Week 1 – Games of Interest

College Football Playoffs – What we Learned in 2014

As we enter into the second year of the FBS College Football Playoffs format, let’s take a look at a few things we learned (or, at least, think we learned) from the inaugural year.

#1. If you are going to lose a game, lose it early in the year. Thank you, Ohio State.

#2. If you cannot go undefeated, have a strong out of conference schedule. Thank you, TCU.

#3. You can play lots of close games, as long as you don’t lose any of them. Thank you, Florida State.

#4. Conference Championships are important. Thank you, Ohio State and The Big 12 Conference.

#5. You can be ranked as high as 22 in the polls and still make the Playoffs. Thank you, Ohio State.

#6. Two teams or four teams, as long as humans are picking, there will be controversies. Thank you, Selection Committee.

#7. Playoff performance will shine a bright light on you. Thank you, Cardale Jones and Ezekiel Elliot.

#8. Playoffs are fun! Thank you, FBS.

Now, let’s see if those lessons hold true, or if we still have things to learn. Bring on 2015.

SOD’s One-Sided Interview with Urban Meyer

Being that I am just Some Other Dude with a whopping 90 followers on Twitter, most of whom are random Twitter accounts fishing for followers themselves; 2 followers of my college football blog, one of whom is me; and 2 likes on my SOD CFB Facebook page; with no access to anyone who has anything at all to do with FBS college football programs, the only kind of interviews I can do are one-sided. But, hey, I thought, why should I let the fact that my intended subject is not, and never will be, available to me stop me from asking the questions and letting you, the reader (yes, singular, maybe someday that can be plural) fantasize about his or her or its answer?

So, here in the first of many one-sided interviews, I am not joined by the Head Football Coach of the reigning National Champions, Ohio State Buckeyes, Urban Meyer.

SOD: First of all coach, thank you for not joining me and congratulations on your success last year and best of luck with preparing to defend your title in the upcoming season.

COACH MEYER: Not available for comment.

SOD: Coach, last year, of all the teams to make the inaugural FBS Playoffs, your Ohio State Buckeyes certainly had the most precarious route to the Final 4. In realistically looking back on last season, was there ever a time when you thought that, perhaps, the playoffs might not be in the cards for your team and when, if ever, did you get the sense that you guys were destined for this historic playoff?

COACH MEYER: Not available for comment.

SOD: Thank you coach for such an honest and insightful answer. Now, as you prepare for this coming year, every analyst and prognosticator has already penciled the Buckeyes into the 2015 FBS playoffs and most of the talking heads suggest that your most challenging opponent this year is going to be the potential complacency of your own football squad. What, as a coach and coaching staff, if anything, do you do to battle this opponent week in and week out with such high expectations on your team?

COACH MEYER: Not available for comment.

SOD: Very interesting. So, even before fall practices start, you have disciplined 4 high impact players on your team for violating team rules which includes being suspended from your opening game against a very tough Virginia Tech squad – the one team, by the way, that beat you last year and almost derailed your trip to the National Championship. Now, I understand and appreciate that this is an internal matter and you are not going to get into the details of this decision, but, is the behavior of these four football players in any way an indication of complacency already sticking its ugly head into your locker room?

COACH MEYER: Not available for comment.

SOD: I understand. Now coach, you have had a very successful and very impressive first three years at Ohio State including a combined record of 38 wins and 3 losses and culminating, at this point, in the 2015 National Playoff Championship. But, your tenure at Ohio State started after a well-documented, somewhat surprising and somewhat controversial, early retirement from the ranks of Head Coaching for personal and health reasons. You have vowed to continue your coaching career with a bit more “balance” between your coaching and personal life, and, what I think our reader would like to know is, how is that working out for you? You are in the spotlight once again at a very prominent university with higher than life expectations year in and year out; are you maintaining that sought after balance? Do you have any fear of returning to that unhealthy place where you found yourself in Florida?

COACH MEYER: Not available for comment.

SOD: I am glad to hear that coach. Now on to 2015. One of the reasons why Ohio State sits at the top of everyone’s pre-season polls is because you return so many of the players, on both sides of the football, that took you to the pinnacle last year; can you tell us about any of the fresh, new faces we might expect to see play a prominent role on your team this season?

COACH MEYER: Not available for comment.

