Between The Hashes - Week 8

Between The Hashes

Welcome back SportzFanz to yet another week, Between The Hashes. In each issue we take a look at the College Football landscape and report on the state of all things Grid Iron. With so many quality games unfolding this weekend, I’m afraid it’s gonna take us until Saturday to get through it all, so lets just get right down to the action…


What This Week Will Be Remembered For
The shattering of school records being broken and, quite possibly, the night the lights went out in Georgia. In Saturday’s Georgia-Arkansas battle, Dawgs’ QB D.J. Shockley left the game with a sprained left knee after getting twisted around something fierce on a third down scramble up the middle. While he isn’t believed to knee surgery to repair it, he is listed as doubtful for the World’s Largest Cocktail Party this weekend, and that ain’t a good thing as the Bulldogs lacked a noticeable punch without Shockley in the line up.

But how about all those school records that came tumbling down this weekend: The Penn State offense set a record for most points scored in a half with 56. The previous mark of 55 was set on October 11th, 1947 against Fordham (I believe Joe Pa was coaching that one too). The Irish’ Brady Quinn set a trio of passing marks as the Golden Domers pasted BYU for their first home victory of the season. He set marks for most touchdowns in a single game (6), most passing touchdowns in a season (20), and most 400-yard passing games in a season (3). Brad Smith of Missouri set a school record for most total yardage in a game with 480 yards, including an unbelievable 246 yards on the ground against the much ballyhooed Blackshirts of Nebraska. But the cou’de gra of record setters is Auburn’s John Claude-Vaughn-Damn! He set himself up in the school record books as the only kicker to miss 5 field goals in a single game.


Today’s Topic –
I’m not saying that I’m for the idea of a Division 1-A playoff, but I think it is simply a matter of time before the powers that be force it upon us. Fortunately though, Jon Saraceno of USA Today points out a fabulous silver lining about life with a NCAA playoff: Imagine what Winter Madness would be like. In fact, imagine what Winter Madness would do to the NFL. Nowadays, the playoffs are really the only time the NFL adrenaline gets pumping –and that’s usually only when the game is played outdoors in near freezing weather. Whatsmore, when was the last time the Super Bowl was more about the play on the field than the commercials off it?

So I ask you: Would you rather watch the best 8 or even 16 college teams in the country going head to head, hopefully in their own stadiums, for a playoff, or would you rather watch a mostly tired and staid National Football League playoff where some of the teams even have to compete under the guise of something called a ‘wild card’?

In the college format, you’ve got 18-22 year’s flying all over the field on adrenaline and energy, sucked straight from the raucous home crowd that’s boiling over into the ‘freaking nuts’ zone replete with cannon blasts and the marching band belting out the old fight song. Meanwhile in the pro’s, you’ve got neatly formatted 3 hour games with their picture perfect timing of when to cut to commercial and when not to, their canned audio system celebrations and ‘be loud’ scrolling marquees, and let us not forget their oh so blasé ‘sudden death’ overtime format where the only ones hoping for sudden death are those watching.

So I ask you, which would you rather watch if, or when, the NCAA formally requests a Division I-A playoff system: Winter Madness or the NFL Playoffs?


Your Instant Impact Quotes of the Week Are:

1. "I thought it was a good lesson for my son." Charlie Weiss, explaining to the media why he went over to the USC locker room after the game and congratulated them on their come from behind victory.

2. “Hodges' accuracy is so uncanny he can throw it in a trash can from 50 yards." Kansas State Coach Bill Snyder on the Air Raider’s Cody Hodges. Well, that certainly may be true, but if you could actually put a little pressure on him, he might only be able to throw it into a trash can from five yards out.

3. “He gets kissed a little bit –and I don’t mean that, ya know, favorably.” Dave Lapham, trying to find a reason that he said the word ‘kissed’ on camera and during a football game. To his credit, he was trying to explain how Husker QB Zac Taylor got knocked down by a seething, sweaty, 300 pound defensive lineman… but I digress.

4. “It’s turned into a turnover party” Dave Lapham. Good golly, really? What’s next, Dave, a pajama party? ..sorry folks, I must still be a little wierded out by that whole kissing the quarterback thing.

5. “Troy Smith with the ball. Still on his feet… oh, he puts it on spin cycle!” Mark Jones, doing the play-by-play as Troy Smith puts together an amazing scramble for the endzone in Ohio State’s destruction of Indiana. Meanwhile, Rece Davis pounds his fist in shock and disappointment: now he has to come up with another catch phrase for the ESPN Game Break..

6. “That’s one big dude.” Brent Musburger, sizing up Texas’ ‘Big Henry’ Melton, a 6 foot 3 inch, 276 ‘plus’ pound full back. He’s 7% body fat folks –yep, he’s one big dude.

