Category: College Football (Page 47 of 296)

      Under Brady Hoke, the focus is now clear again in Ann Arbor: Beat Ohio State.

      March 18, 2011 /

      Whether you’re a Michigan fan that despised what Rich Rodriguez did to the program or one of the few who thought he would eventually right the ship, you have to at least appreciate what new head coach Brady Hoke is trying to do in Ann Arbor.

      He’s trying to find a kicker? Well, yeah. He’s trying to find a kicker. He’s also trying to make it as seamless a transition as possible for quarterback Denard Robinson, who is currently learning Al Borges’ pro-style offense after running RichRod’s spread option for the past couple of years. Hoke needs to fix the mess that Rodriguez left him on defense as well.

      But above all that, Hoke’s focus is simple: Beat Ohio State.

      The Buckeyes are currently in a hell of their own making. Unlike their rivals in Ann Arbor, they have the players on both sides of the ball to win Big Ten championships. It’s just that some of those players decided it was a okay to trade memorabilia for free tattoos and, along with their head coach Jim Tressel, will be suspended for the first five games of the 2011 season.

      But Hoke’s message has nothing to do with kicking an enemy while it’s down. Despite the hatred, the Michigan-Ohio State rivalry has always been about mutual respect. (The latest example of that was in Friday’s Detroit Free Press when Hoke referred to Tressel as “a good man.”) Hoke doesn’t want to just take advantage of the Buckeyes’ predicament: he wants to beat Ohio State because that’s what Michigan coaches have to do. It should be priority No. 1 and if that happens, then everything else should fall into place.

      Among other things, that’s something Rodriguez never fully grasped. He never beat Ohio State or Michigan State, which is unacceptable in the eyes of Wolverine fans. You’re not going to beat OSU every year, but you damn better well make it a focus regardless.

      While reading this NBC Sports article, I found it interesting that Hoke has two clocks near his office at Schembechler Hall. One of the clocks is ticking down the time until Michigan plays Michigan State again. The other clock ticks down the time until the Wolverines face the Buckeyes. In between the two clocks is a red number that goes up every day. That number represents the days it has been since Michigan last beat Ohio State, which is now more than 2,600 and counting.

      It’s going to take some time for Hoke to turn things around in Ann Arbor but at least the man has his priorities straight.

      College Football, External Sports

      NCAA denies OSU’s appeal for suspended players, Jim Tressel also chooses to serve five-game ban

      March 17, 2011 /
      Ohio State University head football coach Jim Tressel speaks during a news conference in Columbus, Ohio, March 8, 2011. Tressel was fined $250,000 and suspended for two games for violating NCAA rules, according to reports. REUTERS/Jay LaPrete (UNITED STATES – Tags: SPORT FOOTBALL HEADSHOT)

      Ohio State coach Jim Tressel will no long have to worry about the public asking him why he received lesser punishment then the five Buckeye players involved in “Tattoogate.” That’s because now he too will serve a five-game suspension.

      On Thursday night, the NCAA finalized its ruling that OSU players Terrelle Pryor, DeVier Posey, Daniel Herron, Mike Adams and Solomon Thomas will be suspended for the first five games of the 2011 season after swapping memorabilia for free tattoos with a parlor owner in Columbus. Ohio State had appealed the suspension on behalf of the players, but the NCAA upheld the punishment.

      Despite being handed a two-game suspension in a separate investigation by the university, Tressel decided that he too would serve a five-game ban along with his players.

      “Like my players, I am very sorry for the mistakes I made. I request of the university that my sanctions now include five games so that the players and I can handle this adversity together,” Tressel read in a statement. “Throughout this entire situation, my players and I have committed ourselves to facing our mistakes and growing from them; we can only successfully do this together. I spoke with athletic director [Gene] Smith, and our student-athletes involved, and told them that my mistakes need to share the same game sanctions.”

      It’s a pretty slick move by Tressel. He would have never been able to live down why he only served a two-game suspension for lying to the NCAA and to the university while his players served a five-game ban for committing a similar infraction. Granted, it doesn’t change the fact that he made a poor decision and embarrassed the program, but his decision will no doubt win the respect of his players and OSU fans (or at least some of them).

      I’m sure Tressel truly does feel bad about what he did. Everyone makes mistakes and as long as they’re willing to (eventually) own up to them and seek to rectify the situation the best they can, what more can you ask of them? (Besides not committing the infraction, that is.) I’m not excusing what he did but there are good guys in the college football coaching ranks, and there are bad guys. Tressel is a good guy.

      College Football, External Sports

      What do we think of the new Pac-12 logo?

