Norman Einstein's
ISSUE 04 (09/09)
"An Incomplete & Completely Biased College Football Preview"
Strike up the band. Slather on the war paint. Send the kids out for supplies. The college football season is just days away.
To prepare you for the next four months of collective, collegiate insanity, the Norman Einsteins presents this week-by-week guide to the best games of the season. For each week, we highlight one important game. Our experts, a talented team of fan bloggers, share insight about their teams playing in each highlighted game.
Our preview is by no means complete, nor is it balanced. But the fun of college football is in its unrepentant biases and utter lack of perspective. To wit, we've asked our contributors to examine their teams in ways you won't find in other season previews.
Go State! Rah U! Let's kick this party off!
Credit: One Bronco Nation Under God
Thursday, September 3
Oregon at Boise State (10:15p)
Saturday, September 5
Georgia at Oklahoma State (3:30p)
Missouri at Illinois (3:40p)
Brigham Young vs Oklahoma (7p)
Alabama vs Virginia Tech (8p)
Kevan Lee, One Bronco Nation Under God
INT. BRONCO STADIUM - DRAB BASEMENT-LEVEL CONFERENCE ROOM - LATE NIGHT
After five overtimes Oregon and Boise State remain tied, muted CHEERS of a restless crowd above are heard intermittently.
BEANO COOK, recently appointed college football commissioner, has decreed the game to be decided by roundtable discussion. Around the table sits Boise State head coach CHRIS PETERSON, Oregon quarterback JEREMIAH MASOLI, television analyst CRAIG JAMES, and others.
BEANO COOK: I can't remember why I brought you all here today. Is this a roast? Are you guys roasting me?
CHRIS PETERSON: We're trying to end this football game. It's kind of important considering this is the only nationally-respected opponent on our schedule this year.
BEANO: Oh. Right. I knew it was either college football or an ESPN SportsZone commercial. I sure hope I didn't confuse the ESPN SportsZone commercial with my colonoscopy intake exam.
CRAIG JAMES: Beano, if it's all right with you, I'd like to start off this discussion by having everyone look at my goatee and giving me compliments.
BEANO: Good. Let's start there and see where things go.
PETERSON: Actually, I'd rather just get right down to it. You see, my team needs this win. If we lose this game, we have zero chance of making a BCS bowl. Then we'll be stuck in the Humanitarian Bowl. Do you have any idea who sponsors the Humanitarian Bowl? A truck stop. A truck stop with showers.
Idaho Vandals head coach ROBB AKEY: Hey, don't knock truck stop showers. The dispenser soap there is delightful.
JEREMIAH MASOLI: Well, I think that Oregon should win because we need to revenge last year's loss.
JAMES: You guys lost to the Broncos last year? I thought I dreamed that...
PETERSON: Yes, all the more reason to give us the win. We need to prove that last year wasn't a fluke and that we deserve to be considered alongside BCS-conference competition. Kellen Moore is as good as any quarterback in the country. Our secondary is one of the nation's best. There's nothing not to love.
AMERICAN VIEWING PUBLIC: We don't like watching games on your blue turf!
BEANO: OK, OK. Petersnoggle, you make some good points. Masolini, tell me more from your perspective.
MASOLI: Well, Oregon should win because we are bigger, faster, and deeper than the Broncos, because I felt a slight breeze from a defensive lineman three seconds after I threw a pass yet there was no flag, and because Oregon fans are the most sane, rational, educated people I know.
OREGON FAN: Kellin More hittin da turf is lulz!1!!!
ABC analyst KIRK HERBSTREIT: Beano, may I chime in?
BEANO: I have no idea who you are.
HERBSTREIT: I picked the Broncos to go undefeated this season so I would like them to win in order to protect my sterling reputation.
ABC analyst LEE CORSO: (snickering)
Notre Dame head coach CHARLIE WEIS: Did someone say "Snickers?!"
KELLEN MOORE: C'mon, guys. What would Jesus do?
JESUS: Oh, you shouldn't ask me. I'm a Broncos fan. I can't be neutral.
PETERSON: Beano! Enough's enough. We need a decision.
MASOLI: Oregon!
HERBSTREIT: Boise State!
AMERICAN VIEWING PUBLIC: Anything but Leno's new show!
JAMES: A delightful new ABC buddy-cop comedy starring myself and Mark May: They fought the law... and the law fun!
BEANO: Fine. It's decided. I will have the Applebee's chicken fried chicken, hold the vegetables. I'm glad we could all get together for this ESPN commercial.
Thursday, September 10
Clemson at Georgia Tech (7:30p)
Saturday, September 12
Notre Dame at Michigan (3:30p)
UCLA at Tennessee (4p)
USC at Ohio State (8p)
Cian O'Day, editor
"A Non Fan's Notes"
On Thursday, the first of January, 2009, while patrolling a grassy expanse of the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, awaiting the inevitable victory of his USC Trojans, Taylor Mays induced what, at the time, I took to be two simultaneous concussions.
