NCAA college football 2017-18: Official thread

Well, Mayfield won. Not necessarily surprised, as ESPN has been pushing the narrative.

But Lamar 3rd in voting? Behind a RB who he had the same number of rushing TDs as, not to mention all his passing stats?

WTF?

Stele wrote:

Well, Mayfield won. Not necessarily surprised, as ESPN has been pushing the narrative.

But Lamar 3rd in voting? Behind a RB who he had the same number of rushing TDs as, not to mention all his passing stats?

WTF?

#BlameStanfurd

Double post

New thread for Bowl Mania here.

Okay, let's get this rolling. We have three choices this year.

One Entry to Rule Them All

Why Not Two Entries?

One Entry, But Ranked by Confidence

Passwords are all stan. All three are hosted on ESPN, so I hope that works for all.

I'm in for the single entry and the confidence. Multiple entries are for losers!

Spread the word and lets get folks signed up. We don't have much time.

Jayhawker wrote:

New thread for Bowl Mania here.

Okay, let's get this rolling. We have three choices this year.

One Entry to Rule Them All

Why Not Two Entries?

One Entry, But Ranked by Confidence

Passwords are all stan. All three are hosted on ESPN, so I hope that works for all.

I'm in for the single entry and the confidence. Multiple entries are for losers!

Spread the word and lets get folks signed up. We don't have much time.

Password for One Entry to Rule Them All seems to be "Stan".

Whoops! Thanks tboon.

The weird as hell coaching situation at ASU continues to simmer. As you may know, they fired their coach and required any incoming coach to retain all of the assistants. They hired Herm Edwards, who immediately gave us youtube gold by apparently not knowing their mascot and reacting with caution to a question from "Devils Digest". Herm apparently does not commune with the dark one, nor wish to.

They also released a weird statement in business consultant speech about the New Coaching Model, of which they shall be the firstfruits.

Now both their coordinators have fled the wrath to come, which seems wise. This story is officially in the Tyson Zone for me, and the 30 For 30 can't get here soon enough. I hope Netflix embeds a camera crew yesterday.

Still not as bad as Tennessee, IMO.

Abu5217 wrote:

Still not as bad as Tennessee, IMO.

Funny you should say that. A post to the effect of "Tennessee thinks ASU's coaching search is a disaster" got over 100 likes on TexAgs today.

It's definitely debatable, but in the end, UT got a decent coach and will move forward now. ASU... I don't even know what they're trying to accomplish.

Fedaykin98 wrote:

It's definitely debatable, but in the end, UT got a decent coach and will move forward now. ASU... I don't even know what they're trying to accomplish.

Yeah, I'm reasonably happy with what our mess turned up. But it was far from a dignified way to get there for a school with the athletic budget TN has (about 5th nationally).

Nov 12 - Fire Butch Jones
Nov 26 - After missing Chip Kelly and Dan Mullen, AD Currie attempts to hire Greg Schiano from Ohio State. Fans revolt. Rocks are painted. Social media melts down in TN, and protest occur at the stadium. Hire cancelled, and national media thinks fans are nuts for not wanting a sub-par hire with a iffy past around probably the biggest scandal in college football history
Nov 27 - Duke coach and former UT offensive coordinator (under Fulmer and during Manning's time) turns UT down
Nov 28 Desperate times causes the rock to be painted "Bring Lane Home", asking for the most hated coach (left after one year) in recent UT history to be brought back
Nov 28 Mike Gundy at Oklahoma State offered a bunch of money, but turns UT down
Nov 29 Brohm at Purdue might have been offered by AD Currie, but rumored to have the MOU shot down by the chancellor who refused to pay the large buyout Currie had said UT would
Nov 30 UT turned down by Butch Jones of the ACC Dave Doeren
Nov 30 Reportedly turned down by Kevin Sumlin
Nov 30 Rumors are that AD Currie is meeting with Mike Leach in LA. Fans actually happy about turning Vol Navy into a pirate fleet. However, Currie told to get his ass back to Knoxville
Dec 1 Currie fired, Phillip Fulmer hired to try to calm things down and do a rational hire
Dec 5-7 Fulmer talks to several people, for Les Miles, Tee Martin, Kevin Steele, Mel Tucker, and Jeremy Pruitt
Dec 7 Pruitt hired.

r/ockytop on Reddit post count returns to typical UT basketball season volumes.

This player from New Orleans is KU football’s first top-100 signing ... ever

Kansas coach David Beaty accomplished something Wednesday that has never been done in the football program’s history: He received an official commitment from a player ranked in the Rivals Top 100.

Corione Harris, a cornerback who ranks 97th in Rivals’ 2018 class, stuck with his longtime pledge to KU on Wednesday, signing with the Jayhawks over Mississippi State. He is former high school teammates at Landry-Walker High School in New Orleans with KU safety Mike Lee.

In an article posted Wednesday, Rivals analyst Woody Wommack said Harris “projects as a shutdown corner at the next level” before saying the news “marks a major recruiting victory (for KU) and puts other programs on notice that the Jayhawks are going to be a presence in New Orleans going forward.”

So this is why Beaty kept his job, I guess.

That big win against the Longhorns last year is paying big dividends!

