It’s the middle of the bowl season and we’ve had some great games so far. What’s cool about this time right now, is that coaches are making jumps left and right, either to the NFL or back down from the NFL. Players are also declaring their intentions for the big time as well. So while we try to keep up with who’s going where and who’s staying, we get some great bowl action left. Well, at least through Monday. Until then, here’s the Crib Sheet:
So Kansas State got burned on an excessive celebration penalty in their loss in the Pinstripe Bowl to Syracuse. A simple salute to the fans cost the Wildcats 15 yards and a missed shot for a 2 point conversion to tie the game up. The officials had some lame-o explanation and because of that it may be reviewed next year. Overall the game was pretty sloppy for the Wildcats but you can’t end the game on a penalty.
One of our favorite mascots, Georgia’s UGA (number VIII this time), missed the Liberty Bowl trip due to a sickness. Let’s wish him a good recovery. If you remember this UGA took over duties because to previous died at a very early age.
Florida’s on a rampage. We know they got Will Muschamp from under Texas as their new head coach. Now they signed up Kansas City Chiefs offensive coordinator Charlie Weiss. I figured Weiss was a short termer for the Chiefs but leaving so soon to go back to college is kind of a scratcher. Maybe he will have free reign?
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.
Happy Holidays from everyone here at KC College GameDay! We’ll be taking a break over the holiday weekend and soak in some presents and bowls. I hope you all have a great time and we’ll see you next Tuesday for an update to the Bowl Pick It and Stick It. In the meantime, here’s this week’s Crib Sheet:
So Colorado will end up playing California next year. You’re saying, “Duh, it’s a home and home!” Yes, but next year will be different as Colorado will be in the Pac 12 conference starting next year. What does that mean? It means that they are considering calling that game a non-conference game. Weird, right?
So Mark Cuban is thinking of funding a college football playoff system. Wow. Just wow. He failed at buying two baseball teams and he’s itching to spend his money in some other sports arena. Cuban’s plan involves hitting up college athletic directors and presidents to drum up support. He needs to talk to the bowl people. Better yet, he needs to keep funneling money in his non-championship winning NBA franchise. BCS president Bill Hancock bitch-slapped him away, btw.
ESPN has an article up about weak tickets sales for some bowls this year. Who’s not on the list? The Missouri Tigers. Good job by the fans for knocking out some tickets sales and showing up.
Kansas was so close to getting a new athletic director from Tulsa, but Bubba Cunningham turned them down. Strange huh? I’m thinking Tulsa came up with the dough and Kansas didn’t look as posh as Cunningham though. This looks pretty bad for the Jayhawks.
Big Ten Commissioner Jim Dlenay said that they may rethink the division names for the conference. Why? ‘Legends’ and ‘Leader’s is hilarious. Please keep it, Jim, so I can go back to it when I need a good chuckle.
Another day, another Nebraska Cornhusker gets a DUI. This time it’s safety Ricky Thenarse. Looks like he won’t be going to the Holiday Bowl.
Turner Gill landed a pretty great quarterback recruit from the hands of Colorado due to their coaching change. Apparently, Brock Berglund is a dual threat type guy. Let the slow rebuild begin.
While the Cornhuskers are going through a rough patch of arrests, the fans are having a hard time getting up for the bowl game. Nebraska is actually offering free pairs of basketball tickets for people who buy bowl ticket games. I’m not sure they’ll make their allotment. Awesome.
It’s the most wonderful time of the year! Happy holidays from KC College GameDay! It’s bowl season and I’ll do a couple of recaps in the next couple of days as well as run down some bowls I’m in to. In the meantime, we have a fat Crib Sheet so let’s get to it:
Meanwhile, the Nebraska Huskers suspended defensive tackle Baker Steinkuhler for getting a DUI last week. He’ll be out of the Holiday Bowl and the Husker’s rematch against Washington.
Even though I think Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany is evil incarnate, I do agree with him on holding back the college football playoff. His reasons come from a wealth of ego. Delany says that the Big Ten sacrificed enough by letting other conferences play in the Rose Bowl. There’s enough ego around other commissioners that there would be no way a playoff would bubble up.
Let’s take a look at how some Big 12 coaches voted in the final coaches poll of the year. Interesting stuff here, especially the one where Bo Pelini ranked his Cornhuskers #8 even though they lost to Oklahoma in the Big 12 Championship Game.
Speaking of coaches, the USA Today has a break down of some interesting contract provisions for some of the coaches out there. Bill Snyder 2.0 gets a free ride and tickets to basketball games. If Mack Brown resigns, he’ll be reassigned to another a part of the school. Mike Sherman gets a cool $100K for appearing or being named a national champion.
Keeping with Bo Pelini, he had to shoot down rumors of taking the Miami job that’s up for grabs now. Usually, when rumors like that happen, it means that something is ticking. It makes sense, too. Miami got rid of an upstanding Randy Shannon because he wasn’t winning games. Shannon did turn around the program in terms of class act athletes. Bo Pelini coaches the opposite way.
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.
