This Week in College Football 11/21 - 11/26

[CanadianChris 0]

Speaking of,  what the hell happened to the Syracuse and Arizona programs.

The first thing that comes to mind with Syracuse was firing Paul Pasqualoni, which might have been justifiable after a couple of mediocre seasons, but I thought it was weird just because it's always seemed to me that college coaches are tenured like professors: If you manage to keep your job for six years or so, you're practically unfireable thereafter

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No, Coach P got fired because his recruiting had become quite bad, and it's just now showing up on the field. I can't see it getting much better, either...there aren't a lot of positives to going to Syracuse compared to other BCS conference programs.

 

Upstate New York isn't exactly the greatest place to go to school...there's not a lot nearby, and I don't know how many of you have been there, but in the winter, it's sure not Miami. There aren't a lot of kids who grow up dreaming of playing for Syracuse, like they might West Virginia or Louisville or Pitt if they grew up in-state. You never get on national TV -- the Big East is the only BCS conference that doesn't have a network deal with a broadcast network or ESPN (not ESPN2 or ESPN+). Syracuse only got on national TV once this year, when they played Notre Dame (and got killed, of course). And with Miami and Va Tech leaving the conference, there aren't any perennial powers in the conference that you can point to and say you get to play those guys every year.

 

I don't see things turning around in Syracuse anytime soon. It's hard to recruit to a losing program, and it's hard to turn around a losing program if you can't recruit.

[Guest Leelee]

I always wondered how Syracuse managed to get great basketball teams, good football teams, and the best lacrosse program. There's nothing there. The snow there is worse than in Buffalo. And it's supposedly a pretty difficult academic school.

[Bored 0]

Wow that Arizona 4th place in 1998 totally slipped my mind. What bowl did they play in that season?

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Only the Holiday Bowl because again like this year the Pac-10 second place team gets stuck with it if they don't get into the BCS. They beat Nebraska 23-20 who was #14 at the time. I'm thinking they should just make the game a January 1st game as nine of the last ten years a Top 10 team has played in it. Looking back the Fiesta Bowl was the title game that year so otherwise have to figure they would have been a natural at-large selection for it.

[CanadianChris 0]

Jim Brown absolutely MADE the Syracuse lacrosse program. Plus, I would imagine they get a lot of Canadians in their program, given they're only two hours from the border.

[LooseCannon25 0]

I remember when Arizona kicked the shit out of Miami 27-0 in the first Fiesta Bowl. I forgot the year though, Maybe 94. That was embarrasing. In 91 when Miami and Washington both won the national championship Arizona bursted onto the scene and barely lost to both teams that year.

 

 

Insight.com Bowl ---- Rutgers vs. Arizona State is being reported

[Hogan Made Wrestling 0]

Wow that Arizona 4th place in 1998 totally slipped my mind. What bowl did they play in that season?

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Only the Holiday Bowl because again like this year the Pac-10 second place team gets stuck with it if they don't get into the BCS. They beat Nebraska 23-20 who was #14 at the time. I'm thinking they should just make the game a January 1st game as nine of the last ten years a Top 10 team has played in it. Looking back the Fiesta Bowl was the title game that year so otherwise have to figure they would have been a natural at-large selection for it.

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Was their BCS score too low to qualify automatically that year? Or did the top 4 rule only get introduced later?

 

I definitely agree that the Holiday Bowl should be made into a New Year's bowl.

[Bored 0]

They were #7 in the final BCS standings before the bowls and the Top 4 rule wasn't put in until the following year. In that first year of the BCS Kansas State was snubbed at #3 and didn't get into a BCS bowl and that's why the rule was put in.

[Damaramu 0]

Would everyone agree that KSU was screwed that year?

[Guest Leelee]

No. Look at the conference they played in.

[CanadianChris 0]

Pretty much, although losing to A&M in the title game was inexcusable. Still, they deserved the big payout.

[Damaramu 0]

Pretty much, although losing to A&M in the title game was inexcusable.  Still, they deserved the big payout.

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How good was A&M that year? Wasn't that when the North was filled with Top 25 teams and the South blew hard?

[CanadianChris 0]

I stand corrected. A&M was ranked 10th. I was thinking of the year Nebraska lost to Texas.

[Damaramu 0]

I stand corrected.  A&M was ranked 10th.  I was thinking of the year Nebraska lost to Texas.

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So it wasn't a horrible loss.

 

A question....did OU deserve an at-large the year they lost to KSU in the conference title game? KSU was like 13th. I agree they didn't deserve the national title game. But after that year they probably did deserve an at-large(which they got but i'm talking about if USC and LSU had hooked up).

 

Man these conference title games cause chaos but it always seems like the Big XII title game. Has the SEC title game ever caused chaos like that?

[CanadianChris 0]

Of course they did. That was never an issue.

