Between The Hashes - Week 9
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. On this Halloween Weekend, more than just a few teams got quite a scare: Georgia fighting some demons masquerading as Gators; Texas spotting the Cowboys 30 minutes …again, UCLA uncorking the magic genie …yes, again; Phil Fulmer and the Volunteers getting whacked by The Visor (I’m sure they thought it was just another bad dream), and Northwestern being blown to bits by Michigan –yes, that was a Wolverine that saying ‘Boo’, you can come out now. With so much to talk about and discuss, lets just get right down to the action…
What This Week Will Be Remembered For
The is No Defense Against Da Vince. I’ve been on the fence for a while now, trying to decide who should bring home the Heisman Hardware this year. The top three candidates are obvious, deciding among them who gets the nod is not –at least until this weekend. Reggie Bush, don’t let him get his hands on the ball –he can juke you silly and beat you stupid with his speed. Matt Leinart, you can’t let him sit back in the pocket –he’ll pick you apart with short, crisp throws and then bomb away on your secondary like a battleship shelling the beach. But Vince, ah well, what do you do about Vince Young? No, really: what do you about him, myself and the rest of the defenses in the country would like to know.
You can blitz him and flush him from the pocket, but he’ll evade even your best tacklers, making them look like Pee Wee players stuck in molasses. You can play ‘contain’ and let him sit in the pocket for as long as he likes, but he’ll just pick you apart through the air with his speedy receiver corps and stable of tight ends and running backs. You can even try bringing a mixture of both and to keep him off balance, but if it’s one thing we’ve learned about playing against this young man it’s that the defense is the one kept off balance.
I’ve watched this kid play almost every single game of his young career at Texas. I’ve seen him make silly, stupid mistakes that make you swear and curse, but I’ve also seen him fight with the kind of fire that’s reserved for the rarest of rare athletes –elite’s like Michael Jordon and Tiger Woods. Such was the case on Saturday night against Oklahoma State. Sure, he threw a bad pick –even over threw his receivers repeatedly in the first half, and yes, he fumbled the ball away during the opening fifteen. But do you know what else he did? He reached down into depths of talent, drive, and motivation that everyone stands in awe of: when the chips go down and the rubber hits the road, that’s when #10 picks up his game and goes all in.
Young set career marks on Saturday with 267 yards rushing and 506 yards of total offense. He also set a school mark for longest scramble by a Texas quarterback: 80 yards on the third play of the second half –and he did it by using a pump fake to get a Cowboy DB three feet in the air while he glided past him towards the end zone. Anyone hanging around long enough to watch this one on TBS had to be in awe of the Texas Thoroughbred: Just when you thought ‘maybe Texas really is still, just Texas,’ Vince kicked it into a new gear, a new level. How many levels and how many gears he has is anyone’s guess –I bet he doesn’t even know. But that’s what separates the great from the unbelievable, and Vince Young is truly unbelievable.
Today’s Topic
What’s up with the Big Bad Ten? For a conference that traditionally pride’s itself on power run games and stalwart defenses, this season is certainly a curveball –well, maybe a split finger fastball is more apropos. Penn State, Ohio State, Michigan State and Northwestern have all gone the way of the Spread/West Coast Offense, pulling the Big Ten into levels of offensive excitement and flair that they’ve never seen. Of course the down side to all that excitement is that, seemingly, just about every team in this blue collar conference has forgotten how to play a little thing called DEFENSE.
Aside from Ohio State’s 3rd ranked run defense, there isn’t another top 10 rating out there in the Big Ten –in any of the major statistical defensive categories. But what is more worrisome for the conference isn’t that they no longer have stellar, top notch defenses: it’s that they have porous, shaky and increasingly horrible defenses. For example: which conference owns the nation’s two worst rated defenses? If you said the Sun Belt, WAC, Mountain West, C-USA, or even the PAC-10 you’re wrong. The answer is the Big 10 with Northwestern sitting at the bottom (117th) and Purdue right on top of them (116th). In fact, they also got the nations 97th (Wisconsin) and 111th (Illinois) overall defenses. Against the run, they’ve got numbers 114, 102, 96, 90, and 80; against the pass it’s 114, 106, 100, 90, and 80.
To put it a different way, the Big Ten doesn’t have a single squad ranked in the Top 10 in the nation on defense. Ohio State at 13 and Penn State at 14 are the two top defenses in the nation. The next best is Michigan’s at 51st. That’s right, the Big Ten has only two defenses among the FIFTY best in the nation. Isn’t that insane.
Your Instant Impact Quotes of the Week Are:
1. “When you try and tackle Tyrone Moss, you better bring some of your homies.” Andre Ware, part of the ESPN crew during the Miami, Fla.-UNC game. Apparently, the Tar Heels didn’t bring quite enough homies –they gave up195 yards on the ground to Tyrone Moss on Saturday.