They weren't... concussions, that is. Oh, good old Mays did, indiscriminately, ferociously, level two players at once -- one an opposing Nittany Lion attempting to catch a pass, one a fellow Trojan attempting to defend it -- a feat brought on by Mays's nearly heroic recklessness. Stung as if by an icy death chill, both players writhed on the ground in pain for many moments.
I nearly dropped my beer (a tragedy averted in and of itself) at the sight of such violence. My mouth loosened a strangled cry of surprise, not unlike the cries one imagines loosened by Mays's lunging wallop.
If I had been at the bar, I might have felt the mighty smack of Frederick Exley's hand across my back. Not the jovial back slap of a fellow fan in revelry followed by lunatic winking of desperate and addled acknowledgement. No, you can chalk up Exley's wildly swinging appendages that find my unsuspecting back to a spastic celebration, pirouettes and dodges through the crowded bar in imitation of the play recently unfolded.
"Ex!" I say. "What the hell!"
"No apologies now," Exley replies. "It's too late in the evening for that nonsense. Empty your pockets: tonight, we drink!"
We chase each other through the bottom of pint glasses, then stop to huddle our heads together at the subterranean bar we somehow find ourselves within. Exley tells me that it's an awful thing, this glorification of the violent impact, that it detracts from the true beauty of all that finds its completion in the sudden collisions of the football field. I nod like I know what he means.
We quickly finish our drinks and break the huddle.
How frozen Brooklyn suddenly transformed into sunny California, I'll never know, but Exley gripped my arm tight at the sight of the world around us. Indeed, everyone appeared to have just stumbled, four Vicodins down reflected in glassy, vacant eyes, off the set of a VH1 reality show. This is not our America, the one in which we turn an approving nod for a beautifully turned play into a cackling seizure to measure the truth of it.
We did the only logical thing we could do: ran outside, screaming, to draw as much attention to ourselves as possible, and hopped into the first open-roofed convertible we saw.
I turn to Exley, saying "Ex, you know how to hot-wire these things, don't you?"
"Don't ask me," Exley replies, "I've been dead at least 17 years."
That's when the vision fades. There's battle yet to be done. I am ready. And cleats of Taylor Mays are chewing up turf. We are both running: obsessively running.
Credit: sravanthi.meka (Flickr)
Thursday, September 17
Georgia Tech at Miami (7:30p)
Saturday, September 19
Tennessee at Florida (3:30p)
Nebraska at Virginia Tech (3:30p)
Utah at Oregon (3:30p)
Arizona at Iowa (3:35p)
Cincinnati at Oregon State (6:45p)
Georgia at Arkansas (7:45p)
Texas Tech at Texas (8p)
Doug Gillett, Hey Jenny Slater
The spread offense has dominated talk around the SEC in recent years for the way it's revolutionized playbooks from Gainesville to Fayetteville. But another revolution is taking place on the other side of the ball -- quieter, less widespread, perhaps even less successful, but no less important for the effect it could have on one of the conference's most storied programs.
Quite simply, Georgia strong safety Reshad Jones is out to change the way defensive players tackle. Flying in the face of conventional wisdom that defenders wrap up the ball carrier and take him to the ground, Jones attempts a tackle with only a simple shoulder bump.
"How many times have you seen a guy running down the sideline and all it take is one bump to knock him out of bounds?" the Alabama native says. "We take those mechanics and make them work in the open field. We're containing opposing offenses and putting a lot less wear and tear on our guys in the bargain."
A hidden strength of the technique, Jones points out, is its versatility. Traditional wrap-up tackling can only be drilled on the practice field. But the shoulder-bump can be practiced anywhere -- and usually is. "Getting on the campus bus, just walking through the hallways, we get shoulder-bumped by hundreds of people a day. While players at other schools are just going to class, we're fine tuning our technique. Given time, that'll turn into a huge advantage."
The 6-foot-2, 215-pound junior began applying his philosophy on the field late last season. The results were, at best, mixed. After allowing only 273.8 yards and 18 points a game in the first half of the regular season, the Bulldogs gave up 362.8 and 33 in the second half. In that same period, rushing yards allowed per game nearly quadrupled. The most crushing blow came in the regular-season finale against in-state rival Georgia Tech, whose triple-option offense trampled the Dawgs for 409 yards.
Jones remembers that game all too well - midway through the fourth quarter, he shoulder-bumped Roddy Jones as he scampered across the Georgia 40, only to watch the Tech A-back stay in bounds and run for a game icing score. But Reshad insists his faulty execution, not his system, was to blame. "I get a different angle on him and it's a whole other story," he says.
"Anytime you install a new system, there's gonna be growing pains. Heck, even Urban Meyer had to go through that in Florida with the spread. Now they're winning national titles. Our whole secondary is taking physics this semester, learning about angles and vectors and whatnot to really make this work. Combine those with some biceps curls, really strengthen the shoulders, and you're gonna see a well-oiled machine out there in 2009."
