So last night’s Insight Bowl happened. I’m still sleepy from the late running game. Iowa held off Missouri for a 27-24 victory, with the biggest play in the game going to Blaine Gabbertt tossing a pick six in the 4th quarter to give Iowa the game. Later on there was controversial overturn to receiver T.J. Moe on 4th and 6. Really, the story of the game was a Tiger defense that let a 3rd string running back set an Iowa bowl record for rushing yards. Missouri’s offense chugged along fine except for a few mistakes. Overall, the team looked way less into than Iowa and I think the fight in the heart of the Hawkeyes made the score that we see today. Now let’s check out the bowl edition of the Crib Sheet:
Now that the whole Heisman thing is over, the AP is now okay with naming Auburn’s Cam Newton Player of the Year. WIll these awards be revoked in the next couple of years? Tune in and find out.
So you know how Mark Cuban’s flirting with college football? It turns out that a college football playoff system is actually patented. Now don’t get me started on how ridiculous the patent system is, but what I can tell you is that a patent on the college football playoff system just goes to show that we will never see a college playoff. The wolves will come out and tear everything up if they go this way. Again, it’s a case of doing nothing with the current system being the best course to route.
Here we are in the middle of bowl season. I got some good gear for Xmas and I hope you got some too. The bowl action was light in the last week, but we are now ramping up into the meat of the schedule. Most of the Big 12 schools will be playing this week and there will be ample action in between. Meanwhile, I Bowl Pick It and Stick It standings are out are some peeps jumping out of the gate quick. Let’s look at that first:
Yes, it’s the 2010 edition and first ever annual KC College GameDay Year End Reviewards! What’s a revieward? Welp, it’s a half assed attempt to round up the year in review and then dole out some nameless awards out to who or what I think mattered in the year of college football. It applies to the regular season only as I really don’t want to come back to this. At any rate, I’m shooting from the hip so all you midgets our there better watch your heads.
Another regular season over and another bowl season is set. I like the matchups for the Big 12 this year. Yes, no two teams are in BCS bowls but there is a chunky 8 teams going bowling. I don’t want to hear the yipping from Missouri fans this year as their game against Iowa is way bigger than the game Nebraska has against Washington. Kansas State’s in the first ever Pinstripe Bowl against Syracuse. That should be a fun one too. We have the Army vs Navy game and then the week after is all bowls. Right now, it’s the Crib Sheet:
I was ignoring it but, but now I can’t help but comment on the Miami coaching situation. Randy Shannon was canned and a couple of candidates have cropped up. That’s not exciting. What IS exciting is that Donald Trump wrote a letter to Miami to hire Mike Leach. The U might just become pirates.
Beano Cook is the 2011 recipient of the 38th Bert McGrane Award, which I guess goes to football sports writers each year. I listen to him on the ESPN College Football Podcast each week and has quickly become one of my favorite sports media personalities. Congrats to him too.
Cam Newton is cleared of any allegations by the NCAA. Looks like his dad can’t hang around the program now, though. It looks like the sabotage job by Mississippi State didn’t work too well. I’m now pegging Auburn as the favorite to win the BCS title game.
I didn’t pay attention to the RichRod situation at Michigan until now. He’s crying again and this time it’s about how happy he is being the head coach for the Wolverines. I ignored the talk before because I thought he was pretty much safe, but this latest crying makes me wonder if he’s in trouble. He may be.
It’s one thing when an undefeated non-AQ conference team doesn’t make a BCS Bowl, but it’s another when a 6-6 AQ conference team like Arizona State gets denied a bowl appearance. I thought the slots were so abundant this year that there might have been a 5-7 team in a bowl? Oh well, it looks like they needed one more game.
The site for a new College Football Hall of Fame will be by Olympic Park in Atlanta, Georgia. It will open around March of 2013. Make plans now!
The Cincinnati Bearcat was citied for starting a snowball fight during the Pitt game last Saturday. It’s a good thing they had a backup mascot ready for the rest of the game.
The Bowls are set! Here’s the Big 12 version. I wonder how many Missouri Tigers fans will complain. Oh I know Nebraska fans will, but they are gone after this game so their voice is a little quieter.
Rob Long of Syracuse has a benign brain tumor and will undergo surgery. He will not play the Pinstripe Bowl. As being someone who’s had someone close go through the same thing, all I can say is that my thoughts and prayers go out to him and his family.