2. "Plan on being behind, plan on getting yourself in trouble." Texas Coach Mack Brown, talking to his team right before their game on Saturday. Talk about spooky. Mack hit it right on the head as Texas once more spotted the Cowboys a half, only to come storming back and retake the game at the intermission.
3. "I'm getting stepped on, people were grabbing me, it was pretty special. It was the best stepped-on feeling ever." Rutgers quarterback Ryan Hart, after becoming bowl eligible by beating Navy Saturday.
4. "If you're listening out there Ted Ginn Sr., I love ya ... send me some of your players,” Minnesota Head Coach Glenn Mason, after the Cleveland Glenville coach, whose son and former quarterback (Troy Smith), accounted for four touchdowns against the Golden Gophers. Just goes to show: if you can’t beat’em, join’em.
5. "They just didn't have enough at the end, and the other team made the plays we didn't make," Nebraska head coach, Bill Callahan. So let me get this straight: it’s the players fault that Nebraska has lost two straight home games for the first time since 1968, and not the Coaches? Boy, that’s one heck of a coach you Nebraska faithful have there. Yep, one heck of a coach. Tell me this: what has he done to deserve that post, aside from caretaking a John Gruden team to the Super Bowl of course?
6. "He'd tell his little corny jokes, we'd tell ours. Fans laugh, no big deal. But you tell one about Tennessee they think it's insulting or something," Steve Spurrier prior to the South Carolina-Tennessee game this week. I wonder if Peyton –or even the whole Manning family –feel the same way?
7. “If you went into the kitchen for an adult beverage or something, we’ve scored 21 points in the first half of the first quarter.” The beginning of the Michigan-Northwestern game. I would’ve caught who said it, but I really was in the kitchen getting an adult beverage.
8. “That was one of those Apollo Creed plays” Craig Sagan covering the Texas-Oklahoma State game and describing how OSU turned a busted play into a big gain for Oklahoma State. For those of you not wisened into the mental thought process of Mr. Sagan, Apollo Creed was known as the Master of Disaster.
9. “And Secretariat gallops for Roses.” Craig Sagan, calling Vince Young’s 80 yard touchdown scramble on the third play in the second half.
10. “I love Halloween, I don’t need a facemask.” Lou Holtz in the ESPN Studio. Ah, an oldie but a goodie Lou. The only thing better was watching you zing Mark May for his picks last week.
11. “Nate Swift could not have been more wide open if he’d been out in a cornfield.” Gary Thorne as the Nebraska wide receiver created his own zip code inside the Red Zone for a touchdown. How does a receiver find himself in the end zone when there isn’t a defensive back even inside the twenty?
12. "It was the greatest show on turf!" linebacker Bobby Carpenter after Ohio State prevailed in the Thunder Dome for the ninth straight time. Ohio State and Minnesota combined for 76 points, 1,027 yards, 45 first downs, and 10 touchdowns, but surprisingly enough only one turnover.
And this week’s Instant IQ award goes to…
“When it’s breezy, swing it easy.” Ed Cunningham.
“Yo, Yo! Write that one down!” Gary Thorne.
This week’s Super-Stud Awards go to…
1. Vince “The Program” Young, QB Texas – Obviously, Vince makes this list. He joins Missouri’s Brad Smith as the only other player to rush and pass for over 230 yards in a game. Vince finished with a NCAA high 267 yards on the ground and 239 through the air, to go with his 4 touchdowns.
2. Kalvin’n’Hobbs McRae, RB Ohio – Frank Solich’s sophomore is quickly closing in on 1,000 yards for the season. This week he netted 224 yards and two touchdowns on 31 carries as Ohio cruised past Buffalo.
3. Steven “Which” Wichman, QB Idaho – Wichman led the Vandals past the New Mexico State Lobo’s this weekend, throwing the little pigskin for 489 yards –ouch!
4. Daniel Smith, WR Idaho – Helping Wichman pick up the victory, Mr. Smith snagged 11 catches for 269 yards and 2 touchdowns.
5. Michael “I’m fast, but I’m not that fast” Johnson, DB Arizona – He was fast enough on Saturday, converting one of his school record three picks into the pig house as Arizona surprised Oregon State.
6. Chub “B.” Small, RB Marshall – With a name like that, Mr. Small deserves this list just for making it out of middle school. On Saturday, the freshman returned 4 kicks for 160 yards and a touchdown, helping the Herd Thunder past the Green Wave, 27-26.
7. Ted “e-Bear” Ginn Jr., WR Ohio State – I think this is the first time Mr. Ginn has made our list all season. Against Minnesota, lucky #7 ran back a 100 yard kick off for a touchdown in less time than it takes most college guys to pound a beer –now, that’s fast.