I'm watching this Hawaii Bowl with my aunt, who graduated from UH.

Man, that was a lousy first series.

Fedaykin98 wrote:

I'm watching this Hawaii Bowl with my aunt, who graduated from UH.

Man, that was a lousy first series.

FRESNO STATE FRESNO STATE FRESNO STATE

From 1-11 to 10-4 with a bowl win in one Tedford season.

*Legion* wrote:

FRESNO STATE FRESNO STATE FRESNO STATE

From 1-11 to 10-4 with a bowl win in one Tedford season.

FSU! FSU! FS... Oh, wait...

(Congrats on the great turnaround)

Um... Go Noles?

Longhorns win vs. Mizzou. Some mistakes but overall I feel like they're finally moving in the right direction. Hook 'Em.

Ego Man wrote:

Um... Go Noles?

Given how poorly this season went and the apparent mailing-in by some of the coaches, I am happy with the result. Even though it was one of the worst seasons to endure, the team finished with a bowl game and winning season (36 and 41 straight, respectively) as well as a positive vibe going into the offseason due to the Taggart hire.

It's really the best possible end to a tough year and really illustrates how spoiled we are as fans that a 7-6 season is a floor.

Impressive drive by Louisville just now. Bowl season is a bounty of football!

Fedaykin98 wrote:

Impressive drive by Louisville just now. Bowl season is a bounty of football!

Lamar gon' Lamar.

That run before half was ridiculous.

But the 12 yard should have been sacked by 4 guys that he turned into only a 2 yard loss might be more impressive. Dude has escapability like nobody else.

Congrats to a State team that, minus QB Nick Fitzgerald and minus best-coach-in-school-history Dan Mullen, squeaked out the win. I have a coworker who will be very pleased.

My run in the pool has been weird. I was 7-13 after 20 bowl games. I have no proceeded to pick the nine straight, and 12 of the next 13. And if Penn St. holds on, that will be another win, and make me 20-14, which is almost respectable.

I'm stunned watching the half empty stadiums around the country in these early bowl games that they even still exist. Don't know how the economics work. Seems too many bowls, and a lot less people traveling to the non-major ones.

MannishBoy wrote:

I'm stunned watching the half empty stadiums around the country in these early bowl games that they even still exist. Don't know how the economics work. Seems too many bowls, and a lot less people traveling to the non-major ones.

TV money and corporate sponsorships.

That's how the bowl host committees make money. The schools themselves usually get clobbered. But they're used to losing money on athletics. A bowl game means they lose it all at once rather than over the course of a couple of semesters.

The bowl system cannot die soon enough. You have a 16-24 team playoff, and all those games are making money and drawing fans, because they mean more than a meaningless exhibition. Fans will be filling out brackets, underdogs will beat legendary teams, and we will all love it.

It really comes down to prying the cold dead fingers of bowl owners off of their NCAA football games. It's one thing for how long it has taken college football to have some sort of playoff, but it is insane for how long they are taking to instill a system that will make everyone happy and lots of money.

I really would like someone to explain how a team like Cal, or Indiana, or Kansas, or Vanderbilt is happy and makes lots of money in the system you describe. Cal has finished as a top 25 team probably fewer than 5 times in the last 25 years. Given automatic bids to non P5 schools, I can honestly think of maybe one year (the year Mack brown F*'ed us over) that Cal would have gotten an invite to a 16 team tournament, and maybe another year or two where we would have been invited to a 24-team tournament.

I know we can always point to D2 or basketball as a system that works. For D2, my unfounded hypothesis is that the money is so low to begin with that it doesn't matter what they did. Eastern Washington probably made more money when Washington or WSU comes to town for a meaningless (to UW/WSU) game than they did from their TV deal on the D2 playoff. Basketball, most teams in the major conferences make the tournament every few years, so there's always hope.

For a team like Cal, I would go into 2018 season objectively (if there is such a thing) that every game we play would be meaningless because we're not going to go 10-2 and get invited to this tournament. That makes me neither happy, nor do I see how that makes the school lots of money.

Carlbear95 wrote:

I know we can always point to D2 or basketball as a system that works. For D2, my unfounded hypothesis is that the money is so low to begin with that it doesn't matter what they did. Eastern Washington probably made more money when Washington or WSU comes to town for a meaningless (to UW/WSU) game than they did from their TV deal on the D2 playoff. Basketball, most teams in the major conferences make the tournament every few years, so there's always hope.

Except Northwestern, a founding member of the Big 10, that finally made the NCAA tournament for the first time last season.

Carlbear95 wrote:

I really would like someone to explain how a team like Cal, or Indiana, or Kansas, or Vanderbilt is happy and makes lots of money in the system you describe.

Vanderbilt gets a big check from the SEC every year with share of all the teams that make the big payoff games's earnings. Not to mention TV deals.

Not saying that covers their athletics budget, but that's a benefits of the major conferences.

Auburn beat Bama, eliminating them from a chance at the conference championship. Bama still gets into the CFP. UCF is undefeated and won their conference, but doesn't get a sniff.

UCF beats Auburn, but we get to hear from Bama and SEC apologists about the "eye test."

Just sayin', this year's champion already needs an asterisk.