You know, I wanted to talk about something going on in college football, but I just can’t put my finger on it. It’s on the tipe of my tongue and it’s some other cliched phrase as well. Oh well, if I remember it, I will talk about it later. We have some Pick It and Stick It to go over. The polls had some changes at the top but the BCS didn’t really chamge much. In the pick league, the top pretty much stayed the same as well. Let’s look at the standings:
Chilly times are ahead folks and its time to wrap yourself up into some nice and tasty picks. This week sees some hot action on the cold, cold fields of Lincoln, Nebraska. Will Missouri continue to roll or be tripped up by the scrappy Cornhuskers? No matter, we’ll be staying warm the best way we know. Hot chocolate helps. So does coffee or fried mac n’ cheese wedges. I’ll probably have all this Saturday. Grab your favorite warm-upper and check out the picks for the week. Remember, he colder and longer the season goes, the harder the picks get.
Another Friday and another day after for me and some Stadiumspotting. Last week didn’t go to well for me but this week was the complete opposite. The college football season is full of ups and downs and it can change every week. With this weekend, we will be about halfway through the football season. The time is running down for more great games and for even more great picks. The field’s thinning at the top and the clock is starting to run down. Let’s go over this week’s Pick It and Stick It to see how the downs can turn into ups:
Welp, Armageddon has come. Nebraska is going to the Big 10. After the speculation, the rumors, and the threat of the Big 12 South going to the Pac 10, we have our first major move in the modern era of expansion. The Big 12 meetings last week provided some ultimatums and some wishy-washy talk. Now it looks as though Friday is the day for the official announcement from the Cornhuskers. After that, it seems the Big 12 South, sans Baylor and including Colorado, will be going to the Pac 10. The rest of the teams, well, they are left behind. Kansas City will become a ghost of a sports town. Besides all of this depressing talk, there was other news this week. Here’s the Crib Sheet:
The SEC and its head coaches laughed off any expansion talk during their meetings last week. You know it seems they have been the quietest in all of this. Will they invite anyone else? They’ve won 7 BCS Championships so I guess they won’t have to.
Boise State is left at the altar while the Mountain West sees what the fallout will be from the expansion bonanza. This won’t be cleared up for a while and the Broncos will just have to wait it out.
The current UGA is too young to be on the field and that’s the delima Georgia has going into this year. The sudden death of the last UGA means that the next-in-blood-line gets called up to the majors early. Will they stand the young pup up or will they opt for a veteran replacement?
So who all will fit in the glass slipper that the Big 10 is dangling out in front of the college football landscape? In our series, we talked about how the traditional Big 10 aims to scratch their expansion itch and what could happen to every conference around them when they do. Today we look at the candidates either actively or inactively campaigning to be ones who get the golden ticket of an invite. There are oddball choices as well as solid, sensible choices in this competition. Not all will be covered, but we’ll see the ones that matter. Then after that, the swimsuit competition! On with the show!
This week we will take another look at a potential power pill to the Big Ten’s Pac-Manning of college football in the Pittsburgh Panthers. This Big East team has been linked to a rivalry with Penn State and generally fits well with other potential teams like Syracuse and Notre Dame. So how does ‘Roc’ the Panther stand up to mascot standards? We’ll find that out as well as where this guy came from and why he’s the ‘Roc’. So kick back and see if Roc rocks our world if, much like Sex Panther Cologne, he works 60% of time every time.
This week’s mascot trip takes us up to the snow blizzard Big East and a school traditional known as a basketball powerhouse. For Syracuse Orangemen, they keep their spirits warm with Otto the Orange. The bouncy ball fellow seems more home in Florida, but the students and faculty adopted this fellow after a bit of controversy. Today, Otto works the sidelines of the games in using his juicy disposition. The help us grab the peelers as we begin pull the rind off Otto and see what makes him tick.
After a well deserved week off, we are back to bringing you some tasty college football. Alot happened during our mini hiatus so we are playing catch up with the Crib Sheet. We have alot to get to here with the start of bowl season this weekend. Tune in soon for a couple of year end reviews, bowl picks, and some bowlspots. Until then, here’s a very chunky Crib Sheet:
Alabama took the high road when it announced that they will cancel classes for the BCS National Championship. That’s nice for football fans, but the last time I remembered there are people who actually don’t like football AND go to college. It seems kinda chintzy to lob off classes for everyone during the bowl game. Then again, this is South and it is football.
Congress will crack the whip on the BCS soon and vote on a bill to ban promotion of the NCAA division I football series unless they get a playoff. The argument against it is that they have better things to do (health care bill, anyone). The argument for it is that the NCAA is a business and they should treat the conferences like companies in an industry. Problem with that one is that then the argument will come up that the students should get paid then (on top of free college). The slippery slope just got some juice.
Charlie Strong is you new Lousiville head coach. This guy was rumored for the Kansas job, but right now the hot note is Buffalo’s Turner Gill. Anywho, back to Strong. This guy was co-defensive coordinator for Florida and looks to be a real good hire. Good luck to Cardinals.