8. The USC Trojan Offense – In what was widely expected to be a down week for the Trojans, they exploded right out of the gate to pick up their 30th consecutive victory and reclaim the BCS #1 slot. When the dust cleared and the Cougars were picked up off the turf, the Trojans had compiled 745 yards of total offense.
9. Todd “Don’t Be” Blythe, WR Iowa State – In torching the Aggie DBs, he caught eight passes for 214 yards and four touchdowns. To boot, he set the school mark for most receiving touchdowns in a game.
10. Brian “Boom Boom” Calhoun, RB Wisconsin – The Badger’s Back lowered the boom on the Illini for 197 yards and five touchdowns in Wisconsin’s 41-24 win. In so doing, ‘Boom Boom’ tied a school record for most touchdowns in a single game –that’s the second time he’s tied that particular record this season.
Riding the Bench This Week is…
1. Nebraska’s Offensive Line – Minus Two yards rushing last weekend, sixteen yards rushing this weekend –that’s pitiful, ridiculously pitiful for a storied program like Nebraska. To make matters worse, the offensive line gave up a school record 9 sacks against the Sooners on Saturday.
2. Gary Pinkel, Head Coach Missouri – Last week, he had the game plan to make QB Brad Smith the first Division I-A player with better than 230 yards in a single game through the air and on the ground. This week, not only did he forget to bring a game plan, but he forget how to make half time adjustments. The Kansas defense smothered Brad Smith for just 179 yards of total offense, 38 with his feet.
Random Hits and Misses
My moments of clarity and confusion from the weekend are:
1. Notre Dame announced on Saturday that first year head coach Charlie Weis has been rewarded with a 10-year contract extension to ‘ward off’ speculation that the coach may move to the NFL. The contract is believed to be the richest for any coach in the NCAA (somewhere between $30 and $40 million) and runs through the 2015 season. While that all sounds nice and wonderful, I can’t help but have a sense of Déjà vu here: Tyrone Willingham was rewarded in much the same way after starting off his tenure with eight straight victories and, well, we all know how that ended. At 5-2, Charlie is hardly a godsend –yet. True, he’s done magnificent things with this year’s Golden Domer squad, but Ty did the same in his first season so just don’t go counting your chickens before they’re hatched.
2. As happy as the Irish are with their head coach, the Aggies of College Station are increasingly and increasingly less so with theirs. Dennis Franchione was stolen away from Alabama to replace long time Aggie man R. C. Slocum (what is he up to these days, anyway?). Now in his third season, ‘French’ione is just 11-13 overall and 5 -3 this season, and owns the nation’s third worst pass defense and worst overall defense in the Big 12. Was this the kind of success the Aggies expected? The only coach in the Big12 more on the hot seat than Dennis is Husker’s Bill Callahan.
3. This past week saw a new ‘all-divisions’ NCAA scoring mark set: most points scored in the shortest amount of time. The honor goes to the Division II Central Washington Wildcats who put 27 unanswered points up on the board in 70 seconds. How’d they do that, you ask? By scoring putting together a nice offensive scoring drive and then following it up with three quick strike defensive touchdowns, two pick sixes and a fumble return. The previous record was held by Division III Mont Union, who had scored 21 points in 33 seconds in 1996. The Division I record is held, not by Texas Tech, but by Colorado State. In 1997 and against San Jose State, the Rams scored 20 points in 55 seconds.
4. If I hear one more time about how Mack Brown decided to ‘lighten it up’ and download 2,000 songs onto his I-Pod, I’m gonna seriously lose it. How many times can they report the exact same thing? Ok, we get it, enough already: Mack “Daddy” Brown is a player’s coach. Great, now let’s move on…
5. Kudos to Barry Switzer and Tom Osborne. During the OU-Nebraska game, they told it like it is. When asked whether their power run game would be able to compete and win against the Spread Offense, they wasted no time in making one thing very, very clear: Yes, their playbooks will still win national championships, but nobody wants to use them because high scoring, dynamic offenses are all the rage. I would submit, too, that those offenses make it easier to lure in top athletes from around the country, but some places still need to play to their strengths (and I think Mr. Osborne would agree).
6. The Hard Luck Bears continued their odyssey through woe and sorrow on Saturday. This week it was at home against the Red Raiders. Up until the 4th quarter, the Bears largely kept the Air Raid attack in check, trailing just 6-0. In fact, they had several chances to actually take the lead in this one (a touchdown called back and a missed fourth and goal opportunity, proving the most devastating). In the end though, they could only contain these Raiders for so long, finally succumbing to the prick-and-poke Tech attack, 28-0.
7. How in the world have we allowed ourselves to be so fooled? With their 4th loss of the season, the Volunteers have now dropped out of the Top 25. They began the season at #3 in the pre-season, and now join Michigan, Oklahoma, Iowa, Louisville, and Purdue as teams that were ranked in the Top 15 nationally, only to crash and burn once the pigskin started flying.