Saturday, September 26
Illinois at Ohio State (TBA)
Miami at Virginia Tech (TBA)
Arkansas at Alabama (TBA)
North Carolina at Georgia Tech (TBA)
TCU at Clemson (TBA)
California at Oregon (3:30p)
Iowa at Penn State (8p)
Texas Tech at Houston (9:15p)
Mookie, 3rd Saturday In Blogtober
"To Roll a Mocking Bird"
Bahr Bryant is (as luck would have it) alive and well, maintaining quarters on the Alabama campus, in the basement of the Gorgas Library. He and his long-time roommates, Elvis Presley and Tupac Shakur, are currently adjusting to new fourth resident, Michael Jackson, in their basement dwellings. Bahr once told Terrence Cody and me, "Whip all the bluejays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a hokie."
That was the only time we ever heard Bahr say it was a sin to do something, and he continued, "Hokies don't do one thing but make music for us to enjoy... they don't do one thing but sing their hearts out for us. That's why it is a sin to kill a hokie."
At the time, Terrence leaned over to me and whispered, "What in the name of Joe Namath's pantyhose is a 'hokie?'" I told him it was a mentally challenged turkey or osprey or something of the sort.
Enough months have gone by to enable us to look back, so we sometimes discuss the events leading to the 2009 Chik-Fil-A Kickoff Classic versus Virginia Tech and our sense of wanting to prove something. I maintain that Andre Smith's agent started it all, but Terrence, who is two years my senior, said it started long before that. He said it began in the Georgia Dome, when someone had the idea of making Tim Tebow come out -- not out of the closet, but rather in a less metaphorical sense, on the football field (i.e. if Tebow was a turtle, and he was hiding in his shell, we lit a match under his belly, and he quickly emerged, fangs gnashing).
I said if he wanted to take a broad view of the thing, it really began with Mike Price. If Pappy Price hadn't ridden his Destiny right out of town, Mike Shula would've never paddled us up brown creek and thrown away the paddle, and Nick Saban may have never had the chance to "not... be the Alabama coach." And where would we be if he hadn't (not "not... [been] the Alabama coach")?
About halfway through the first quarter versus Virginia Tech, Terrence came off the field as the Hokie band tripped through its 35th rendition of the musical monstrosity, "Old Hokie Cheer," and he pulled me aside.
"Bahr Bryant is either dead or a liar. I'd rather be a sinner than have to listen to this awful junk for another second. Beside, I only ate a few ham hocks before kickoff, and I'm hungry."
That's when I knew Alabama was going to win the 2009 Chik-Fil-A Kickoff Classic.
Thursday, October 1
Colorado at West Virginia (7:30p)
Saturday, October 3
LSU at Georgia (TBA)
Oklahoma at Miami (TBA)
Michigan at Michigan State (TBA)
Central Michigan at Buffalo (3:30p)
USC at California (8p)
Johnny Saward, Ronald Bellamy's Underachieving All-Stars
Michigan's first season under Rich Rodriguez was not good. It was not close to good. It was three connecting flights, the Mount Ventoux stage of the Tour De France, a ride on the Port Authority Bus, and a rickshaw through dense traffic from good.
For as long as we've known this team, even the bad was never that bad. Bad was 2005: crippled by injuries, humbled by the graduation of the school's greatest wide receiver, and losing to Nebraska in a late-December bowl. After that, we told ourselves it could get no worse. (And I assure you, even winning the Alamo Bowl would have been no great feat. Because as with being able to recite the theme song from "Family Matters," eating 14 oreos in one sitting, or surpassing 100,000 points on cell-phone Tetris, it's impressive only until you consider that it's moderately embarrassing.)
Players on this Michigan team are either too young, or too haunted by previous catastrophes, to have concrete expectations. They just want things to get better. For most of the decade, Michigan has been a waning powerhouse constantly undone by complacency and a bullying rival. Michigan came for the throne and lost, and now they must return to the common folk. Last season demolished everything but a helmet, a fight song, and a stadium. They're forgotten, and that hurts the most.
Among the players lambasted by fans and abused by opponents last season (and there were several) few were as tormenting as Stevie Brown.
If Mike Hart represented the "Balls and My Word" underdog cherished and keenly unearthed by Lloyd Carr, Brown has been a condemnation of Carr's ability to develop athletes. The dreaded ATH out of high school whose hype rode squarely on the back of a strong 40-yard dash, Brown spent his first three seasons at safety before being converted to linebacker this off-season. In addition to being a poor tackler and displaying even worse football instincts, Brown's most notable achievements have been getting tagged in several Facebook pictures with wide receiver Greg Matthews, and supplanting Ryan Mundy as "Safety whose name has become a verb, noun, and expletive."
But, in the end, in a strange way, Brown's egregious failings only serve to strengthen our bond with this team. We've spent long afternoons hating the way he's played; we've blamed him for problems more complex than he's capable of causing. And it's always done somewhat regrettably, because he's still one of our guys. He's been under three different defensive coordinators and two head coaches and he speaks bashfully and plays tentatively, almost as if he knows he's been lousy and he agonizes over it far more than we do.