SOD: Thank you coach, and, to no one’s surprise, the QB position is not one of those where a new face will shine. You have been quoted as saying that Ohio State has “an embarrassment of riches” on their football team and that is certainly no truer than when it comes to the QB position; what are you in position to share with us about this position as you start your fall practices?

COACH MEYER: Not available for comment.

SOD: Well, coach, we thank you for not taking the time to join us today and allowing our reader to fantasize about how you might have answered all of our questions. We wish you and the Buckeyes the best of luck this year in defending your title and look forward to following your Buckeyes throughout the year.

So there you have it, our first one-sided interview of the 2015 College Football year. We look forward to conducting a number of these interviews throughout the year. Certainly it will be easy to schedule and conduct such interviews when we are not burdened with the problem of having the subject actually answer any of our questions. If you have any people or topics that you would like to see us cover in these interviews, please let us know.

And, who knows, when our viewership exceeds 2 people a day, maybe we can actually entice someone to be our first two-sided interview. Thanks for reading and … if you can’t spike the football, then spike the lemonade.

Pre-Season to Post Season #1s

So would anyone be surprised if all of the pre-season College Football polls has THE Ohio State Buckeyes ranked number 1 this year? It seems like a foregone conclusion. With the way the Buckeyes finished last year; and, with the fact that they have much of their roster returning this year, they seem to be a lock. Don’t they?

But, Some Other Dude wonders, doesn’t that happen a lot? I mean, every year, the champion from the previous year must certainly stay number 1 going into the next year. Right? I guess if they are losing their quarterback or some stud running back or a large number of starters, maybe not. But, I wonder.

So, we took a look back into time.

Since the 2002 season, there have been 6 times when the previous season’s #1 was ranked #1 to start the next season. That’s 50% (or, half, for those of you who attended non-Ivy League schools – just kidding) of the time. But, how often does that team finish the year still (or, back) on top?

The chart below shows the Pre-Season and Post-Season #1 teams as ranked by the AP and USA Today polls since 2002. The team that finished #1 in 2003, 2004, 2008, 2009, 2013 and 2014 entered the next year as the Pre-Season #1 Team. Only USC finished that follow-up season as the #1 in 2004.

That table also shows just how hard it is to pick the ultimate Champion in a Pre-Season poll. That one year that USC repeated as the Champion is only 1 of 2 times that the polls got it right with the Pre-Season rankings. Interestingly enough, the year that Alabama repeated as National Champions, they were not ranked #1 in the year following their previous Championship season.

In fact, the preseason #1 team finished outside of the Top 5 at the end of the season 50% of the time. And, the eventual champion was ranked below #10 in the pre-season polls 3 times.

So, yes, Ohio State will be a unanimous #1 in the pre-season polls this year, but, history seems to suggest it is still too early to pencil them into even the four team playoff, yet. There is still hope for non-Buckeye fans out there. But, they sure do look strong, don’t they?

Trivia Tuesday – Wins and Losses

Here it is, already Tuesday again. Let’s try some more college trivia … are you ready?

QUESTION #1. Let’s start it off a little bit easy: Name the top 5 FBS winningest schools, all time in terms of number of wins.

QUESTION #2. Now, list the top 5 schools in terms of winning percentage. It changes a little bit and includes one relative newcomer to the FBS ranks.

QUESTION #3. Name the school that has the most all-time wins, without winning a National Championship.

QUESTION #4. List the 5 FBS schools with the most all-time losses.

QUESTION #5. List the 5 FBS schools with the poorest winning percent.

QUESTION# 6. Name the school with the most wins for a team that has a sub-500 winning percent.

QUESTION #7. Name the school with the most losses for a team that has a > .500 winning percent.

BUFFER ZONE

Some Other Dude in the off-season.

ANSWER #1. The top 5 Winningest programs are: Michigan (915 wins); Notre Dame (882); Texas (881); Nebraska (874); Ohio State (863).

ANSWER #2. The top 5 Winning Percentages are: Notre Dame (.732); Michigan (.729); Boise State (.724); Old Dominion (.722); Ohio State (.720).

ANSWER #3. The team with the most wins, but without a National Championship is West Virginia (719 wins).

ANSWER #4. The 5 FBS teams with the most all-time losses are: Indiana (651); Northwestern (649); Wake Forest (633); Kansas State (623); Iowa State (621).