8. It’s official: Rutgers is the feel good story of the season. It’s been 26 long years since the Scarlet Knights have played in the post season, and now that drought is over. Is this just an aberration for a Big East in flux, or the start of something new? Quirky stat of the week: The last time Rutgers made themselves bowl eligible was in 1982 (although they did not go bowling that year) with a win against, you guessed it, Navy 31-21.
9. Texas Tech’s Taurean Henderson is just 75 yards short of becoming the first player in NCAA history to reach 2,000 yards rushing and 2,000 yards receiving. With the Aggies coming for a visit out on the Tumbleweed Plains, do you think there’s even the slightest chance he won’t grab that record?
10. I think this may be the funniest thing I’ve read in a long, long time, straight from a wire article : Casey Dick, a freshman quarterback who's seen no action in Razorback games this year because he's been redshirted, will start for the Hogs against the Gamecocks on Saturday, coach Houston Nutt said. "He has a strong arm and good instincts. It's hard to explain. He just has 'it.'”
If I Could Be Anyone This Week It’d Be…
A South Carolina Gamecock. Not only did they manage to beat Tennessee on a field goal with under three minutes to go, but they did at Rocky Top –something the South Carolina program has never done before. Equally nice, at 5-3 they are in good shape for a bowl bid with Arkansas, Florida, and Clemson still on the docket. What might even be more delicious (if you’re a Gamecock fan): the last Tennessee coach that lost to the Gamecocks (Johnny Majors in 1992) ‘left the program’ six days later.
Next Week’s Quick Peeks
Pittsburgh @ Louisville –After a two week hiatus, the BEast is finally back on the tube, this time in a Thursday night showdown. Louisville will try to recapture some pre-season magic and climb back up the conference standings. Meanwhile, off-the-radar Pittsburgh has begun playing a little ball: three straight victories over Cincinnati, South Florida, and Syracuse. Can they make it four in a row?
Iowa @ Northwestern – Both teams ride into this one having dropped their last game (and both to the Wolverines, oddly enough). Will the week off for the Hawkeyes prove the difference here, or will Tyrell Sutton and Brett Basanez prove too much for the Iowa defense?
Tennessee @ Notre Dame – The pre-season #3 Tennessee Volunteers travel to South Bend for a tussle with the Fighting Irish. Early on in the year, this one was circled by just about everyone. Now, it’s an after thought, penciled in mainly by those Volunteer faithful hoping that Fulmer can somehow pull a miracle out of his hat and muster back some respect for the downtrodden program. On the other side of the hashes, Charlie Weiss will be looking to jump some more poll slots to finish no lower than 12th in the nation, and so ensure Notre Dame’s return to the BCS.
Wisconsin @ Penn State – It’s THE Big 10 showdown as the Badgers from Camp Randall ship out to Happy Valley to find out who takes control of the race for the conference crown. With Wisconsin’s defense playing worse than I’ve ever seen them, this one may not be the battle that everyone’s predicting –especially with that young, electric offense Joe Pa’s got brewing up in Beaver Stadium. Even so, the Badgers should get a couple of key personnel back on defense and keep this one tight (remember: Barry’s Boys love a good fight).
Army @ Air Force – Over on The Classic, the Commander-In-Chief trophy goes up for grabs: 1-6 Army can still claim the trophy by sweeping Air Force this week and Navy the first week of December. In order to do so, the Army Grunts will have to have their game of the season against the nation’s 8th ranked ground assault and much underrated QB Shaun Carney.
UCLA @ Arizona – Will the Bruins Cinderella comeback run continue this week? ‘Zona and the Stoops Boys says no, but perhaps it’s the Drew Boys who will have the final say on the matter. Maurice Drew and Drew Olson are the one-two punch that drive this Bruin team to heights well beyond what could have been considered normal in the preseason. The Wildcats, meanwhile, have inserted Freshman QB Willie Tuitama into the starting lineup and got an outstanding 13 of 22 for 335 yard passing day out of him against Oregon State last week. Can he do the same against the PAC10’s best pass defense?
Miami, Fla @ VA Tech – The Hokies finally get their headliner game this week. Texas had Ohio State, USC had Notre Dame, the Hokies get the Hurricanes. On Saturday night on ESPN, if you’re even the least bit of a college football fan, you’d better tune in for this one. Marcus Vick and the versatile Hokie offense host Larry Coker’s Hurricanes in Blacksburg. Miami is brining their nation leading defense to the table –one that allowed just 4 yards of offense to NC State during a 29 minute span in the second half. Are the Hokies for ready for that kind of smash mouth?
Stanford @ USC – Despite last week’s loss in double overtime to UCLA, Walt Harris has this Cardinal team on a role. Can they put a stop to the nation’s longest win streak, or will the Trojan offense rip apart another lesser team?
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...
