Simulated Gameday Experience

In retrospect, I probably shouldn’t have posted as quickly about the Leach firing as I did. Since that post went up with my initial thoughts, there have been a few developments: (more…)

The Liberty Bowl has fallen off a bit from its 2004 Louisville – Boise State clash-of-the-mid-majors tilt; sure, it reeked of an undercard, but for a bowl who’s typically sitting around second-level status, it counts as glory days. Since then, Conference USA got raided by the Big East and the Mountain West backed out of the picture; the Liberty Bowl capitalized on that by bringing in some essentially random mediocre SEC West team (note: capitalized is only used in the highest irony possible). Under this scenario, it’d make East Carolina and Arkansas squaring off wholly unexciting. (more…)

One of the last games of the year, the Sun Bowl has had its share of good games and good stories in recent history – Oregon rebounding from the devastating loss of Dennis Dixon to win big in 2007, Oregon State making a huge 4th quarter comeback against Missouri and memorably going for two rather than sending the game to overtime… in fact, no game in the last eleven years has been decided by more than 12 points, and only two had double digit margins. Of course, close isn’t always good, as last year’s 3-0 win by Oregon State over Pitt was a complete disaster of a game, all the way down to the 1/4 FG line, but hey that shouldn’t happen this year, right? I mean, it’s not like one team has a great defense but at the same time has been completely decimated by injuries on the offensive… oh wait. But nah, this’ll be a good game! We promise! (more…)

2007 was a noteworthy year for the Texas Bowl, as it was the only year a team from Texas has participated in this Houston classic with a deep history spanning four years. That year, TCU defeated Houston 20-13 in the only game (of the three so far) that wasn’t a complete blowout. So yeah, Texas Bowl. Good times. Let’s meet the 2009 participants. (more…)

I can’t shake the feeling that the Capital One Bowl is a generally vague disappointment this season. Both Penn State and LSU opened the season as fringe BCS contenders who needed a bit of help to make the national title game; they finished the season 1-3 against teams in the Top 25 when they played them and more importantly 0-5 against teams that are currently in the top 25. Somehow these teams are ranked 11th and 13th in the BCS for reasons that quite frankly pass understanding to me, although they’re somewhat similar. (more…)

So this was supposed to be yet another preview article about both teams, their seasons (including their one combined loss) and, well, who’d have a shot to win this. There’s one heck of a stylistic matchup between Florida’s defense and Cincinnati’s offense that’s probably worth blowing 1,000 words on in its own right. Then again, that was also before the coaches decided they were going to up and leave town – since the end of the season, we’ve had both head coaches and both the coordinators in the main matchup bail for either various other head coaching gigs or for personal reasons. For clarity’s sake: Urban Meyer is going on vacation, Brian Kelly is at Notre Dame, Charlie Strong (Florida’s DC) is at Louisville, and Jeff Quinn (Cincinnati’s OC) is at Buffalo. Of the four, Meyer and Quinn will be acting head coaches for their respective sides and Strong will be a DC for one final game before moving on- only Brian Kelly won’t be around for this one. (Incidentally, incoming HC Butch Jones won’t be on the sidelines for either Cincinnati or his former Central Michigan outfit. Apparently there’s a pipeline between CMU and UC, who knew?)

It’s a complete shame that all the coaching activity ended up drastically overshadowing the storylines on the field, since as far as matchups go this is pretty solid. (more…)

From the annals of the truly bizarre comes Mike Leach’s termination, effective immediately. Leach is a bit of a character in his own right; as I’m writing this I’m half-staring at a pirate flag across the street, which is doing nothing but reminding me of Leach and his fascination with pirates. That, along with a prolific passing offense and tendency to act a bit bizarre at times (sometimes that qualifies as understatement), is why we’ve heard of Leach.

That, not coincidentally, is why he ended up getting canned. On some level, this came down to a he-said he-said argument; Adam James (and, by extension, Craig James, and, by extension, his employer ESPN, albeit acting as a platform only and not with any sort of agenda – would’ve made it a wee bit awkward had James gone through with broadcasting the Alamo Bowl, which TTU is a part of) assert that Leach treated him unfairly while he was injured. Leach, of course, denies this, although he does assert that he did take disciplinary action. I’m not going to get into all the details here. What’s important right now are two factors:

- Mike Leach is now available as a coach, at least in theory

- Texas Tech brass, Leach, and possibly the James family are about to get embroiled in one heck of a legal mess

(more…)

The Holiday Bowl has had a lot of interesting matchups and shocking upsets during the BCS years. When neither conference gets a BCS invite, it matches up the #2 team in the Pac 10 against the #3 team in the Big 12. Often times this has been a team on the cusp of playing in a BCS game, perhaps a loss away from the championship game, and we’ve seen some teams like 03 Texas, 04 Cal, and 05 Oregon come into this game perhaps focused on that a little too much, only to leave San Diego with their tail between their legs. Since 1998, only twice has either conference claimed this game in back-to-back years, and just three games have been settled by 14 or more points. Many times this has ended up being arguably the best December bowl game of the season, perhaps most notably Major Applewhite’s classic comeback performance in 2001. (read more…)

Look, this whole Urban Meyer thing is weird. It walks, talks, and smells like burnout. First, we had a full-blown resignation occurring amidst unsubstantiated speculation this was either cancer or some kind of serious heart condition. (This was also occurring as we got to play everyone’s favorite game – “Let’s Figure Out / Take Wild Guesses on the Next Florida Coach.” The Society of People to Lure Bob Stoops Away from His Cushy Job with Lifetime Security approves.) This would also make the resignation turned sabbatical turned leave of absence understandable; granted, since Meyer seems (so far) like he’s going to be the head coach once the 2010 season rolls around, this may not have a significant effect on the Florida program. This looks like a man going “I have to get away, this is going to kill me” and taking whatever steps he had to before dialing the hyperbole back a bit. (more…)

Look, I don’t care: this is the Peach Bowl. This is not the Chik-Fil-A Bowl, although they do make one heck of a sandwich. This is one of the comparatively few bowls out there that actually has some kind of history, and if it’s good enough for the Rose Bowl to stubbornly cling to an outdated tradition and be mocked roundly, well, it’s pretty easy for me to do the same.

This year’s incarnation pairs a couple of teams who are strikingly similar; both rely on power running games and excellent defensive play (typified in part by a safety operating up in run support a large percentage of the time). The difference lies in – go figure, knowing the teams – special teams: Virginia Tech has them, while Tennessee hasn’t had them in a while, up to and including this season. (more…)