It’s the last real week of college football for about a month so let’s get down to Crib Sheet business. Bowls are coming, invitations are going out, and we have a good chuck on news for you to nibble on. Let’s check it out:
Ho boy do we have a feast of news for you to munch in this Thanksgiving edition of the Crib Sheet. There should be enough left over to keep you fed over the whole weekend as there is college football on pretty much all of the time. Grab a bib and get ready for some Crib Sheet:
Is it me or has this season become anti-climatic? After last weekend, we have the Big 12 North pretty much locked up and we might as well call the Big 12 South. So as I see it, Nebraska will face Oklahoma State in the Big 12 Championship Game. Now, unless something goes crazy, what else is left for the season except bowl games? Oh, well we have some rivalry games left. That’s a good thing. You know what else is a good thing? This week’s Crib Sheet:
My body is still out of whack due to the daylight savings time change Sunday. Hey, at least I got an extra hour of sleep work in. It seems like some people around the college football landscape are also adjusting. Who knew that the loss to Kansas coupled with the time change forced Colorado to fire Dan Hawkins? That and many more half-asleep wackiness on this week’s Crib Sheet. Read on, my friends, read on.
In the wake of one of the most massive events in history ever yesterday, not the election but the reintroduction to the McRib, I have yielded time to this week’s Crib Sheet introduction. Ronald McDonald Bless America:
With the historic win over Oklahoma, Missouri gets the coveted Peace Pipe. You know, the somewhat annual trophy given to the winner? Welp, apparently even the two teams forgot about it and lost it. You know a rivalry is lopsided when that happens.
Oklahoma State wide receiver Justin Blackmon ended up with a suspension for the Kansas State game last Saturday. That’s what happens when you drink and drive, kids. It didn’t really stop the Cowboys, though, as they throttled the Wildcats.
Notre Dame student Declan Sullivan died after injuries received from a blown over video tower. Look for the school to either ban it or put in a more permanent solution.
Will Ferrell said on ESPN College GameDay that, “It’s scientific law that Baylor cannot beat Texas at Texas.” Baylor ended up winning that game. I’m betting Ferrell picked USC to win over Oregon as well. Those are some funny pics.
Expansion, as we have learned, is never done. The Big East will get on the expansion bandwagon as they voted to expand to 10 teams at board of director’s meeting Tuesday. Who will they grab? Notre Dame of course.
Halloween is Sunday and we are cooking up various items around the place with pumpkin in them. The roasted pumpkin seeds with cinamon and nutmeg were awesome but so where the pumpkin muffins. Grab your favorite pumpkin related food and check out this week’s Crib Sheet:
It looks as though the NFL cracked down on concussions and big time hits, doling out suspensions for head on collisions now. What does this mean for college football? Probably the same type of suspension. I’m not sure they will completely lock down like they do in the NFL. I’m guessing that this sport may be going away in the next 15 years, or at least it will turn into more of an arena style of play. Even for the colleges. Now check out the Crib Sheet:
Looks like Kansas State’s leading receiver Brandon Smith is out for the year with a broken leg suffered from last week’s Nebraska schilacking. Chris Harper will have to step up to fill the role. We’re going to wait and see about the Oregon trasnfer.
We’ve heard of backups on the field, but backups for mascots? That’s what Georgia had with “Russ” when UGA VII died unexpectedly. Welp last Saturday saw the return of the starter in UGA VIII. He’s officially registered as “Big Bad Bruce” but he’ll be UGA VII for everyone here on out.
Right before his potential start in the NFL, Colt McCoy will have his jersey retired at Texas. He’s the sixth player from Longhorn country to get his jersey retired and it may be the last one for awhile. Even though the guy never won a national championship, he has won more games in 4 years than any other in college football history. That deserves the rub.
Your new Ole Miss mascot is: The Rebel Black Bear. Okay, so it was from a William Faulkner story and he went there so it makes sense. We can’t help but think that Admiral Ackbars would’ve been a better fit. Oh, and there is some controversy with the name still.
Another coach banned Twitter for his football players. This time it’s Butch Davis and North Carolina. He needs to ban them from talking to sports agents. While he’s at it, he needs to ban assistants from talking to sports agents, too.
Get your claws ready, Missouri Tigers fans, ESPN College GameDay is heading to Columbia. Did you know it’s the first time they’ve been there? It’s about time, too, as I think they’ve been to Manhattan and Lawrence before.
Rutgers defensive tackle Eric LeGrand was left paralyzed from the neck down due to a tackle he made against Army last Saturday. It really sucks when this happens but players have walked again from this kind of injury. Let’s hope he can get up off the chair real soon.
Pace University football player Danoy Henry was killed by the police in a freakish accident. The police were saying that Henry tried to escape the police and ran into another officer, which led to officers firing into the car and killing him. The other side says that the cop jumped on the hood and fired. We may not know whatever happened and this is certainly a tragedy.
So I just found out today that I have at least 2 more road trips to go this year for the KCCGD crew. This year has been by far the most travelled and will be the most Stadiumspotted. It’s a nice change of pace from the last couple of years as we have begun to run out of new and cool places to Barspot. One of the new road trips just happens to be tomorrow night. Tune in tomorrow to find out here, but you won’t have to think hard if you want to guess. In the meantime, let’s catch up to the news items in this week’s Crib Sheet:
Coach Mark Dantonio of Michigan State had his health issues and that apparently inspired a fan to postpone surgery to watch the battle for Paul Bunyan’s Trophy last Saturday. Major Hester put off getting a pacemaker installed to watch the battle. Okay, that’s hardcore. I would pick life over college football, but it would be close.