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. On this Halloween Weekend, more than just a few teams got quite a scare: Georgia fighting some demons masquerading as Gators; Texas spotting the Cowboys 30 minutes …again, UCLA uncorking the magic genie …yes, again; Phil Fulmer and the Volunteers getting whacked by The Visor (I’m sure they thought it was just another bad dream), and Northwestern being blown to bits by Michigan –yes, that was a Wolverine that saying ‘Boo’, you can come out now. With so much to talk about and discuss, lets just get right down to the action…
What This Week Will Be Remembered For
The is No Defense Against Da Vince. I’ve been on the fence for a while now, trying to decide who should bring home the Heisman Hardware this year. The top three candidates are obvious, deciding among them who gets the nod is not –at least until this weekend. Reggie Bush, don’t let him get his hands on the ball –he can juke you silly and beat you stupid with his speed. Matt Leinart, you can’t let him sit back in the pocket –he’ll pick you apart with short, crisp throws and then bomb away on your secondary like a battleship shelling the beach. But Vince, ah well, what do you do about Vince Young? No, really: what do you about him, myself and the rest of the defenses in the country would like to know.
You can blitz him and flush him from the pocket, but he’ll evade even your best tacklers, making them look like Pee Wee players stuck in molasses. You can play ‘contain’ and let him sit in the pocket for as long as he likes, but he’ll just pick you apart through the air with his speedy receiver corps and stable of tight ends and running backs. You can even try bringing a mixture of both and to keep him off balance, but if it’s one thing we’ve learned about playing against this young man it’s that the defense is the one kept off balance.
I’ve watched this kid play almost every single game of his young career at Texas. I’ve seen him make silly, stupid mistakes that make you swear and curse, but I’ve also seen him fight with the kind of fire that’s reserved for the rarest of rare athletes –elite’s like Michael Jordon and Tiger Woods. Such was the case on Saturday night against Oklahoma State. Sure, he threw a bad pick –even over threw his receivers repeatedly in the first half, and yes, he fumbled the ball away during the opening fifteen. But do you know what else he did? He reached down into depths of talent, drive, and motivation that everyone stands in awe of: when the chips go down and the rubber hits the road, that’s when #10 picks up his game and goes all in.
Young set career marks on Saturday with 267 yards rushing and 506 yards of total offense. He also set a school mark for longest scramble by a Texas quarterback: 80 yards on the third play of the second half –and he did it by using a pump fake to get a Cowboy DB three feet in the air while he glided past him towards the end zone. Anyone hanging around long enough to watch this one on TBS had to be in awe of the Texas Thoroughbred: Just when you thought ‘maybe Texas really is still, just Texas,’ Vince kicked it into a new gear, a new level. How many levels and how many gears he has is anyone’s guess –I bet he doesn’t even know. But that’s what separates the great from the unbelievable, and Vince Young is truly unbelievable.
Today’s Topic
What’s up with the Big Bad Ten? For a conference that traditionally pride’s itself on power run games and stalwart defenses, this season is certainly a curveball –well, maybe a split finger fastball is more apropos. Penn State, Ohio State, Michigan State and Northwestern have all gone the way of the Spread/West Coast Offense, pulling the Big Ten into levels of offensive excitement and flair that they’ve never seen. Of course the down side to all that excitement is that, seemingly, just about every team in this blue collar conference has forgotten how to play a little thing called DEFENSE.
Aside from Ohio State’s 3rd ranked run defense, there isn’t another top 10 rating out there in the Big Ten –in any of the major statistical defensive categories. But what is more worrisome for the conference isn’t that they no longer have stellar, top notch defenses: it’s that they have porous, shaky and increasingly horrible defenses. For example: which conference owns the nation’s two worst rated defenses? If you said the Sun Belt, WAC, Mountain West, C-USA, or even the PAC-10 you’re wrong. The answer is the Big 10 with Northwestern sitting at the bottom (117th) and Purdue right on top of them (116th). In fact, they also got the nations 97th (Wisconsin) and 111th (Illinois) overall defenses. Against the run, they’ve got numbers 114, 102, 96, 90, and 80; against the pass it’s 114, 106, 100, 90, and 80.
To put it a different way, the Big Ten doesn’t have a single squad ranked in the Top 10 in the nation on defense. Ohio State at 13 and Penn State at 14 are the two top defenses in the nation. The next best is Michigan’s at 51st. That’s right, the Big Ten has only two defenses among the FIFTY best in the nation. Isn’t that insane.
Your Instant Impact Quotes of the Week Are:
1. “When you try and tackle Tyrone Moss, you better bring some of your homies.” Andre Ware, part of the ESPN crew during the Miami, Fla.-UNC game. Apparently, the Tar Heels didn’t bring quite enough homies –they gave up195 yards on the ground to Tyrone Moss on Saturday.