This year Michigan is a team cobbled together with freshman quarterbacks, an unproven secondary, running back Brandon Minor, defensive end Brandon Graham, and a number of defensive position switches necessitated by both a revamped defensive scheme and a frightening lack of depth. The offense returns almost entirely intact, and as a whole the team has reportedly embraced the Rodriquez culture far more earnestly than a year ago.
Fittingly, the self-declared theme of this year is "All In for Michigan," which while a little hackneyed is reminiscent of the vengeful, nothing-to-lose attitude that fueled 2006's 11-2 season. They are fighting against the overwhelming perception that they cannot win in this conference playing the only way their coach knows how.
But doubt is a galvanizing force.
"We weren't together last year," Minor said recently. "Players questioned the program. We got everybody all in now."
Saturday, October 10
Alabama at Mississippi (TBA)
Georgia Tech at Florida State (TBA)
Connecticut at Pittsburgh (TBA)
West Virginia at Syracuse (TBA)
Michigan State at Illinois (noon)
TCU at Air Force (7:30p)
Florida at LSU (8p)
Sean Keeley, Troy Nunes Is an Absolute Magacian
EXT. CARRIER DOME - HOME TEAM SIDELINE - NOON
The Dome is abuzz as Syracuse is about to take the field against the hated Mountaineers. The West Virginia defense has just lined up and is preparing for battle. Head coach DOUG MARRONE looks out proudly as his team takes the field. Except...
One player is missing.
DOUG MARRONE: Paulus! Where's Paulus?
Starting quarterback GREG PAULUS, looking dazed with two bandaids in the form of an 'X' on his forehead, comes running. He's carrying a basketball.
GREG PAULUS: Hey, coach!
MARRONE: Uh... what the hell are you doing?
GREG: Gonna go play, coach.
MARRONE: Why do you have a basketball?
GREG: How else do you want me to run point?
MARRONE: Greg, when I said I want you to be like a point guard out there, I meant it figuratively. This is football, son.
GREG: Just explain one thing to me. How many fouls does the defense get before they foul out?
MARRONE: Foul what?! What are you talking about?
GREG: Look, coach, I'm not taking any charges unless I know.
MARRONE: You're not taking any charges, period.
GREG: You wanna play loose and up tempo: I like it. I'm gonna look for Delone Carter at the arc for three.
MARRONE: No, you're going to hand the ball off to Delone. There is no arc. We have kickers to handle the threes.
GREG: No arc? That's some serious Matrix stuff, coach.
MARRONE: Greg, I need you to focus.
GREG: Is Delone coming to me? I don't want to travel.
MARRONE: (sighing deeply) Delone will come to you. Just stay where you are.
GREG: I like it, coach. At Duke, I always ended up on my back.
MARRONE: Son, I don't think this is going to end any differently.
GREG: Watch for my signal, coach. I might call timeout in the middle of a play if it doesn't look like it's developing.
MARRONE: You do that.
GREG: Final Four, here we come!
Paulus runs off. Marrone turns to face his backup quarterback, RYAN NASSIB.
MARRONE: Ryan, get ready.
Thursday, October 15
Cincinnati at South Florida (7:30p)
Friday, October 16
Pittsburgh at Rutgers (8p)
Saturday, October 17
Kansas at Colorado (TBA)
Virginia Tech at Georgia Tech (TBA)
California at UCLA (TBA)
Oklahoma at Texas (noon)
USC at Notre Dame (3:30p)
HeadThief, LandThieves
"New Boomer Sooner"
Bradford's awesome, Gresham's awesome,
Bradford's awesome, Gresham's awesome,
Bradford's awesome, Gresham's awesome,
Stoops is awesome, OK U!
4 new lineman, 4 new linemen,
2 new safeties, 2 new safeties,
Ryan's left knee, Ryan's right knee,
All these problems, OK U!
I'm a Sooner born and a Sooner bred,
Let's win a bowl game before I'm dead,
Rah Oklahoma! Rah Oklahoma!
Rah Oklahoma, OK U!
Credit: ConcussionLLP (Flickr)
Thursday, October 22
Florida State at North Carolina (8p)
Saturday, October 24
Oklahoma at Kansas (TBA)
Arkansas at Mississippi (TBA)
Oklahoma State at Baylor (TBA)
Clemson at Miami (TBA)
TCU at Brigham Young (7:30p)
Oregon State at USC (8p)
Sir Wesley Willis, Spit Blood
INT. LAVELL EDWARDS STADIUM - VISITORS LOCKER ROOM - EVENING
TCU head coach GARY PATTERSON wearing a grim expression walks up to defensive end JERRY HUGHES and places a heavy hand on his shoulder.
GARY PATTERSON: Jerry, I've been meaning to talk to you. Now, you're the best defensive end in the country. You'll probably be a first round draft choice next year. Some people even say that you invented the bitchslap, you know that?
JERRY HUGHES: Well, coach, I just try and play my game, you know, get to the quarterback.