      March 17, 2011 /

      The soon-to-be Pac-12 Conference recently unveiled the Pac-12 logo and it looks an awful lot like the Pac-10 logo, only with a “12” instead of a “10.” That shouldn’t be overlooked, however, given the way the Big Ten is clinging to that moniker despite expanding to 12 teams next season.

      The Pac-10 has an easier time switching to Pac-12 because the conference name is more about “Pac” than it is the number of teams in the conference. The Big Ten doesn’t have that luxury because it was so uncreative in naming itself way back in 1899 (when it was the Big Nine) and 1917 (when it became the Big Ten). They should just bite the bullet and rename it the Big Midwest. It would only take a year or two for the name to catch on BECAUSE IT IS SO MUCH BETTER and ACTUALLY MAKES SENSE.

      College Basketball, College Football, External Sports, March Madness, News

      More concerns emerge about Da’Quan Bowers’ knee

      March 11, 2011 /

      Earlier this week, I wrote a post about how Clemson defensive end Da’Quan Bowers’ draft stock may be falling due to a knee injury and this report from the Denver Post does nothing to refute that claim.

      According to the report, “several teams” insist that Bowers’ knee surgery was more serious than the defensive end claimed. Bowers had arthroscopic knee surgery following the season and was only able to participate the bench press at February’s scouting combine. He has also postponed his Pro Day from March 10 to April 1 as he continues to try and recover from what was thought to be a minor knee scope.

      For Bowers’ sake, I hope he performs well at his Pro Day and he can put the concerns about his knee to rest. He’s a bona fide top 5 prospect and was a terrific player at Clemson. He’s strong, long-armed and extremely athletic. He has excellent closing speed for his size and could turn out to be a very good edge rusher in the NFL. But the concerns about his knee could cause him to drop out of the top 10 and while he would wind up being a steal for whichever team drafted him later in the first, it would cost him millions in the process.

      One thing to keep in mind is that some teams will attempt to sabotage a prospect in hopes that he’ll fall in the draft. But it’s not like this is the first time that a media outlet has reported problems about Bowers’ knee. We’ll just have to wait and see if he can perform at his Pro Day in April and convince teams at the top of the draft that he’s still worthy of being selected among the first five of picks.

      College Football, External Sports, NFL, NFL Draft

      RichRod defends Jim Tressel

      March 11, 2011 /

      Former Michigan head coach Rich Rodriguez recently appeared on Colin Cowherd’s ESPN radio show and wound up defending Ohio State coach Jim Tressel in the wake of “Tattoogate.”

      From the Detroit News:

      Cowherd told Rodriguez he no longer trusts Tressel; Rodriguez responded by defending Ohio State’s coach.

      “If you run a program at Ohio State or at Michigan or something like that, so much of what you do is public,” Rodriguez said. “There’s not all this crazy cheating and things like that going on that people think. There are some guys out there that bend the rules a little bit or they get around the rules and try to get a competitive advantage. I don’t think that was the case in this at all. There were five guys who sold items who shouldn’t have sold it. And they were wrong for doing it. Did that give Ohio State a competitive advantage? I don’t think so.”

      Rodriguez continued: “There’s coaches out there that are trying to get a competitive advantage the wrong way, a handful, and they seem to get away with it. And there are other coaches that are really trying as hard as they can, doing everything in good faith, and they seem to get nailed. I think that’s the thing that frustrates coaches, like, ‘Geez look at what these guys did, and they’re winning and they did all that.’

      “How do we fix that?”

      Rodriguez’s overall point is correct. The NCAA has a much, much bigger problem on its hands than what Tressel did. He broke rules, made a poor decision and deserved to be punished. But he’s not in the same stratosphere as the coaches who are flat out cheating when it comes to signing recruits. I think it’s safe to say that there are a lot of coaches out there doing a lot worse.

      But even though I agree with some of what he said, I think RichRod is missing the bigger picture when he talks about how there are coaches out there that “bend the rules a little bit or they get around the rules and try to get a competitive advantage.”

      Rules are in place so that everyone has a fair playing field. The fact that some coaches have done far worse than what Tressel did isn’t the point: If you break rules, you should be punished. Granted, there are different degrees of punishment but nobody should be “bending the rules a little bit” or “getting around the rules” to try to get a competitive advantage. Play within the rules and then you won’t wind up embarrassing your program like Tressel did.

      Now, if the NCAA decides to crack a stronger whip and terminates Tressel’s contract, then that’s a whole different can of worms. But until then, it would be nice if college coaches made wiser decisions when it came to running their programs and then something like “Tattoogate” wouldn’t be an issue.

      College Football, External Sports

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