also gives us a good contrast between a good mascot and a bad one. Now, we’ve seen some non-plussed mascots before but we think YoUDee from the University of Delaware takes the cake. So come with us on the journey to find out about this blue hen.
Continue reading Mascot Monday: YoUDee →
Most of the news of the week for college football revolved around the NFL Combine. We will not talk about the NFL Combine for this week’s Crib Sheet. All of those stories revolve around kids entering the NFL. We like to talk about what’s coming up for next year’s college football season. It was hard to find some related items, but we juiced the news fruit hard and got some drops of tasty college football to pour down your throat. So open wide, here comes the Crib Sheet:
- So we told you last week that Colonel Reb is gone and they started a new search for a mascot at Ole Miss. Welp, this week the students are putting their name down for another rebel. Admiral Ackbar. Yes, that’s right, the leader of the Rebel Alliance from the Star Wars universe is the leading candidate for the kids. It’s a trap!
- Texas and Boise State are getting together. Not to play, but to talk shop! Apparently Mack Brown wants to try some trick plays to mix things up. We’re not sure what Boise State is getting in return.
- Boise State has another run for their money. The Broncos are known for have a blue turf field, but now Eastern Washington will have a red turf field. No matter what it’s called, we sure many a headache will crop up around the nation when they watch their games on television. Also, if some one has a Broncos game on one TV and an Eastern Washington game on the other in the same room, can you watch it in 3D with the proper glasses?
- Texas head coach Mack Brown’s mom lost a battle to cancer. Our condolences goes out to Mack Brown and all involved.
- Nebraska’s Jacob Hickman will not play in NFL. Not because he’s not good, but because he has no desire for a professional football career. We always get the upside of going to the NFL but we rarely see why some players opt out of the NFL.
- We here at the KCCGD Headquarters want to welcome David Ubben as the new Big 12 Blogger for ESPN. We look forward to catching up on his posts as they roll in throughout the year.
It’s been awhile since we’ve done a live mascot so it’s refreshing to see one perched up and proud way down south in College Station, Texas. Yes, where most of us are familiar with Texas A&M’s marching band. But how many of you out there are familiar with Texas A&M’s live mascot Reveille? Now she could be mistaken for TV’s Lassie but we know better. Come with us on a mascot journey that takes up through the ranks of the military and back down to the deep heart of Texas. Wake up, it’s Reveille.
Continue reading Mascot Monday: Reveille →
College Sports, Kansas City style
