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When Saturdays die
October 5, 2007
Isn’t this sad, folks?
Just five weeks into the season and, remarkably, Your Editor is having a hard time getting excited about this coming weekend of college football. Even though I’m going to the game.
That’s what a couple losses (bad ones) will do to you: They make Saturdays die.
Two weeks in a row now, I’ve seen my favorite day of the week expire early. It’s hard to handle. And I’m not sure I can handle it again this week.
Let me explain.
It goes without saying that the most important part of any college football Saturday, for me, is watching the Penn State game.
Still, I’ve got an admission to make: The Nits game is not my favorite part of my college football Saturdays. No, my favorite part of college football Saturday is all of those hours I can spend watching all of those other games around the nation, after the Nits have already won. This is why noon games are good, folks.
But also bad. Sure, if the Nits win at noon, the rest of the day us a freaking party. But if they lose?
Well, turn out the lights. Day over.
I love college football for the huge variety of games every Saturday. I love college football for all those the highlights shows late at night. I love college football for all of the all-day phone calls and text messages my friends and I exchange about the day’s events.
But when my Nittany Lions lose, none of that is fun. Not in the least.
See, when Penn State loses, I can’t enjoy watching the other games of the day—because the sight of some other team winning (especially Ohio State, Michigan, Pitt or Notre Dame) makes me angry (luckily, I haven’t had much trouble with Pitt or Notre Dame this year). I can’t enjoy the highlights—because inevitably ESPN will show all of the plays that broke my heart just hours before. I can’t even switch sports gears and enjoy baseball—because with those damn scrolling scoreboards that ESPN uses now, I am taunted every 20 minutes by the sight of that awful score: Illinois 27, Penn State 20 … Michigan 14, Penn State 9. They might as well stab with me with a fork.
Bottom line, folks? When the Nits lose, it might as well be a Tuesday. Because there’s no recovering from an early-day Saturday loss.
Luckily, there are two sure-fire ways to prevent this tragedy, to prevent this killing of Saturday:
A Penn State win.
Or an 8 p.m. start.
continued ...
Out And About: News And Notes You May Have Missed
• I think it's a kind of cruel injustice that Your Editor spent much of the summer promoting Illinois as an up-and-comer in the Big Ten, then saw them lose their opener to Missouri (which took the wind out of my prediction’s proverbial sailes), and then was made to suffer when my warnings about the Illini finally came true—against Penn State. I mean, what the ****? Regardless, anyone who has seen Illinois play this year knows they aren’t bad. Not bad at all. There is speed on offense (Juice Williams, Rashard Mendenhall), a game-changer on defense (linebacker J. Leman) and a superstar in the making (receiver/return man Aurellius Benn). All of which may explain why the Illini are actually the favorite (according to Vegas [snore]) to beat No. 5 Wisconsin (and is there a more overrated No. 5 in the history of college football than the Badgers, folks?; Answer: No) this week. But the oddsmakers certainly didn’t make Illinois coach Ron Zook happy. Told that his team was a 3-point favorite, even though they are unranked, Zook said "I think that's ludicrous. That's somebody from Wisconsin trying to get them upset or fired up. I don't think there's any way possible that a team like us could be favored over a team like Wisconsin.''
• Chad Henne’s senior season is not going according to plan. There were those two season-opening losses to Appalachian State and Oregon. There was the knee injury, suffered during the Oregon loss. There was the misery of not being able to play against Penn State (and beat them) one last time. And now there is the indignity of a senior-season quarterback controversy. Henne has heard the chants from Michigan faithful (they were especially loud during the Oregon game) for true freshman Ryan Mallett (“We want Mallett!”), but kept quiet about the situation until this week, when he finally made his feelings known to the Michigan student newspaper. Asked whether he thought his job was in jeopardy, Henne said: "It's all a bunch of B.S. It's not going to happen. I have too much pride to let that happen, and I'm not going to let myself slip. (Mallett) is a great person and I have a lot of respect for him. But it's my team, it's my senior year and I'm going to go out and play my best football these next couple games."
