Some Bowl Season Thoughts

As the bowl season winds down to its merciful conclusion (rumor has it there will be a championship game of sorts sometime next week), we had some thoughts about the games, teams and programs we’ve watched thus far:

Outside an epic collapse against Stanford, the ’07 season had to feel like Groundhog Day all over again for the USC Trojans. An 11-2 season, 2 conference losses, another thumping of Notre Dame and all other non-conference opponents and another ass-kicking of a hopelessly out-classed Big Ten team in the Rose Bowl made it a virtual mirror image of the ’06 season. And take a look at their schedule next year and ask yourself if a “three-peat” is not in the offing.

And for you BCS supporters out there, after watching SC destroy Illinois (and their spread-option offense), ask yourself if you really think this BCS thing works. We know it’s a slippery slope to play the comparative win/loss thing but SC humiliated the team that Ohio St. loss to and Ohio St. will play a LSU team that will probably be the first (and hopefully ever) 2-loss national champion. What a great system!


Oklahoma…. We don’t want to say Bob Stoops is on notice…. but Bob Stoops is on notice. We commented before the regular season that though Stoops was not on the hot seat, Sooner fans were starting to get a little edgy that Oklahoma had not appeared in the BCS title game since beating Florida St. after the 2000 season. And that fact itself would not be so bad if the Sooners had not dropped 4 of their last 5 BCS bowl games including a 20-point loss last night to West Virginia, the epic upsest loss to Boise St. last year and a 55-19 thanks-for-showing-up-and-collecting-the-game check "appearance" against USC 3 years ago in the BCS title game. For one of the 6 or 7 mega-programs in the nation that expects to compete for the championship every year, this is entirely unacceptable.

In fact, as opposed to Oklahoma, its precisely because USC shows up to not just win but abuse their BCS opponent every year, that makes these multiple loss seasons much more tolerable (a 5-1 record in their last 6 while outscoring their opponents by an average of 23 points in those 5 victories).

Great win by 10 pt. underdog Michigan in Coach Lloyd Carr’s last game against Florida in the Gator Bowl. What was up, though, with incoming coach Rich Rodriguez (formerly of West Virginia) on the Michigan sideline? We understand that Rodriguez was invited by Carr himself but the class move would’ve been to politely decline so as to not be a distraction and to allow Carr one last moment of glory as a Michigan's Man.

Kansas (and perhaps the largest man you will ever see roaming the sidelines) takes on Virginia Tech tonight in the Orange Bowl for your antidote to the Hawkeye Caucii. Orange Bowl... hmmm... Hey, do you think we'll see these guys?