Tennessee confirms that there is an investigation into their Orange Pride group and possible recruiting violations. Basically, the Orange Pride comprises mostly of very attractive Volunteer females that drive around and persuade recruits to join the program. They would even friend them on Facebook. Did they break any rules? Who knows? This has been going on for a long time, however. The power of gender persuasion is a might force, my friends.
Stanford head coach Jim Harbaugh hired his dad Jack to be interim running backs coach for the Sun Bowl. It’s nice to see that the Harbaughs like to keep in the family. His dad won some titles in Division II and his brother John just happens to the head coach of the NFL’s Baltimore Ravens.
Notre Dame took the plunge and finally hired a head coach. His name? Cincinnati’s Brian Kelly. It’s a good fit for the Domers. They guy won the Big East the last two years and has won at least 10 games the last three. Let’s hope the boosters expectations aren’t too high this time around, otherwise we’ll be seeing this dance again in three years.
Mack Brown from Texas is getting an extra $2 million per year on the rest of his contract for doing such a great job. The guy now will make about $5 million per year. Meanwhile, an Iowa senator complains that coaches are being paid too much. Nevermind that Texas brings in about $100 million a year via the athletic department. Oh and don’t let Kirk Ferentz or Paul Rhoads hear this guy. They might go somewhere else and the voters will vent on their frustration in the voting booth.
Colt McCoy wants a bowl playoff. He’s thought about long and hard. Did he think about it while he almost blew the game for the Longhorns at the Big 12 Championship? Maybe that’s why he wants playoff. It would’ve covered up his mistake. Doh!
A handful of awards were handed out on ESPN last week to college football players. We’re not going to go through the whole list but we will say that Big 12 was represented very well. Congrats to Colt McCoy and Ndamukong Suh.
So Kansas ended its coaching search over the weekend. Some people thought it was Stanford coach Jim Harbaugh, but that was denied big time. So the Jayhawks fell to their 2nd choice, Turner Gill. This guy turned around Buffalo from perennial losers to a decent MAC team, even winning the title last year. Some people have overlooked that and started a fire-this-guy website. Oh well, beggars can’t be choosers.
Mark Ingram won the Heisman over the weekend as well. The race ended up being the closest ever with Ingram taking it over Gerhart, McCoy, Suh, and Tebow respectively. The sexy pick leading up to it was Suh, but that’s why it was sexy. No chance of winning and you get to appear smart. That said, there was no clear leading guy running up to it, so it’s no surprise it was this close.
Kansas State special teams stand out Brandon Banks was released from jail after beating a women while stoked on some stimulants. Ruh Roh. At least there’s no bowl to damage for the Wildcats. Hopefully this guy will get his act together and salvage his draft status, if there’s any left.
Looks like Illinois will hire Kansas State co-defensive coordinator Vic Koenning to be their sole defensive coordinator. He was with Clemson for a couple of years before his one year stint with the Wildcats. Hopefully the Wildcats defense won’t suffer that much.
Looks like the Big 10 will finally come into the century and explore a possible 12th team and conference championship. Who will it be? Some say Missouri or Iowa State. We know Missouri would listen. Others are point toward the Big East and Syracuse, Rutgers, or Pittsburgh. Let’s hope they keep it Big East for the east coast television money too.
The NCAA, following the lead of the NFL, will recommend keeping an athlete out of the game if they lose consciousness or show signs of a concussion. Head trauma is big news nowadays and the NCAA is quickly stepping in to cover their own heads with this rule. Now I get the old folks harping about leather helmets and poor pads being a better sport. We’ll be talking like that in a c0uple of years.
It’s a short week here as we’re are in training for Thanksgiving Thursday. We thought about calling up Mark Mangino to help us train but we don’t like being verbally abused and we most certainly don’t want him to hog all of the food. So here we are stretching and exercising for the marathon of food we get to sprint through. A couple of things to note in setting your eat order is: Do you use dark meat or white meat? Are you a gravy fan? Pumpkin or Apple pie? These answers can lead you to the top of the glutton mountain and be crowned the Feast King. Now here’s the Pick It and Stick It standings:
It’s the opening weekend of Conference play and we will be heading to good ‘ole Overland Park to take in some games at Nick and Jake’s. Their dealio is they have one owner who like restaurants and one who likes sports bars. Obviously we will be spending most of the time in the bar spot (pun intended). Will this split decision location play to their benefit? We’ll find out this weekend. There are some BIG games going on Saturday night so plan on us getting there a little later in the afternoon. Hope to see y’all there.
We were very skeptical when we strolled toward the Johnny’s Tavern setup on the corner of the Power & Light District in Downtown Kansas City. We’ve been to a couple of placesaround there before and the experiences were weak. We had some hope, however, as Johnny’s Tavern came through for us before. After spending the afternoon there we can say it is the best bar in the district. The food was great, the poker game was loads of fun, and the games on the screens were stellar. If you own or work at a bar around that area, read on to see how to make it successful.
