0 comments by Matt Zemek on 1/7/2015
It’s the kind of thing you couldn’t have made up if you tried. It’s the kind of fact that blows away your mind. It’s a reality which ripples across 76 years of American history, 76 years of collegiate sports history. It’s the longer-than-longshot which defies the odds and leaves you breathless. It’s part of the […]
Gary Patterson’s team never should have been moved up to third after week 14, in which the Horned Frogs beat 6-6 Texas. If the committee was consistent, it could have left TCU out of the field by never putting the Frogs higher than fourth. Putting them third only clouded the issue, especially after a 52-point win on Saturday against Iowa State.
0 comments by Matt Zemek on 1/6/2015
A coaching performance often stands on its own merit, but it can sometimes expose the extent to which an opposing coach lacks answers of any shape or form. The 10 most notable coaching performances of the bowl season fit into both categories. We’ll provide the details: * 10 – KYLE WHITTINGHAM, UTAH The aggressiveness of […]
0 comments by Matt Zemek on 1/5/2015
Sometimes, the winning team represents the major story in a sporting event. Sometimes, the losing team becomes the central story. Sometimes, the margin of victory rightly grabs a banner headline. Sometimes, the flow of the game — accompanied by a deceiving final score — earns extra notice. How did the 38 bowls shape the storylines […]
0 comments by Matt Zemek
Before the bowls, we explored the idea of which games meant more to each team; which games mattered to one team in particular; and which games were going to be more central as revealers of conference strength. Now that the bowls are over, though, there’s another exercise to engage in — judging the bowls based […]
0 comments by Matt Zemek on 1/4/2015
The point is 10,000 times more true — and urgent — in the National Football League, which is a business without the pretense of amateurism: Football is serious business, serious enough that coaches (and the organizations whose fates lie in coaches’ hands) need to make the right game-management decisions. A multi-billion-dollar business should not tolerate […]
0 comments by Matt Zemek
Now that all the power-conference bowls are over (there’s still the GoDaddy Bowl between Toledo and Arkansas State), what can and should be said about the bowls? You’ll get many different opinions on the subject. Some will say that the bowls — as non-conference games with plenty of time for the coaches and players to […]
0 comments by Matt Zemek on 1/3/2015
Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever. George Wallace’s words in the midst of the tumultuous Civil Rights Era didn’t come true, but in college football’s bowl structure, the Pac-12 and Southeastern Conferences remain segregated. In what has become an enduring and prolonged problem for the sport, two of its Power 5 conferences simply can’t agree […]
0 comments by TSS LOCKER
You’ve probably heard something about the Jim Mora-Bill Snyder episode at the end of the Alamo Bowl on Friday, won by UCLA over Kansas State. Here are the three relevant images from that larger drama. The play which angered Mora: The first blow-by handshake from Mora: Then, the circle-back reunion with Snyder, involving a longer […]
Where will Mike Gundy coach in 2015? The outcome of the 2014 Bedlam game could very well provide the answer.
0 comments by TSS LOCKER
It’s the play from the Cactus Bowl no one can stop talking about: 300-pound defensive tackle James Castleman very nearly scored a long-distance FAT GUY TOUCHDOWN for Oklahoma State against Washington. Credit OSU coach Mike Gundy for being both fun and creative on a critical third-and-two play late in the game with the Cowboys clinging […]
0 comments by TSS LOCKER
Oklahoma State defensive lineman James Castleman was the feel-good story in the Cowboys’ win over the Washington Huskies in the Cactus Bowl late Friday night. Oklahoma State gained a measure of field position late in the contest on a third-and-two conversion by Castleman, who rumbled past Washington defenders for a 48-yard gain. He took some […]
0 comments by Matt Zemek on 1/1/2015
How can one sum up the view from Eugene in the wake of Oregon’s shocking Rose Bowl blowout of Florida State? It’s a view defined by refutation. Oregon spoke loudly on a picture-postcard New Year’s Day afternoon in the Arroyo Seco… but not with any words. The Ducks were as gorgeous and crisp as the […]
0 comments by Matt Zemek
The years come and go — a reality never more present than on New Year’s Day — and sports continue to amaze us. The new year of 2015 didn’t waste much time causing our mouths to drop, our brains to explode, our hearts to thump-thump-thump away. Like a slow-motion train wreck, one calamity after another […]
0 comments by Matt Zemek on 12/31/2014
This was supposed to be the Fiesta Bowl Boise State would not win. This was supposed to be the splash of cold water on an afternoon in suburban Phoenix when — interestingly enough — the weather outside University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale was cold, gray, and wet. This was supposed to be the main-event […]
0 comments by TSS LOCKER
Early in the Peach Bowl, TCU is running all over… and around… Ole Miss. Trevone Boykin, the Horned Frogs’ quarterback, put a little Bill Raftery “lingerie on the deck” with this pitch fake:
0 comments by Matt Zemek
Dear Rose Bowl, Red roses are meant for ladies, but you are that special grandfather who loves flowers, especially the big rose painted in the middle of your lush football field, the one America gets to see in all its splendor on New Year’s afternoon. You’re always dressed up for a big occasion, and you […]