PATTERSON: Damn right, son. You remember last year? Remember what you did to Max Hall? You treated him like Michael Vick treats a pit bull! Four sacks? I think we can double that.
HUGHES: Well, coach, 8 sacks for a season is a lot, especially considering I'm double teamed on every passing down...
PATTERSON: Jerry, I don't think you're hearing me. You WILL get 8 sacks TONIGHT! Knock old Joseph Smith's golden sunglasses off. Make him shit his magic underwear. Here, let me show you something.
Patterson walks Hughes to a closet and opens the door. Inside are former TCU standouts LAMARCUS MCDONALD and TOMMY BLAKE.
HUGHES: LaMarcus? Tommy? What are you guys doing here?
PATTERSON: Bet you thought LaMarcus was in prison, didn't you? You really think I'd let those socialist pigs do that to one of my own? And Sigmund Freud here? Well, let's just say I had other plans for him all along.
TOMMY BLAKE: (drools rabies on the floor)
LAMARCUS MCDONALD: (bares fangs, eyes glow red)
PATTERSON: You see, Jerry, all along I've been trying to breed the perfect defensive player and I've finally accomplished it. A pinch of Ortiz, a dash of Martin Patterson, not to mention what I've extracted from these two, has all combined towards a higher cause. Hell, Gator would be here if he weren't babysitting Ochocinco! You know those bottles of Gatorade I've been delivering to you? Let's just say those weren't electrolytes!
HUGHES: (stumbles backwards) ...What are you saying, coach? That I'm some sort of science experiment? That I'm really just some Frankenstein monster?
PATTERSON: (grinning ominously) Hmmm... I prefer Frogzilla, but I suppose you could say that. And I'm not done! I've brought you here for your final dose, the one that will put you over the top and craft you into a defensive end that will make Brian Orakpo look like a My Little Pony.
HUGHES: No coach! You can't!
PATTERSON: We'll just see about that. Bumpas! Get him!
Defensive coordinator and walrus DICK BUMPAS jumps out of the shadows with a syringe and choloroform-soaked towel. After a brief struggle, Hughes is subdued and drugged. After a moment, he rises slowly from the floor, veins bulging.
PATTERSON: Yeeesssssyessssss! I've done it! My creation is perfected! And when he regains consciousness after playing the game of his life, he won't remember a thing!
INT. SAME VISITORS LOCKER ROOM - FOUR HOURS LATER
TCU defeats BYU 44-0. Hughes records 17 sacks, totals 30 tackles, and tallies over 100 yards in unsportsmanlike conduct penalties.
PATTERSON: Jerry! Great game! I told you you'd top your performance from last year!
HUGHES: Hey, thanks coach. But listen, it's the strangest thing. I hardly remember any of it! I have a huge headache, I'm covered in blood, and it feels like someone blindsided me. I also found this syringe jammed into my right butt cheek.
PATTERSON: (stammering) ...I'm sure it's all just a by-product of a job well done.
HUGHES: Also, coach (looking around nervously) I found this in my cleat after the game.
Hughes sets a cracked helmet on bench with cleat still fully embedded in the top. Inside is what appears to be the freshly severed head of BYU quarterback Max Hall.
PATTERSON: (muttering) Hmm, perhaps I should lower the dosage next week.
Thursday, October 29
North Carolina at Virginia Tech (7:30p)
Friday, October 30
West Virginia at South Florida (8p)
Saturday, October 31
North Carolina State at Florida State (TBA)
Texas at Oklahoma State (TBA)
Miami at Wake Forest (TBA)
UCLA at Oregon State (TBA)
Southern Miss at Houston (1p)
Georgia vs Florida (3:30p)
USC at Oregon (8p)
Mike White, Tar Heel Mania
EXT. LANE STADIUM - VISITORS SIDELINE - EVENING
The game is nearing the end of the 3rd quarter, UNC trails Virginia Tech, 17-13. The Hokies have just scored the go-ahead touchdown on a drive in which, for the first time all night, the Tar Heels' defensive line was dominated from start to finish. Head coach BUTCH DAVIS talks to MARVIN AUSTIN, ROBERT QUINN, and the rest of his defensive line.
BUTCH DAVIS: Can anyone tell me what the hell just happened on that drive?
ROBERT QUINN: I don't know, coach. We did the same stuff we've doing all game. Their o-line must've figured us out.
MARVIN AUSTIN: (eats Snickers, clearly not paying attention)
DAVIS: I think... (looks at Austin) we're not FOCUSED ENOUGH!
AUSTIN: Now, wait a minute, coach. I've been paying attention to everything you've said, and elephants do not live in Australia.
DAVIS: My point exactly. Look, Marvin, you need to focus on one thing and one thing only: make Tyrod Taylor's life a living hell. You see him right now? Across the field in the dark uniform?
AUSTIN: Yeah...
DAVIS: With those orange stripes?
AUSTIN: Yeah...
DAVIS: Looks like a giant Tootsie roll, doesn't he? Like a big ole piece of candy?