7. “This is where, as a player, you play your guts out all afternoon and then it just comes down to a kick.” Mike Tirico, right before Iowa sent it into overtime with a field goal on the final play in regulation. You know, you’d be one helluva a motivational speaker Mike.

8. “Here’s a naked… Bomar, going ….in the end zone.” DrewGoodman, calling the play as Oklahoma QB Rhett Bomar takes a bootleg to the end zone for the Sooners. Guys, guys, guys. We went through this last season: never leave something like that just hanging out there. That’s just as bad as talking about one player being ‘kissed’ by another out on the field!

9. “Don’t get behind.” One of Bob Davie’s three keys to the game for Auburn. That brought a big ‘well, duh’ from, oh I don’t know, maybe the 2.4 million people watching the game! …and if you listened very carefully you, you could just make out the laughter of Rece Davis and Lou Holtz in the ESPN studio.

10. “Ass-trick” Bob Davie, trying to pronounce the word ‘asterisk’ during the Auburn-LSU game. Yeah, that one pretty much speaks for itself. The only thing worse is that Bob repeated it about six times over the next five minutes.

11. “Damn it Scotty, I need more power!” Bob Davie. Oh, wait, you mean he didn’t say that? Damn. Well, at least Franklin made sure to correct him each time he improperly said the word “ass-trick”.

12. “You gotta lookout for getting ear-holed and watching for his legs on the punt coverage –I hate that!” Craig James in the studio, watching a replay of Reggie Bush’s marvelous punt return for a touchdown. Yeah, but if I were you, I’d watch out for getting ear-holed by John Saunders or Aaron Taylor.

13. “You’ve heard of the long jump, well how about the … head first, jumping through the air for about five yards or so …jump?” Gary Reasons, trying to, find a new Olympic event?, and explain how Rhett Bomar ‘jumped’ along the sideline for a first down.

And this week’s Instant IQ award goes to…
“Mad” Mike Leach for his insightful interview going into halftime against Texas:
Jack Arute, “Will you make any changes [in the second half]?”
Mad Mike, “Well, ….Aaghhh! We need to figure out how to punt the ball.”


This week’s Super-Stud Awards go to…

1. Brad “Mmm, I like Corn” Smith, QB Missouri – What is it about Nebraska that gets him so pumped up? This time, he set a single game school record with 480 yards of total offense, including an unbelievable 246 yards on 28 carries.

2. Brady “Bunch” Quinn, QB Notre Dame – Would the Irish answer the starting bell after that unspeakable atrocity in Notre Dame Stadium last week? Um, let me see: Brady Quinn threw for a school record 6 touchdowns and 467 yards on 32 of 41 passing.

3. Kalvin “n’Hobbes” McRae, RB Ohio – Frank Solich has found his one man wrecking crew. Kalvin took over the top slot for single game rushing day with his 29 carry, 264 yard performance. With all those yards though, one has to ask: how did he only manage to put the pig in the house one time on Saturday?

4. Kenny ‘Nine’ Irons, RB Auburn – It’s not your fault your place kicker missed 5 field goals. Mr. Irons thrashed the vaunted Tiger D for 218 yards on 27 carries. Wow, maybe the ole’ War Eagle should’ve given it to him a bit more often.

5. Jason “King of the” Hill, WR Washington State – The Cougar’s upset bid of Cal came ever so short, but Jason did his part, making the most of his six grabs: 240 yards and three touchdowns.

6. The Missouri Tiger Defense – While your offense, especially Mr. Smith, lit up the Cornhuskers, your defense pitched a whale of a game: holding Nebraska to -2 rushing yards on the day. When did you ever think you’d see Big Red held to negative rushing yardage?


Riding the Bench This Week is…
1. CanesVision, the company that runs the JumboTron for NC State. During the NC State-Clemson game, they flashed images on the crowd with various captions like “Kissing Cam” and “Fan Cam”. All in all, nobody would’ve said a thing about the crowd shots except that they showed one of their own employees up on the big screen with the caption “Mexi-Cam”. While the employee wasn’t offended, it was enough to get the other 60,000 in attendance to stop booing the home team and boo the JumboTron.

2. Referees and play calls. In the Husker-Tiger game, Nebraska battled back to 21-20 but when the Refs missed a call on a big 2nd and 15 for Missouri, the momentum turned back in favor of Missouri. The referee credited the Tigers with a completion despite the fact that the receiver had stepped out of bounds just prior to making the play. Okay, I can believe the referee might have missed the call (he didn’t have a great angle), but the replay was absolutely in your face (despite the fact that Lapham and Land were going on about something completely un-related). Where was the replay official, in the little boys room?