Looks like the move to the Big 10 will support a stadium expansion for the Nebraska Cornhuskers. The newly approved plan will cost about $56 million and put the capacity at around 90,000 seats. How much do you want to bet that they will try to build Memorial Stadium up to be bigger than the Big House?
Meanwhile, the Rose Bowl has expansion plans of its own. The $152 million expansion will keep the lease going with the bowl through 2043. They have an upcoming BCS National Championship Game so they need to spruce things up a bit.
But while the two stadiums have expansion competition going, the locker room just got better for the Nebraska Cornhuskers. Ndamukong Suh donated about $2 million and as part of that, the players get iPads installed in the locker room. Man they need to put that in the toilet, not the locker. You’re not going to get much use out in the open with those things.
Baylor receivers Willie Jefferson and Josh Gordon got busted with pot after they were found passed out in a Taco Bell drive through. The whole 4th meal thingy from the Bell targets potheads anyway so it was a no brainer that these guys were found with weed. They’ll more than likely miss a couple of games.
Neither of those two were involved last week in one of the shortest kick returns in history. Texas Tech hit an onside and it didn’t go 10 yards. Terrance Ganaway nabbed it and ran 38 yards for a touchdown. It wasn’t the shortest, but it was awesome to see the special teams fail on the Red Raiders.
This bit of news is confusing so bear with me on this. A former agent said an agent friend of his, Gary Wichard, used ESPN’s Mel Kiper, Jr. to recruit college players. Kiper’s released statement says he talked to players by going through agents. I’m having a hard time finding where the fault is. I think it’s the fact that agents are pushing players to Kiper and his Big Board. But I don’t know it’s players after college or during. This does smell fishy.
College football is cyclical. Power programs come and go and the traditional ones always swing around back into power. Much like the seasons, power programs have summers and winters. For Penn State’s winters, that also includes the usual cries for Joe Paterno to retire. This guy is going to die on the field, in anything to fulfill my prediction. He’s not going to retire and Penn State will be good in a couple of years.
A very special lady sprung on me some tickets to the Kansas State and Nebraska game going on tomorrow. So we’ll do some Stadiumspotting there as well get you stoked for this week of football. First thing is first, though. This week’s Crib Sheet goes over some of the hottest news items of the last week. We have some spicy giblets ready to feed ya and then we’re gonna get the car ready for the impromptu road trip. On to the sheet:
Irish eyes will be smiling when Notre Dame will play Navy in Ireland 2012. We’re not sure where they will play but more than likely there’s a good chance they’ll all go out together after the game and get drunk.
Communication issues have tormented Turner Gill and the Kansas Jayhawks. His solution? Yanking cell phones from players the day before the game and then giving it back in the locker room after the game. How will the players wake up in the morning or talk to their mothers? I guess that’s what computers are for. We wonder how many more losses it will take for Gill to yank computer privileges too.
The NCAA leaped to action regarding the issue of sports agents and collegiate players by writing a letter. A letter. They asked for cooperation. Nothing else. Just another reason the NCAA needs to upgrayedd or just disband. These guys are getting real irrelevant.
The Playoff PAC, the special interest group formed to blow away the BCS and instill a college football playoff, will file a complaint with the IRS regarding the tax status of the Fiesta, Sugar, and Orange Bowl. They used a load of lawyers and one accountant to pick apart the tax returns and public documents of the BCS bowls and found that some loans and director salaries were just too much. Whether the IRS will remove the tax status, we won’t know. But we do know that the Playoff PAC is digging into every crook and cranny to blow away the BCS.
It seems Landry Jones of Oklahoma will have a higher calling after he is done calling plays. Jones says he’s 98% sure that he wants to become a pastor after football. Just goes to show you all walks of life come to play football. We wonder how many Hail Marys he’s tossed compared how many he’s recited.
He’s just hanging with Tim Brewster. He’s not going for the head coaching job. That’s what Minnesota is saying after Mark Mangino was spotted on the sidelines of a game, supporting his buddy. Minnesota should’ve gotten right out in front of this. There is no way no one would not recognize Mark Mangino hanging out on the sidelines. The nose bleeder seats would’ve been able to see him.
Apparently along with the no cell phone rule for players, Turner Gill’s Kansas Jayhawks can’t be with the ladies after 10 pm. That’s a harsh rule. It’s on any night. Do mothers count? Like as in visit and talk to. Keep your mind out of the gutters, people.
Strange things are afoot for Missouri. First off, cornerback Munir Prince left the team due to the transient quadriplegia he suffered in the preseason. If he plays anymore it could get permanent. Next up, senior safety Jasper Simmons has been suspended indefinitely from the team. He had knee surgery after the Illinois game. Are they just trying to drop a scholarship or something? At any rate, some very unusual things are going down in Columbia.