AUSTIN: (mouth watering) Yeah...
DAVIS: Get. The. Candy.
AUSTIN: Get the candy?
DAVIS: Get the candy!
AUSTIN: GIT DAT CANDYYY!!! AHHH!
DAVIS: Now go out there and get him like he's the last hunk of refined sugars on Earth!
On their next drive, Virginia Tech faces a 3rd and 12 near midfield. TYROD TAYLOR takes the snap from the shotgun.
TAYLOR: Hut!
AUSTIN: (runs through offensive line like swinging saloon doors) MUST GET DELICIOUS CANDY! ARRRGHHH!
Taylor screams like a girl and fumbles the ball as Austin tackles him. Teammate Bruce Carter scoops up the fumble and returns it 40 yards for a touchdown. The Tar Heels hold on to win, 23-20.
INT. TAR HEELS TEAM BUS - LATE NIGHT
Austin is fast asleep. Coach Davis talks to his star quarterback T.J. YATES.
DAVIS: Hey, T.J., could you wake Marvin up? I never got the chance to congratulate him.
T.J. YATES: Sure thing, coach. Hey, Marvin! Coach wants to see ya!
AUSTIN: (still asleep) Mmmhmmm... delicious candy... bars...
YATES: Pssst. Marvin.
AUSTIN: Mmm... Almond Joy... you make me happy...
YATES: Yoo-hoo. Marvin?
AUSTIN: Wait... Almond Joy! Don't run away!
YATES: MARVIN!
AUSTIN: (waking) AHHH! MUST GIT CANDYYY!
Austin tackles Yates with all his might.
YATES: OWWW! My shoulder!
DAVIS: Oh, crap. Not again. How are we supposed to explain it this time, Marvin?
AUSTIN: Hmmm...
INT. UNC PRESS CONFERENCE ROOM - FOLLOWING MONDAY, MIDDAY
REPORTER: So how did T.J. break his shoulder?
DAVIS: T.J., ehhh, got hurt... uhhh... (shoots quizzical glance at Austin)
AUSTIN: (nods head in approval from across the room)
DAVIS: ...while extreme ironing.
REPORTERS: (all groan)
AUSTIN: (winks)
Thursday, November 5
Virginia Tech at East Carolina (7:30p)
Saturday, November 7
Oregon State at California (TBA)
Oklahoma at Nebraska (TBA)
LSU at Alabama (TBA)
Ohio State at Penn State (TBA)
Connecticut at Cincinnati (TBA)
Florida State at Clemson (TBA)
Corey Gallagher, the North End Zone
EXT. DOWDY-FICKLEN STADIUM - VISITORS SIDELINE - EVENING
Hokies head coach FRANK BEAMER fuming with rage, signals timeout to the nearest official. His quarterback TYROD TAYLOR trots over.
FRANK BEAMER: Marcus! Marcus! Get your ass over here!
TYROD TAYLOR: Coach, my name is Tyrod.
BEAMER: Whatever! Look, you're getting a little too flashy out there. What the hell was that last play? The ooptie oop?
TAYLOR: It was a 9 yard out.
BEAMER: How many times do I have to tell you kids: draw up the middle, draw up the middle, draw up the middle. You know Stinespring has those pictures of me, and if we don't do what he says I'll be ruined.
TAYLOR: Don't you think it's time to get a new offensive coordinator? Maybe find someone more like that goatee-sporting guy the defense has?
BEAMER: Foster? You mean the guy over on the bench killing live chickens to motivate the defense? Yeah, another one of those guys is exactly what we need.
TAYLOR: I'm just saying maybe we need to shake things up a bit, take some chances.
BEAMER: Maybe you're right. It's high time this offense scored its first touchdown of the season.
TAYLOR: Uhhh, coach, it's November. We've scored twice.
BEAMER: Right. OK, so this ECU defense is pretty sharp. I know they have the game plan of a high school team, but somehow they've figured out our complicated offensive scheme.
TAYLOR: Our offense is about as complicated as the plot to Beerfest. And who the hell scheduled a Thursday night game at ECU in November?!! Does our AD know anything about football?
BEAMER: Is that a real question? The guy schedules football games like they're church services. I'm surprised we have any games starting after 1p. No, he doesn't know anything about football.
TAYLOR: Whatevs. OK, so what's going to be the great "shake it up" play?
BEAMER: Stinespring says the wheel chose a draw up the middle.
TAYLOR: Wheel? What wheel?
BEAMER: Yeah, he has a wheel of 25 plays that he spins after each down. Wherever the marker lands, that's the play he calls. Twenty-three of them are draws.
TAYLOR: Are you freaking kidding me? That's it. I'm going to get Foster over to start running the offense. Bud! Come here for a sec!
Defensive coordinator BUD FOSTER runs over, a large red mark from headbutting a helmeted player covers his forehead.
BUD FOSTER: Woooooo!!!