3. Arian Foster, WR Tennessee – Fumbling the ball in the red zone is bad enough. Fumbling the ball in a tight, 3-3 game is worse. Fumbling the ball into and out of the back of the end zone in such a game earns you a spot on this list. Of course, RB Gerald Riggs Jr. also lost a fumble inside the Tide ten yard line and probably should be on this list too…

4. The LSU Receivers – Two easy drops in the end zone would have made mincemeat out of Auburn on Saturday night. Instead, the Bayou Bengals prevailed simply because of the play on Auburn’s special teams.

5. John “Claude” Vaughn “Damn”, PK Auburn – He missed five field goals as the War Eagle’s title run got snuffed out by the Bayou Bengals in overtime 20-17. Quite a change from last season’s nail biter, where Vaughn initially missed a PAT but was granted a second chance due to a LSU penalty. Vaughn nailed it, spring boarding Auburn to an undefeated season with their 10-9 victory over LSU.

6. Referees and play calls – Part II. In the Baylor-OU game, Sooner Rhett Bomar lunged out of bounds trying to make the sticks for a first down. The referee gave him the choice spot, but replay clearly showed that he was at least a yard short of the marker. Why didn’t the ref up in the booth review this play? In the Big12, the booth can review ball spots on the field –as they did during the Texas Tech-Texas game to give the Red Raiders a first down after the ball was spotted short of the sticks. Why didn’t they intervene here?!?

7. The guy in the stands wearing the shirt that read “LSU Twinkies” during the Tiger vs. Tiger game. Yeah, I know your girlfriend was standing right next to you wearing an exact copy, but that still isn’t any reason to embarrass yourself like that. Whomever the ‘Friends Of Twinkie’ are (and I’m sure you know who you are), had better give him grief to no end.


Random Hits and Misses
My moments of clarity and confusion from the weekend are:

1. In good hands with All State, huh? I hope everyone out there has heard that the State of Texas has had to force All State to pay off claims from policy holders who were under mandatory evacuation from Hurricane Rita and then subsequently not allowed to return home for several days. By state law, when such a condition arises the homes in the affected area are automatically deemed ‘uninhabitable’. When a home is ‘uninhabitable’, according to home owner policies, that means you are entitled to re-imbursement from your insurance company for expenses related to being forced from your home. All State, however, saw it differently and refused to pay out those claims. The State of Texas intervened and TWO state courts have now ordered All State to begin making good on the policies that their customers signed. If you’re considering switching to All State (FYI: I am not a policy holder with them), I strongly encourage you to check out this story. In good hands, indeed...

2. Just when you thought the Big East couldn’t be shafted any further by the ‘Majors’: Each and every Big10 game was on TV this week (either nationally or on ABC’s regional telecast). The Big East: the golden goose egg, and it’s not because the WVa-South Florida game was postponed. Can there be any clearer of a message sent to the conference formerly known as the BEast: you aren’t keeping your automatic big boy punch ticket.

3. Which way gets you shnockered faster: drinking every time Musburger says “Jack’a’root” or “pard’ner”, or drinking every time Bob Davie uses a ‘dramatic’ pause to think about what he’s going to say? Discuss.

4. This just in: Texas to win a share of the national title via the old geezer poll. Well, with the number of polls out there, it’s hardly any surprise that you can find ONE that has the Longhorns leaping in front of the Trojans. The Master’s Coaches Survey (yeah, we’ve talked about them before), ranked UT ahead of USC last week and figures to do so again this week with Texas’ trouncing of the Red Raiders. The question that comes to my mind is: how do votes from 16 former college football coaches tally up to 394 points for Texas, but only 389 for USC?

5. The most over-thrown flag this season: By far, it’s the ‘illegal formation’ flag for not having enough men on the line of scrimmage. The most under-thrown flag: The ‘delay of game’ when the play clock reaches zero. At least half a dozen times in each of the past two weeks, I’ve seen this one either missed or ignored entirely. What’s up with that Zebra’s?

6. Ok, I know the Wildcats dusted Michigan State but do you think those two missed field goals and 3 first half turnovers by the Sparties in the red zone helped? I do –I think it made all the difference in the world.

7. Newsflash: Baylor has just been upgraded from the Bad News Bears to the Hard Luck Bears. Despite pushing the Sooners to double overtime IN Norman, they still came up a sandwich short of a full picnic, losing 37-30.

8. The nation’s longest win streak (and no I’m not talking about the Trojans) came to a halt on Saturday as the Mount Union Purple Raiders fell to the Ohio Northern Polar Bears, 21-14. The loss snapped their miraculous 110-game win streak, dating back all the way to October of 1994 (that’s over a decade!). Word has it the Mount Union faithful are so distraught by this turn of events that they’re thinking of firing the whole coaching staff!?!