ANSWER #5. The 5 poorest Winning Percentages are: Georgia State (.193); Florida International (.305); Kent State (.392); UNLV (.405); Wake Forest (.408).

ANSWER #6. The team with the most wins with a < .500 winning percentage is Kentucky with 587 wins and a .495 winning percentage.

ANSWER #7. The team with the most losses with a > .500 winning percentage is Rutgers with 620 losses and a .507 winning percentage.

Trivia Tuesday – Football and Basketball Championships

March Madness is now upon us and SOD gets just as caught up in the basketball hysteria as many others of you. I, too, will fill out a bracket that gets all busted before the end of the 1st weekend. It’s a yearly tradition in our house; my wife, who doesn’t follow the game very closely, and I, who watches intently all season long, will each fill out brackets and track our results. She has about a 15 year winning streak going on me – she always kicks my football lov’n backside. But, this is a College Football Blog and it is Trivia Tuesday; so, today’s trivia will focus on Football and Basketball.

QUESTION #1. You probably heard in the build up to the National Championship game the coincidence that Ohio State and Oregon also played in the first ever NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship. The then called Webfoots from Oregon beat Ohio State, 46 – 33 in that game. But, do you know what other two teams made up the first Final Four?

QUESTION #2. This one is pretty easy. SOD looked to see how many times the same school was the reigning Football Champion and Basketball Champion. It has only happened once and that was pretty recently. What is the only school to be both Football Champions and Basketball Champions in the same off season? (It gets weird because the Football Champion is listed as the previous year – but, they would both be Champions over the same summer.) Not only that, but they achieved this feat by beating the same school in the championship for each sport.

QUESTION #3. Now here’s the tougher one. To make what the team that is the answer to Question #2 did so remarkable, there are only 10 schools that have ever won at least 1 of each national championships over all the years. Name the 10 schools that have at least 1 National Football Championship and 1 National Basketball Championship.

THE BUFFER ZONE

ANSWER #1. In the semi-finals of that first ever NCAA Championship Tournament, Ohio State defeated Villanova, 53 – 36 in the East Bracket and Oregon defeated Oklahoma, 55 – 37 in the West. The entire tournament consisted of only 8 teams and was played on the campus of Northwestern University in Evanstown, IL.

ANSWER #2. The Florida Gators won the BCS Championship Game over Ohio State to conclude the 2006 season and then won the 2007 NCAA Basketball Championship by beating the Buckeyes again on the hardwood.

ANSWER #3. The 10 schools to have at least 1 National Football Championship and 1 NCAA Basketball Championship are:

Arkansas – Football Co-Champs in 1964 (with Alabama and Notre Dame); Basketball Champs in 1994

California – Football: 1920, 1921 (with Cornell), 1922 (with Cornell); Basketball: 1959

Florida – Football: 1996, 2006, 2008; Basketball: 2006, 2007

Maryland – Football: 1953; Basketball: 2002

Michigan – Football: 1901, 1903 (with Princeton), 1904 (with Pennsylvania), 1918 (with Pittsburgh), 1923 (with Illinois), 1933, 1948, 1997 (with Nebraska); Basketball: 1989

Michigan State – Football: 1952, 1965 (with Alabama), 1966 (with Notre Dame); Basketball: 1979, 2000

Ohio State – Football: 1942, 1954 (with UCLA), 1957 (with Auburn), 1961 (with Alabama), 1968, 1970 (with Nebraska and Texas), 2002, 2014; Basketball: 1960

Stanford – Football: 1926 (with Alabama); Basketball: 1942

Syracuse – Football: 1959; Basketball: 2003

UCLA – Football 1954 (with Ohio State); Basketball: 1964, 1965, 1967, 1968, 1969, 1970, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1995

NOTE: This information is from the NCAA List of recognized champions. SOD did not look at NIT Champions for the years that this was the premier end-of-season basketball championship.

College Football Meets Rhyme and Prose

I know it may seem like an odd combination but, Some Other Dude, the guy who writes this college football blog, is also an Average Joe posting to a poetry blog.  Weird, I know.

While we enjoy a little break from college football and just before the madness of the college basketball tournament, here is a sample of when my worlds collide – poetry about college football.

Trivia Tuesday – Power 5 Conferences

In recent years, there has been a lot of shuffling of College Football Conferences. And, if you believe Some Other Dude, there is more yet to come as we advance upon the age of the Mega-Conferences. But, SOD wonders, how well do you know the history of the current Power 5 Conferences?