TAYLOR: Hey, yeah, calm down. I need you to use some of your coaching skill to run the offense for a while. Maybe this we can crawl out of the bottom 50 in offensive production this year.
FOSTER: Woooooo!!!
TAYLOR: Ugh.
BEAMER: I told you, he's no help.
TAYLOR: At least now I understand why all the Hokie quarterbacks go insane...
Credit: ut_alumni_assoc (Flickr)
Thursday, November 12
South Florida at Rutgers (7:30p)
Friday, November 13
West Virginia at Cincinnati (8p)
Saturday, November 14
Tennessee at Mississippi (TBA)
Florida State at Wake Forest (TBA)
Miami at North Carolina (TBA)
Iowa at Ohio State (TBA)
Texas Tech at Oklahoma State (TBA)
Nebraska at Kansas (TBA)
Utah at TCU (7:30p)
Sunday, November 15
East Carolina at Tulsa (8:15p)
Oskie, 3rd Saturday In Blogtober
"Rocky Top 2009"
Soon we'll all be back on Rocky Top,
Lookin' for a football thrill.
Nervousness is high on Rocky Top,
Don't know how to feel.
Got a new coach up on Rocky Top,
Crazy as the dung from a bat.
Wild boys, Orgeron and the Coach's Pop,
Maybe we can win with that.
Vol fans hope they're not gonna be
At the bottom of the S-E-C.
Poor ole Rocky Top,
Bottom of the S-E-C.
Johnny Majors back on Rocky Top,
Ain't no signs of Phil.
Kiffin says he'll get us back where we belong,
Vol fans hope he will.
Injuries running high on Rocky Top,
Players dropping left and right.
Vols keep pushing hard on Rocky Top,
Putting up a hell of a fight.
Vol fans hope they're not gonna be
At the bottom of the S-E-C.
Poor ole Rocky Top,
Bottom of the S-E-C.
We've had years of boring Fulmer Ball,
Now we're excited as we've ever been.
But Bama fans just can't stop reminding us,
"Sounds like Shula again."
But Vol fans know that they'll soon be
Back on top of the S-E-C.
Good ole Lane Kiffin,
One day he'll win the S-E-C.
Saturday, November 21
Oklahoma at Texas Tech
Penn State at Michigan State (TBA)
Ohio State at Michigan (TBA)
LSU at Mississippi (TBA)
Air Force at Brigham Young (3:30p)
Tim Aydin, Happy Hour Valley
When Nittany Lions starting linebacker Michael Mauti tore his ACL in preseason, a collective groan could be heard across the vast plains of Penn State message boards. And just like that, the Dow Jones plummeted, swine flu spread like wildfire, and "doom and gloom" became the hip new trend amongst the Penn State faithful. Why such a stiff reaction? Because Mauti out of commission meant only one thing: Josh Hull would be starting again.
Now, non-Penn State fans (or fans out of the loop) reading this might be thinking, "Gee golly, it's just one player! Besides, isn't Penn State nicknamed 'Linebacker U' for a reason?" Allow me to bring you up to par: Josh Hull is the colossus of "can't cut it," the fuhrer of failure, the serpent king of suck. In plain English: Josh Hull is the worst player to sport Penn State's blue-and-white jersey... EVER!
Now how did I come to this harsh conclusion? Well, I consider myself a well-read man who gets his information from reliable sources such as FightOnState message boards and if you happened to be on them during last season, you probably would've seen the following not-as-exaggerated-as-you-might-think comments:
"OMFG! Hull sux!! My little sister could outrun him... and she has cerebral palsy!"
"Let's see: he's undersized, white, slow, former walk-on who grew up around the State College area. Remind me again why the hell he's allowed to suit up?"
"JoePa is senile!!! All these great freshman linebackers are rotting on the bench because he feels Hull's seniority trumps all. This is DIVISION ONE FOOTBALL, not a fucking youth soccer team!!! What's next? Are coaches going to pass out orange slices on the sidelines?!"
So there you have it, straight from the veteran armchair quarterbacks who've watched enough five-second practice clips on the local news to give an informed take on who deserves a starting spot. Sure, Hull did in fact have a game-high 11 unassisted tackles in last year's domination of Purdue and was among the tackling leaders in the Rose Bowl. But let's not allow facts to dampen our uninformed beliefs.
With Hull's return to the starting lineup, I've curbed my expectations from an undefeated season and a win over God's Team (a.k.a. Florida) in the BCS Championship game to 6-6 and a berth in the Motor City Bowl. Half of the wins in my initial predictions relied upon Michael Mauti forcing a game changing turnover in the fourth quarter, including a strip sack of Tim Tebow for the national championship. As I learned the hard way once again: when good dreams die, they die tragically.