2. "Plan on being behind, plan on getting yourself in trouble." Texas Coach Mack Brown, talking to his team right before their game on Saturday. Talk about spooky. Mack hit it right on the head as Texas once more spotted the Cowboys a half, only to come storming back and retake the game at the intermission.
3. "I'm getting stepped on, people were grabbing me, it was pretty special. It was the best stepped-on feeling ever." Rutgers quarterback Ryan Hart, after becoming bowl eligible by beating Navy Saturday.
4. "If you're listening out there Ted Ginn Sr., I love ya ... send me some of your players,” Minnesota Head Coach Glenn Mason, after the Cleveland Glenville coach, whose son and former quarterback (Troy Smith), accounted for four touchdowns against the Golden Gophers. Just goes to show: if you can’t beat’em, join’em.
5. "They just didn't have enough at the end, and the other team made the plays we didn't make," Nebraska head coach, Bill Callahan. So let me get this straight: it’s the players fault that Nebraska has lost two straight home games for the first time since 1968, and not the Coaches? Boy, that’s one heck of a coach you Nebraska faithful have there. Yep, one heck of a coach. Tell me this: what has he done to deserve that post, aside from caretaking a John Gruden team to the Super Bowl of course?
6. "He'd tell his little corny jokes, we'd tell ours. Fans laugh, no big deal. But you tell one about Tennessee they think it's insulting or something," Steve Spurrier prior to the South Carolina-Tennessee game this week. I wonder if Peyton –or even the whole Manning family –feel the same way?
7. “If you went into the kitchen for an adult beverage or something, we’ve scored 21 points in the first half of the first quarter.” The beginning of the Michigan-Northwestern game. I would’ve caught who said it, but I really was in the kitchen getting an adult beverage.
8. “That was one of those Apollo Creed plays” Craig Sagan covering the Texas-Oklahoma State game and describing how OSU turned a busted play into a big gain for Oklahoma State. For those of you not wisened into the mental thought process of Mr. Sagan, Apollo Creed was known as the Master of Disaster.
9. “And Secretariat gallops for Roses.” Craig Sagan, calling Vince Young’s 80 yard touchdown scramble on the third play in the second half.
10. “I love Halloween, I don’t need a facemask.” Lou Holtz in the ESPN Studio. Ah, an oldie but a goodie Lou. The only thing better was watching you zing Mark May for his picks last week.
11. “Nate Swift could not have been more wide open if he’d been out in a cornfield.” Gary Thorne as the Nebraska wide receiver created his own zip code inside the Red Zone for a touchdown. How does a receiver find himself in the end zone when there isn’t a defensive back even inside the twenty?
12. "It was the greatest show on turf!" linebacker Bobby Carpenter after Ohio State prevailed in the Thunder Dome for the ninth straight time. Ohio State and Minnesota combined for 76 points, 1,027 yards, 45 first downs, and 10 touchdowns, but surprisingly enough only one turnover.
And this week’s Instant IQ award goes to…
“When it’s breezy, swing it easy.” Ed Cunningham.
“Yo, Yo! Write that one down!” Gary Thorne.
This week’s Super-Stud Awards go to…
1. Vince “The Program” Young, QB Texas – Obviously, Vince makes this list. He joins Missouri’s Brad Smith as the only other player to rush and pass for over 230 yards in a game. Vince finished with a NCAA high 267 yards on the ground and 239 through the air, to go with his 4 touchdowns.
2. Kalvin’n’Hobbs McRae, RB Ohio – Frank Solich’s sophomore is quickly closing in on 1,000 yards for the season. This week he netted 224 yards and two touchdowns on 31 carries as Ohio cruised past Buffalo.
3. Steven “Which” Wichman, QB Idaho – Wichman led the Vandals past the New Mexico State Lobo’s this weekend, throwing the little pigskin for 489 yards –ouch!
4. Daniel Smith, WR Idaho – Helping Wichman pick up the victory, Mr. Smith snagged 11 catches for 269 yards and 2 touchdowns.
5. Michael “I’m fast, but I’m not that fast” Johnson, DB Arizona – He was fast enough on Saturday, converting one of his school record three picks into the pig house as Arizona surprised Oregon State.
6. Chub “B.” Small, RB Marshall – With a name like that, Mr. Small deserves this list just for making it out of middle school. On Saturday, the freshman returned 4 kicks for 160 yards and a touchdown, helping the Herd Thunder past the Green Wave, 27-26.
7. Ted “e-Bear” Ginn Jr., WR Ohio State – I think this is the first time Mr. Ginn has made our list all season. Against Minnesota, lucky #7 ran back a 100 yard kick off for a touchdown in less time than it takes most college guys to pound a beer –now, that’s fast.