THE TRIVIA CHALLENGE

Name the original teams in each of the current Power 5 Conferences.

THE BUFFER ZONE

THE ANSWERS

The Atlantic Coast Conference.  Even though we appear to be headed to 16 team Mega-Conferences, back in history there was an even mega-er conference; the Southern Conference.  The Southern Conference, at one time, consisted of 23 teams and eventually splintered into other, smaller conferences.  One of those splinter conferences was the ACC which officially formed as a conference in 1953.  The 7 charter members of the ACC were: Clemson, Duke, Maryland, North Carolina, North Carolina State, South Carolina and Wake Forest.  Only South Carolina no longer calls the ACC home as they eventually joined the other splinter conference with former Southern Conference brethren.  Link to information source.

The Big 12.  The history of the Big 12 is a little more convoluted than that of the other conferences.  The Big 12 itself wasn’t formed until 1994 when teams from the Big 8 merged with teams from the Southwest Conference.  The Big 8 Conference was originally chartered in 1907 as the Missouri Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Association and eventually became known as the Big 6 and then grew up to become the Big 8.  The original members of this conference were: Iowa (two-timing with the Big Ten), Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska and Washington University in St. Louis.  Only Kansas remains as a current member of The Big 12.  Link to information source.  The Southwest Conference was first formed in 1912, consisting of: Arkansas, Baylor, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Rice, Texas and Texas A&M.  Baylor, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State and Texas remain as current members of the Big 12.  Link to information source.

The Big Ten.  The name “The Big Ten” was actually not officially incorporated until 1987, but the conference referred to as the Big Ten has been around since 1905.  The original conference was made up of 7 teams in what was known as the “Intercollegiate Conference Athletic Association”.  In 1917, when the conference had expanded to 10 teams, it was labeled the “Big Ten” by members of the media.  The original members of this so-called Big Ten Conference were: Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Northwestern, Ohio State, Purdue, University of Chicago and Wisconsin.  Only the University of Chicago is not a member of that conference today.  Link to information source.

The Pac 12.  The Pac 12 Conference started off as a little seedling conference that eventually grew up into the Pac 12.  Forming in 1916 as the Pacific Coast Conference, its original members stood at only 4 schools: California, Oregon, Oregon Agricultural College (later known as Oregon State) and Washington.  All four schools still remain in the conference today.  Interestingly, Idaho and Montana were one time members of this conference and the conference was disbanded and re-assembled in 1959 due to a pay-for-play scandal.  The re-formed conference was called the Athletic Association of Western Universities, commonly known as the Big 5. After growing once again, the conference started being referred to as the Pacific 8 in 1964 and officially became the Pacific 8 in 1968, the Pac 10 in 1978 and the Pac 12 in 2011.  Link to information source.

The SEC.  The SEC preceded the ACC in splintering away from the huge Southern Conference when 13 schools left in 1932 to form their own conference.  The 13 schools that made up the first version of the Southeastern Conference were: Alabama, Auburn, Florida, Georgia, Georgia Tech, Kentucky, LSU, Ole Miss, Mississippi State, Sewanee (University of the South), Tennessee, Tulane and Vanderbilt.  Georgia Tech now resides in the ACC; Tulane, although still an FBS school is no longer a member of a Power 5 Conference; and, Sewanee, after having decided to de-emphasize sports in 1940, currently competes in Division III athletics.  Link to information source.

2015 Playoff – SOD’s 1st Predictions

Here it is, February 23, way too early to make predictions about the 2015 College Football season, and yet, it seems, everyone already has.  So SOD, with his brand new college football blog, has decided to enter the fray with my very first college football prediction.  No better way to earn or tarnish your credibility than to make predictions that prove, by way of luck, to be accurate or, by way of misfortune, to make you look like an idiot.  So, here we go, SODs prediction of the four teams to land in the second FBS playoff.

Two of my picks show up on many other prognosticators’ picks and two picks are much less popular.