Friday, November 27
Nevada at Boise State (TBA)
Pittsburgh at West Virginia (TBA)
Nebraska at Colorado (3:30p)
Saturday, November 28
Georgia at Georgia Tech (TBA)
North Carolina at North Carolina State (TBA)
Oklahoma State at Oklahoma (TBA)
Missouri at Kansas (TBA)
Florida at Florida State (TBA)
Southern Miss at East Carolina (1p)
Utah at Brigham Young (5p)
Arkansas at LSU (8p)
David Wunderlich (Year2) Team Speed Kills
With a roster famously loaded with returning starters and future NFL draft picks, it's not immediately apparent who the worst starter on the Florida Gators is. It sure would make sense if he came from the potentially weakest position on the field: wide receiver.
Based on that reasoning, I'm fairly comfortable naming receiver David Nelson the Gators' worst starter. He doesn't have the blazing speed of fellow front line guys like Riley Cooper and Deonte Thompson. And he's not elusive like Percy Harvin was. At 6-foot-5, he sure is tall. But not much else stands out about him. When I saw him dodge an Alabama defender on a bubble screen in the SEC Championship game last year, the first words out of my mouth literally were, "Wow! David Nelson made someone miss!"
Prior to catching the game sealing touchdown from Tim Tebow against Oklahoma, Nelson was probably best known in Gator Nation as that one guy who looks a lot like Chris Leak, only taller. A humble guy, Nelson himself admits he was a wasted scholarship until his light bulb finally turned on midway through last season. Put it this way: in 2007, my brother figured out that Nelson being lined up out wide was a tip that the upcoming play was a run. My brother was rarely wrong about that.
Nelson, a fourth-year junior last fall, says he just realized after half of 2008 was gone that his career was rapidly approaching its end without him ever making an impact. Why it took so long for him to figure that out, I don't know, but the change was palpable. After catching 11 balls in his career up to that point, he caught 10 in Florida's final four games of 2008. Essentially, he embraced what he was always meant to be: the tall, sure-handed possession receiver.
I doubt Nelson will ever see the field in an NFL preseason game, much less a regular season contest. He's one of only a handful of players on the Gators' one-deep I would say that about. Wideouts who are possession guys in college have very little upside at the next level after all.
I will say this for him though, he's a good kid who fills a vital role in the offense without ever complaining or causing problems. If David Nelson really is Florida's worst starter then I love the Gators' chance to win it all again.
Thursday, December 3
Oregon State at Oregon (9p)
Saturday, December 5
South Florida at Connecticut (TBA)
West Virginia at Rutgers (TBA)
Cincinnati at Pittsburgh (TBA)
ACC Championship Game (TBA)
Big 12 Championship Game (TBA)
SEC Championship Game (4p)
Nick Haselwander, Off the Pond
EXT. AUTZEN STADIUM - HOME TEAM SIDELINE - EVENING
The annual Civil War between Oregon and Oregon State is almost at an end. There are three seconds left on the game clock, Oregon State has the ball at their three yard line. The Beavers have called a timeout.
Oregon head coach CHIP KELLY converses with defensive back WALTER THURMOND III on the sideline.
CHIP KELLY: Hey, Walter. You see that?
WALTER THURMOND III: What, coach?
KELLY: I'm pretty sure that's the second coming of Jesus in section 25.
THURMOND: Nah, that's Tim Tebow.
KELLY: Tebow? What's he doing here?
THURMOND: He heard Civil War had broken out in Oregon, thought he could bring peace.
KELLY: Seriously? Does he realize it's just a football game?
THURMOND: Who knows? I just saw on SportsCenter, ESPN ranked him #1 human being of our time.
KELLY: He beat Brett Favre?
THURMOND: Guess so, must've been a close vote.
KELLY: Crazy, I really don't see what the big deal is with that guy.
Oregon defensive coordinator NICK ALIOTTI runs up to Kelly and Thurmond.
NICK ALIOTTI: I hate to break up this no doubt stirring conversation... Wow. Is that a clean-cut Messiah?
KELLY: Nah, that's Tim Tebow
ALIOTTI: (shaking head) Chip, they're putting in five wideouts. What do you want to do?
KELLY: I don't know. You run the defense, figure it out.
ALIOTTI: Fine. They're 97 yards away, I'm not worried about it. We'll run a base D.
Play resumes on the field. Oregon State snaps the ball. MIKE PARKER, the Beavers play-by-play announcer, can be heard on a radio placed suspiciously near the coaches on the Oregon sideline.
MIKE PARKER: Canfield, gonna go back to throw the ball. Sets up, looks, throws toward the middle of the field. It is CAUGHT! CAUGHT! The Beavers have the ball! Down to the 35, the 40. Markus Wheaton's gonna score! Markus Wheaton's gonna score! 20, the 10, touchdown! Markus Wheaton... On the reception! The most incredible finish to a football game!
Former Oregon head coach, now athletic director, MIKE BELLOTTI joins coach Kelly on the sideline
KELLY: You know, that was a lot like that play we always show on the scoreboard before games... the one where that guy goes 97 yards for the touchdown against Washington.
BELLOTTI: Yeah, Kenny Wheaton, Markus's cousin. Most famous play in Oregon history.
KELLY: Ain't that something? Hell of a play that kid just made. Too bad the Beavers still lost by four touchdowns.
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