8. The USC Trojan Offense – In what was widely expected to be a down week for the Trojans, they exploded right out of the gate to pick up their 30th consecutive victory and reclaim the BCS #1 slot. When the dust cleared and the Cougars were picked up off the turf, the Trojans had compiled 745 yards of total offense.
9. Todd “Don’t Be” Blythe, WR Iowa State – In torching the Aggie DBs, he caught eight passes for 214 yards and four touchdowns. To boot, he set the school mark for most receiving touchdowns in a game.
10. Brian “Boom Boom” Calhoun, RB Wisconsin – The Badger’s Back lowered the boom on the Illini for 197 yards and five touchdowns in Wisconsin’s 41-24 win. In so doing, ‘Boom Boom’ tied a school record for most touchdowns in a single game –that’s the second time he’s tied that particular record this season.
Riding the Bench This Week is…
1. Nebraska’s Offensive Line – Minus Two yards rushing last weekend, sixteen yards rushing this weekend –that’s pitiful, ridiculously pitiful for a storied program like Nebraska. To make matters worse, the offensive line gave up a school record 9 sacks against the Sooners on Saturday.
2. Gary Pinkel, Head Coach Missouri – Last week, he had the game plan to make QB Brad Smith the first Division I-A player with better than 230 yards in a single game through the air and on the ground. This week, not only did he forget to bring a game plan, but he forget how to make half time adjustments. The Kansas defense smothered Brad Smith for just 179 yards of total offense, 38 with his feet.
Random Hits and Misses
My moments of clarity and confusion from the weekend are:
1. Notre Dame announced on Saturday that first year head coach Charlie Weis has been rewarded with a 10-year contract extension to ‘ward off’ speculation that the coach may move to the NFL. The contract is believed to be the richest for any coach in the NCAA (somewhere between $30 and $40 million) and runs through the 2015 season. While that all sounds nice and wonderful, I can’t help but have a sense of Déjà vu here: Tyrone Willingham was rewarded in much the same way after starting off his tenure with eight straight victories and, well, we all know how that ended. At 5-2, Charlie is hardly a godsend –yet. True, he’s done magnificent things with this year’s Golden Domer squad, but Ty did the same in his first season so just don’t go counting your chickens before they’re hatched.
2. As happy as the Irish are with their head coach, the Aggies of College Station are increasingly and increasingly less so with theirs. Dennis Franchione was stolen away from Alabama to replace long time Aggie man R. C. Slocum (what is he up to these days, anyway?). Now in his third season, ‘French’ione is just 11-13 overall and 5 -3 this season, and owns the nation’s third worst pass defense and worst overall defense in the Big 12. Was this the kind of success the Aggies expected? The only coach in the Big12 more on the hot seat than Dennis is Husker’s Bill Callahan.
3. This past week saw a new ‘all-divisions’ NCAA scoring mark set: most points scored in the shortest amount of time. The honor goes to the Division II Central Washington Wildcats who put 27 unanswered points up on the board in 70 seconds. How’d they do that, you ask? By scoring putting together a nice offensive scoring drive and then following it up with three quick strike defensive touchdowns, two pick sixes and a fumble return. The previous record was held by Division III Mont Union, who had scored 21 points in 33 seconds in 1996. The Division I record is held, not by Texas Tech, but by Colorado State. In 1997 and against San Jose State, the Rams scored 20 points in 55 seconds.
4. If I hear one more time about how Mack Brown decided to ‘lighten it up’ and download 2,000 songs onto his I-Pod, I’m gonna seriously lose it. How many times can they report the exact same thing? Ok, we get it, enough already: Mack “Daddy” Brown is a player’s coach. Great, now let’s move on…
5. Kudos to Barry Switzer and Tom Osborne. During the OU-Nebraska game, they told it like it is. When asked whether their power run game would be able to compete and win against the Spread Offense, they wasted no time in making one thing very, very clear: Yes, their playbooks will still win national championships, but nobody wants to use them because high scoring, dynamic offenses are all the rage. I would submit, too, that those offenses make it easier to lure in top athletes from around the country, but some places still need to play to their strengths (and I think Mr. Osborne would agree).
6. The Hard Luck Bears continued their odyssey through woe and sorrow on Saturday. This week it was at home against the Red Raiders. Up until the 4th quarter, the Bears largely kept the Air Raid attack in check, trailing just 6-0. In fact, they had several chances to actually take the lead in this one (a touchdown called back and a missed fourth and goal opportunity, proving the most devastating). In the end though, they could only contain these Raiders for so long, finally succumbing to the prick-and-poke Tech attack, 28-0.
7. How in the world have we allowed ourselves to be so fooled? With their 4th loss of the season, the Volunteers have now dropped out of the Top 25. They began the season at #3 in the pre-season, and now join Michigan, Oklahoma, Iowa, Louisville, and Purdue as teams that were ranked in the Top 15 nationally, only to crash and burn once the pigskin started flying.