9. Calculate this one in your computers, Mr. Sagarin: Virginia cast down Florida State last weekend but then stumbled and fell to lowly North Carolina 7-5 this week. They managed just 199 total yards and not a single play of more than 13 as the Tar Heels smothered the Cavs all game long. Yeah, I’m sure your computer system saw that one coming…

10. Title this one under ‘wierdest setting for a football game’: In New York, Mount Vernon and New Rochelle moved their game to Friday morning from Saturday afternoon and barred fans from being in attendance. The only people allowed to watch? About two dozen police officers and a handful of media types. Now I know what you’re thinking: this must’ve been a prison league game, but it wasn’t. The precautions were taken after a Mount Vernon resident was found murdered in New Rochelle last month. In case you were wondering, New Rochelle won the game in convincing fashion, 40-16, and the police have no leads in the case.

11. Louisville won this year’s Keg of Nails trophy with their 46-22 victory over Cincinnati. While an actual Keg of Nails is supposed to weigh 100 pounds, this one is a wee-bit lighter as it’s empty and a replica of the original Keg which was lost about thirty years ago during restorations at the Louisville campus. The other trophy game of the week, The Brass Boot, goes home with the Colorado State Rams, 39-31 victors over the Wyoming Cowboys. The win evened the Border War series at 19 apiece, setting up one heck of a showdown for next year.


Next Week’s Quick Peeks

Boston College @ VA Tech – Yet again on Thursday we have the prospect for an Instant Classic. While the games haven’t worked out that way the past two weeks, don’t expect that to hold here. The Eagles will be loaded for Hokie this week as Virginia Tech looks to remain among the ranks of the unbeaten and pound its chest for some BCS #2 love. If this one were up in Chestnut Hill, I’d give it to BC but down in Blacksburg this one will easily be the roughest game of the season for the Eagles –are they physical enough to handle a 60 minute pounding?

Ohio State @ Minnesota – With two weeks to get over the blocked punt that cost them Paul Bunyan’s Axe against Wisconsin, the Gophers should be well rested for these Buckeye’s. After stumbling for a second time this season against the Nittany Lions, the Bucks have had two impressive victories in a row over Michigan State and Indiana. If they can get their offense going, it should prove the difference as the nation’s #1 ground attack runs head first into the nation’s #1 run stoppers.

Oklahoma @ Nebraska – Getting routed in Columbia this past week, Huskernation is seeing Red all over again. This week they get a strengthening Oklahoma squad that should boast the return of all-world back Adrian Peterson. It could be a throwback classic up in Lincoln if the Sooner ground game can push around the Blackshirts (they didn’t do so well against the Bears’ stingy defense). What’s even more pressing is whether the OU secondary can handle the onslaught Bill Callahan and his CornCoast Offense will attempt to throw at them.

Clemson @ GA Tech – In a match up of two schools that can’t decide if they’d rather rise to the top or float to the bottom, the Tigers pay a visit to the Rambling Wreck. With two weeks off to prepare, will the Yellow Jacket’s Reggie Ball be ready to finally take over a game or will Tommy Bowden’s boys find a way to contain him and take the sting out of these Jackets?

Maryland @ Florida State – Thanks to Virginia, the Atlantic Division in the ACC is wide open once more. A victory by the visiting Terrapins would almost certainly knock the Seminoles out of the race for the division title. But FSU knows this and, after their tune up match against Duke, will be ready to rip/roar their way through the ACC’s worst rushing defense.

Georgia vs. Florida – The World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party kicks off this Saturday in Jacksonville. For the Gators, it’s all about the rivalry and removing the Bulldogs from a national title shot. For the Dawgs, it’s all about survival. With DJ Shockley likely out of commission, don’t expect Georgia to bully it’s way past Florida on offense –they weren’t exactly lighting the world on fire when Shockley was in the line up and without him, well… On defense, the Dawgs are just as solid as ever, so that means it should come down to the play of Florida QB Chris Leak: can he or can’t he lead this team?

Michigan @ Northwestern – Northwestern roasted the Spartans this week (although I still contend MSU did it to themselves in the first quarter, thereby keeping us from having a good measuring stick for the Wildcats). Michigan went into Kinnick Stadium and stopped the Hawkeyes home game win streak at 22 (don’t underestimate the importance of that victory, which was incidentally Llyod Carr’s 100th with Big Blue). Will the Wolverines defense be overwhelmed against the spread offense or will they dominate them the way they should have dominated Notre Dame.


The Wrap Up
Well, that about wraps it up for yet another week Between the Hashes, SportzFanz. As always, it’s been both a privilege and a pleasure. Look for our Weekly Run Down of the games on in your area to hit the shelves in a couple of days. Until then...


Rex Frazier is a college football staff writer for football.com. You can reach him at: rexfrazier@earthlink.net