0 comments by Matt Zemek on 7/29/2014
Winning the Rose Bowl will change the way in which a program is perceived. It can certainly give a head coach the freedom to speak boldly about his team and announce to the world that the past no longer matters. Michigan State was an “almost-but-not-quite” program for a long time. However, a Big Ten championship […]
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Media days are winding down. Coaches are preparing to get to camp and whip their teams into shape for the coming season. It’s time for college football to move from media rooms to the practice field. However, before Big Ten Media Days conclude and the focus on specific conferences gives way to a wider survey […]
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A third of a century ago, in 1981, college football wasn’t televised wall-to-wall on Saturdays. The courts had not yet busted open the television landscape, changing forever the way Americans consumed college football as a product… and the ways in which broadcasters presented the product over the airwaves. Therefore, while media coverage of college football has […]
0 comments by Matt Zemek on 7/28/2014
With Big Ten Media Days beginning today in Chicago, it’s time to discuss Jim Delany’s conference. The Student Section’s Big Ten roundtable will be presented in two parts. Today, we’ll focus on the heavyweights in the league. Tomorrow, in part two, we’ll tackle the newcomers (Maryland and Rutgers) and the topic of divisional realignment. For […]
0 comments by Matt Zemek on 7/26/2014
Some play calls are simply fun. In fact, if you look at this YouTube video of the 100 best plays of the 2013 season (you’re welcome), you’ll see a lot of trick plays, some of them even more impressive in terms of raw execution or the concepts involved (or both): *Waits for you to watch […]
Rich Rodriguez now faces the central task of making sure his players don’t lose faith after a classic Arizona stomach-punch loss against USC. The one original Pac-10 member without a single Rose Bowl appearance has to stay the course. If it does, the Pac-12 South is still there for the taking. The winner of this division will probably have at least two conference losses by season’s end. Arizona can overcome just about any scoreboard obstacle, but the Wildcats’ offense needs to be able to score more than 13 points through three quarters at home. The Wildcats were stuck on 13 after 45 minutes in home games against California and USC. The Wildcats overcame the Golden Bears. They weren’t able to make one last kick against USC. Start-to-finish consistency on offense is what Rich Rod has to cultivate over the next month and a half.
0 comments by Matt Zemek on 7/25/2014
Coaches don’t have much more time to speak candidly in these final few days before training camp. One coach who’s bolder than most of his colleagues when it comes to public statements is Rich Rodriguez of Arizona. If the Pac-12 Championship Game matched the teams with the most candid and outspoken coaches in the conference, […]
Scenario: Chaos ensues in the Pac-12. Florida State gets ambushed. It’s 11-1 TCU versus 11-1 Alabama for the fourth playoff spot. Alabama might deserve the bid, but the TSS editors agree: If the Crimson Tide get the nod, they need to get the nod because they’ve earned more on the field, not because the wear the Alabama brand name and carry the SEC label. Reputation-based, television-friendly selections that diminish a less prominent team’s body of work would send a chilling message through the non-SEC precincts of the college football community.
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No, this image won’t get any mileage during the upcoming college football season: No photoshops or “college football meme” tweets will ever come of this. No, sir. Not at all. Ever. Nothing to see here.
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Officiating college football is a much tougher job than it used to be. The speed and power of the athletes have increased, but the speed of the game has increased as well. Faster athletes running hurry-up-no-huddle offenses with spread formations and more downfield passes make life a lot harder for the on-field arbiters of college […]
0 comments by Matt Zemek on 7/23/2014
On so many levels, Pac-12 Commissioner Larry Scott has brought fresh thinking and forward-looking leadership to the West’s power conference. This was never more apparent on Wednesday morning in Los Angeles than when Scott talked about his league’s efforts to study — and fund — ways to better address the problem of head trauma among […]
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College football diehards know that Mike Leach loves talking about pirates, and that this passion is the reason Swing Your Sword was such a natural title for the much-discussed book that had the added effect of prying co-author Bruce Feldman away from ESPN a few years ago. On the occasion of 2014 Pac-12 Media Days, […]
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This photo from day one of the two-day Pac-12 Media Days event in Los Angeles needs no comment… because what can one say about it, anyway? There was more where that came from, too: Hashtag #INNOVATION.
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Big 12 Media Days have come and gone. As each power conference enters the media spotlight this week, you’re going to read a discussion about it. Here’s our installment on the Big 12, which exited the scene in 2013 by affirming the staying power of a familiar brand name in college football while elevating a […]
0 comments by Matt Zemek on 7/22/2014
Bill Snyder gave a vintage performance at his Big 12 Media Days session on Tuesday morning. One of the wise old men in the college football coaching fraternity, Snyder dropped a few pearls of insight that anyone would do well to live by. Kansas State’s head coach showed precisely why he’s been able to not […]
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It is easy to say that TCU’s football program has not succeeded in the Big 12 because the league offers a level of competition not found in the Horned Frogs’ previous home, the Mountain West Conference. (The school joined the Big East, of course, but never played a game in that league.) To an extent, […]
The man who sabotaged an athletic department and misused state resources is now the happy owner of a second chance at Louisville. That’s a fine educational message to send to student athletes.
0 comments by Matt Zemek on 7/21/2014
Someone sure has a sense of humor. Whether you believe in God, or fate, or the stars’ alignments, or some other guiding force in the cosmos, you have to be struck (if you’re a sports fan) by the way in which the course of human events has brought us to this day, Monday the 21st […]