8. It’s official: Rutgers is the feel good story of the season. It’s been 26 long years since the Scarlet Knights have played in the post season, and now that drought is over. Is this just an aberration for a Big East in flux, or the start of something new? Quirky stat of the week: The last time Rutgers made themselves bowl eligible was in 1982 (although they did not go bowling that year) with a win against, you guessed it, Navy 31-21.
9. Texas Tech’s Taurean Henderson is just 75 yards short of becoming the first player in NCAA history to reach 2,000 yards rushing and 2,000 yards receiving. With the Aggies coming for a visit out on the Tumbleweed Plains, do you think there’s even the slightest chance he won’t grab that record?
10. I think this may be the funniest thing I’ve read in a long, long time, straight from a wire article : Casey Dick, a freshman quarterback who's seen no action in Razorback games this year because he's been redshirted, will start for the Hogs against the Gamecocks on Saturday, coach Houston Nutt said. "He has a strong arm and good instincts. It's hard to explain. He just has 'it.'”
If I Could Be Anyone This Week It’d Be…
A South Carolina Gamecock. Not only did they manage to beat Tennessee on a field goal with under three minutes to go, but they did at Rocky Top –something the South Carolina program has never done before. Equally nice, at 5-3 they are in good shape for a bowl bid with Arkansas, Florida, and Clemson still on the docket. What might even be more delicious (if you’re a Gamecock fan): the last Tennessee coach that lost to the Gamecocks (Johnny Majors in 1992) ‘left the program’ six days later.
Next Week’s Quick Peeks
Pittsburgh @ Louisville –After a two week hiatus, the BEast is finally back on the tube, this time in a Thursday night showdown. Louisville will try to recapture some pre-season magic and climb back up the conference standings. Meanwhile, off-the-radar Pittsburgh has begun playing a little ball: three straight victories over Cincinnati, South Florida, and Syracuse. Can they make it four in a row?
Iowa @ Northwestern – Both teams ride into this one having dropped their last game (and both to the Wolverines, oddly enough). Will the week off for the Hawkeyes prove the difference here, or will Tyrell Sutton and Brett Basanez prove too much for the Iowa defense?
Tennessee @ Notre Dame – The pre-season #3 Tennessee Volunteers travel to South Bend for a tussle with the Fighting Irish. Early on in the year, this one was circled by just about everyone. Now, it’s an after thought, penciled in mainly by those Volunteer faithful hoping that Fulmer can somehow pull a miracle out of his hat and muster back some respect for the downtrodden program. On the other side of the hashes, Charlie Weiss will be looking to jump some more poll slots to finish no lower than 12th in the nation, and so ensure Notre Dame’s return to the BCS.
Wisconsin @ Penn State – It’s THE Big 10 showdown as the Badgers from Camp Randall ship out to Happy Valley to find out who takes control of the race for the conference crown. With Wisconsin’s defense playing worse than I’ve ever seen them, this one may not be the battle that everyone’s predicting –especially with that young, electric offense Joe Pa’s got brewing up in Beaver Stadium. Even so, the Badgers should get a couple of key personnel back on defense and keep this one tight (remember: Barry’s Boys love a good fight).
Army @ Air Force – Over on The Classic, the Commander-In-Chief trophy goes up for grabs: 1-6 Army can still claim the trophy by sweeping Air Force this week and Navy the first week of December. In order to do so, the Army Grunts will have to have their game of the season against the nation’s 8th ranked ground assault and much underrated QB Shaun Carney.
UCLA @ Arizona – Will the Bruins Cinderella comeback run continue this week? ‘Zona and the Stoops Boys says no, but perhaps it’s the Drew Boys who will have the final say on the matter. Maurice Drew and Drew Olson are the one-two punch that drive this Bruin team to heights well beyond what could have been considered normal in the preseason. The Wildcats, meanwhile, have inserted Freshman QB Willie Tuitama into the starting lineup and got an outstanding 13 of 22 for 335 yard passing day out of him against Oregon State last week. Can he do the same against the PAC10’s best pass defense?
Miami, Fla @ VA Tech – The Hokies finally get their headliner game this week. Texas had Ohio State, USC had Notre Dame, the Hokies get the Hurricanes. On Saturday night on ESPN, if you’re even the least bit of a college football fan, you’d better tune in for this one. Marcus Vick and the versatile Hokie offense host Larry Coker’s Hurricanes in Blacksburg. Miami is brining their nation leading defense to the table –one that allowed just 4 yards of offense to NC State during a 29 minute span in the second half. Are the Hokies for ready for that kind of smash mouth?
Stanford @ USC – Despite last week’s loss in double overtime to UCLA, Walt Harris has this Cardinal team on a role. Can they put a stop to the nation’s longest win streak, or will the Trojan offense rip apart another lesser team?
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...
posted by TheMOTT at 4:06 PM
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