Ohio State.  This is an easy pick to make.  The reigning champs and winners of the inaugural FBS playoffs almost didn’t make it into the 2014 format.  But, the Buckeyes proved to be deserving of the selection and won out with a third string QB leading the way in two rather dominating performances.  Urban Meyer’s squad returns lots of experience on both sides of the ball and just seems built to repeat.  The one concern about the Buckeyes is … complacency.  After riding a year on the Champions horse, it is sometimes hard to get that motivation and drive to where it needs be.  That is Coach Meyer’s job – to make sure that doesn’t happen.  The schedule looks to be in Ohio State’s favor and they will enter the season odds on favorites for a repeat selection to the playoffs.

TCU.  Like Ohio State, the Horned Frogs are returning a very seasoned football squad, all wearing that “we should have been in the 2014 playoffs” chip on their shoulder.  No concerns about complacency here; the Horned Frogs will come into the 2015 season with something to prove and the bitter taste of being left out of last year’s party in their mouths.  SOD likes TCU’s chances this year and their schedule looks pretty manageable for achieving that end.

And now, here is where SOD varies from the beaten path.  Alabama and USC appear to be the next two teams showing up on the majority of the playoff prediction pages, but, although solid picks, SOD believes that Alabama is just losing too much talent, again, and SOD is not yet a Sarkisian believer.  Whereas, it will not be a surprise to see Alabama and USC fill out the remainder of the 2015 playoff slate, SOD is going with a couple of long shots.

Georgia.  Although the Bulldogs will be breaking in a new QB and they have a way of disappointing their fans year after year with high expectations, SOD is going to roll the dice and predict that the bad luck and injuries of previous seasons abandon the Bulldogs and pave the way for a surprising trip to the playoffs.  The SEC West teams will continue to beat each other up throughout the regular season and limp into the SEC Championship Game against an SEC East winner that is less beat up.  The East Champion will win the Championship Game and sneak into the playoffs after going all year outside of the Selection Committee’s top 4.

Stanford.  Like Georgia, Sanford will start from back in the pack of ranked teams and slowly play their way into contention behind QB Kevin Hogan and a strong defense.  The Ducks will still be competitive with a very capable QB moving in from Eastern Washington to replace Marcus Mariota, but the Cardinal will win the head to head and face a very competitive Pac 12 South Team in the Championship Game as the springboard into the playoffs.

In 2015, the ACC will be left sitting on the sidelines moaning that their champion deserves to be in – but that team will not stand out enough to win over the selection committee.  There are plenty of other teams that will sit at or near the top of the selection committee’s list throughout the year, but, once the conference championships are over, these four teams will be the ones left standing, or, at least, that’s the way SOD sees it on February 23.  Two front-runners and two long-shots.  A credible pick or proof that SOD is an idiot.  Now we just have to sit back and watch the cake bake.

Greatest College Football Games Never Played

As we sit in the off season and wait for August to roll around again, SOD likes to look ahead at the upcoming schedules. In so doing, I was wondering, “What are some great football match-ups that haven’t yet occurred?” What are the greatest games never played?

To answer this question, SOD looked at the schools with the all-time winningest records and identified which of these schools have never played each other.

Like all of SOD’s, unscientific research, the results are only as good as my internet search skills allow – so, my findings may contain some erroneous data, but, the following table lists those match-ups of current FBS schools listed in the top 30 of all-time winningest programs that have not matched up against each other, as best as I could discover.

Many of these unplayed games make geographic sense, but a few of them are surprising and, almost all of them, would make great match-ups in future schedules.

A few observations:

Probably the most surprising games not yet played are: Tennessee v West Virginia and Penn State v Virginia Tech. It is also surprising to see that Oklahoma has never played Georgia and Arkansas has never gone up against Clemson. All of these non-games should be played!

The one team that shows up most often on this list is Washington. The Huskies have not yet matched up against 8 of the 23 other teams on top of the list of winningest programs. I know that the Dawgs are tucked away in the Pacific Northwest corner of the US and many of these teams are Eastern and Southern schools, but, come on Dawgs, you need to get out more!

SOD looked over this list and tried to determine which game would most likely be a National Championship Game? I’d probably have to go with Oklahoma v Georgia.

As we venture deeper into the new world order of the FBS playoff and schedule strength starts to play a bigger and bigger role in who gets selected to participate in the playoffs, SOD believes that we will see fewer and fewer cupcakes on FBS teams’ schedules. As a result, the list of unplayed games shown above would be a great place to start in finding non-conference games to play. Really – which one of those games would you not want to see played and have your team go up against some patsy instead?

Oh well, a guy can dream can’t he?