• So you may or may not have heard about the controversy (if you could call it that) involving Michigan’s apparent use of an “ineligble” player for several games earlier this year. Among those contests was the Wolverines’ (inevitable) win over Penn State. But recently, according to reports from the Detroit Free Press and other news outlets, the Big Ten offices were investigating the matter—and were taking it very, very seriously. How seriously? Well, Big Ten officials had said that if Michigan was found guilty in the matter, they would possibly be forced to forfeit the Penn State win. Which would have been, in Your Editor’s opinion, utterly ridiculous (the player in question, freshman Artis Chambers, appears mostly on special teams), not to mention somewhat embarrassing for Penn State. Coach Joseph Vincent Paterno, asked about the matter this week, apparently agreed. Said Paterno: "I don't want to take it away from the kids. I don't know what's going on. That's up to the Big Ten. They had players on the field and we had players on the field. They got more points than we did. ... I don't even know who the player was or what impact he had on the game.” And, late Thursday night, the final ruling from the Big Ten came down: Michigan would not be forced to forfeit any games. So much for Penn State's chances of breaking The Streak.
Quick Hits: Straight And To The Point
• LSU coach Les “Counting The Days Until I Move To Ann Arbor” Miles had to laugh when he saw his Tigers leapfrog USC for the No. 1 spot in the Associated Press poll this week. The reason? The Tigers didn’t exactly light it up against Tulane last week, posting more penalties (11) than points (10) in the first half, before pulling away late in New Orleans. Said Miles: "The truth of the matter is anybody that voted us No. 1, it's obvious they didn't get up in the morning and watch us play. If they would have watched the first half, there is no way they would have voted us No. 1.” Which again brings us back to the most important question facing college football, folks: Why do we have such a completely moronic system for choosing a champion? It is literally as scientific as a 4th Grade class president election. In fact, it is less scientific than that. Thanks, college presidents.
• Quotable. Michigan quarterback Chad Henne, on his confidence that he won’t lose his job: "It doesn't really make sense. I came back (this year) for a reason, and the coaches realize that. As long as I keep progressing, I deserve the spot. They won't take it away." Never say never, Chad.
• Joe Tiller was leaving his house this week when his neighbor, apparently a big Purdue fan, told the coach, “I can’t wait until Saturday!” But Tiller apparently is in no big rush. Said Tiller: “I was thinking, 'I can wait.'" That's why TCFA likes Joe Tiller.
• Hey Penn State fans, here's some (much-needed) good news for you: Highly classified reports out of State College suggest that our crack offensive coaching staff this week installed some new plays specifically for athletic back-up quarterback Daryll Clark. Think "spread option" kind of plays. You know, the ones Michael Robinson ran so well.
• Hey, Penn State fans, here's some (not needed) bad news for you: When our crack offensive coaching staff installed those plays for Clark, it apparently didn't go over well with Anthony Morelli. In fact, it was reported by one outlet that Morelli "threw his helmet" when the plays for Clark were introduced. If this is true, let me ask: What the ****?
• Clemson kicker Mark Buchholz missed four of five field goal attempts last week. And his team lost, 16-3, to Georgia Tech. This would usually go down as nothing more than a “bad day for the kicker,” but Buchholz’ case is anything but usual. See, besides being Clemson’s placekicker, Buchholz is also a major contributor the Tigers’ soccer team. He splits practice time between the squads and, more problematically, also has to scramble every week to make sure he’s there for both the Tigers’ soccer matches and football games. This weekend, for instance, Buckholz will travel north to Maryland for Friday’s 8 p.m. soccer game, then head back to Clemson sometime Friday night or (if he can't catch a late flight) first thing Saturday morning. Though Buchholz insists he can handle both sports, Tiger football fans are not happy, and coach Tommy Bowden this week admitted that there’s a lot of things he can’t do in Friday practice when his kicker is playing soccer three states away. Said Bowden: "He's off somewhere playing soccer. And his mind's 1,000 miles away from kicking." Something tells me coach Bowden ain't an Arsenal fan.
• Now for our weekly Head Ball Coach moment. Do you folks realize that Head Ball Coach has South Carolina ranked No. 11 in the polls? Do you realize the No. 11 Gamecocks were, last night, taking on a Kentucky team that had No. 8 ranking—its highest position since freaking Bear Bryant was coaching there? It was, you see, the unlikeliest of bigtime SEC matchups, and even Head Ball Coach couldn't quite believe it. Said Head Ball Coach earlier this week: "You guys have seen this South Carolina-Kentucky game for how many years? What'd it mean? Somebody won, somebody lost and somebody's still in position to win six games to qualify for a bowl game.” I know some folks hate the man, but I'll never understand why. He only speaks the truth!