 

It's never happened in a SEC championship game, because they generally don't have medicore teams advance to the game. The few times one did, they got smacked down decisively.

[Slayer 0]

Would everyone agree that KSU was screwed that year?

Fuck yes

 

No.  Look at the conference they played in.

Just because the Big 12 sucked this year doesn't mean it's always sucked

 

In the late 90's you had Nebraska, Colorado, KSU, Texas and A&M all with very strong programs.

 

Pretty much, although losing to A&M in the title game was inexcusable. 

They got fucked over on the final touchdown. The A&M runner dove through the corner in front of the pylon, but the refs ruled it a TD.

[Damaramu 0]

See the Big XII North used to be better than the South.

I was hoping that they would balance it out someday but I'm afraid that if they do that the team they move over to balance it out will hit a down time.

I've heard people talk about how OU and Texas should be in different divisions. But that would mess up the rivalry like the OU/Nebraska game.

But it would help if they balanced out the Big XII.

 

I'm not sure on some of the earlier Big XII title games but hasn't the North and South division rotated conference winners every year? So history is on Colorado's side And more times than not the team that was beat up on the year before or the team that won the year before comes back to win or lose the title game the next year.

[therealworldschampion 0]

No.  Look at the conference they played in.

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Nah the Big 12 was actually quite solid back in 1998. 5 schools had good prgrams.

[Slayer 0]

I don't care if they are in different divisions, OU and Nebraska should still be playing every year

[therealworldschampion 0]

I stand corrected.  A&M was ranked 10th.  I was thinking of the year Nebraska lost to Texas.

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So it wasn't a horrible loss.

 

A question....did OU deserve an at-large the year they lost to KSU in the conference title game? KSU was like 13th. I agree they didn't deserve the national title game. But after that year they probably did deserve an at-large(which they got but i'm talking about if USC and LSU had hooked up).

 

Man these conference title games cause chaos but it always seems like the Big XII title game. Has the SEC title game ever caused chaos like that?

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I'd say they deserved an at-large bid. They did go undefeated until the conference championship game. Had they not went to the Sugar Bowl, my guess is USC to the Sugar, Florida State to the Rose, and Oklahoma to the Orange to play Miami that year.

[cabbageboy 0]

On another note, disaster strikes for U of L. Brian Brohm is out for the season now with a torn ACL. He'll miss spring practice but will hopefully be back for the start of the regular season in 2006.

 

It's still possible that we can beat UConn but if we get Miami in the Gator Bowl with Hunter Cantwell starting at QB it's most likely an asskicking.

[Vern Gagne 0]

Jim Brown absolutely MADE the Syracuse lacrosse program.  Plus, I would imagine they get a lot of Canadians in their program, given they're only two hours from the border.

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Building a good basketball program is easier than building a football program. The number of recruits is dramatically different. Being horseshit on a consistent basis (Temple, Duke, Vandy) is inexcusable. I'm not saying they should be a bowl team every year, but 5-6-7 wins every few years doesn't seem like that much to ask for.

[teke184 0]

Of course they did.  That was never an issue.

 

It's never happened in a SEC championship game, because they generally don't have medicore teams advance to the game.  The few times one did, they got smacked down decisively.

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Actually, it's happened once...

 

In 2001, an 8-3 LSU team made its way to Atlanta through the back door after Ole Miss collapsed, losing three of their last four games to give away the SEC West title.

 

They went in as a severe underdog but, after QB Rohan Davey got hurt, a then-obscure backup QB named Matt Mauck stepped in and lead the Tigers to victory over #2 Tennessee, knocking them out of the BCS title game.

 

That wasn't an isolated occurrence that year... That was the same season Nebraska blew a game against Colorado in the last week of the season to miss out on the Big 12 Championship then got to face Miami in the title game because Colorado and Tennessee both lost in their championship games.

 

 

 

At least LSU went on to beat Big Ten champ Illinois solidly in the Sugar Bowl, proving that their win over Tennessee wasn't a fluke like K-State destroying Oklahoma then getting killed by Ohio State.

[Slayer 0]

Colorado did win the Big XII title in 2001 by beating Texas (with Chris Simms, god did he suck)

 

The controversy with Colorado was that they were arguing they should be in the BCS title game, but no one wanted them in there because they were a 2-loss team, though on the other side those two losses were to good teams (Fresno State which went undefeated for most of the year and a regular season loss to Texas which was avenged in the title game).

 

Losing to Oregon in the Fiesta bowl took the wind from that argument though, and made Oregon the "should have been in the title game instead of Nebraska" choice

[Damaramu 0]

Yeah but wouldn't anyone have been destroyed by Miami that year?

[Slayer 0]

Probably, but they were far more deserving of the shot at the loss, er, title than Nebraska