CigarSmokinFootball

Considering all the surprises and happenstances that have plagued College Football this month, we needed a dose of reality, the REAL teams needed to stand up and be counted, the CFB world needed to be righted, equilibrium restored. Thanks be to God, equilibrium has been restored, …. sort of. There’s still enough turmoil to make writing a column interesting, but, at least, ALABAMA has finally played like ALABAMA. But I get ahead of myself.
As this is being written, it is our due diligence to provide frequent updates on two college football issues: 1) the status of Will Muschamp’s tenure at Florida, and, 2) the whining and hand-wringing from Brian Kelly.
FLASH: Florida has announced that they are mulling over Muschamp’s future with their program.
Double flash: Coach Kelly has announced that when Notre Dame receivers block defensive backs down field for the purpose of providing a pick so another receiver can catch as pass, as is legal in basketball, but is not within the scope of the rules in football, it should be classified as a “blown coverage” by their opponent and should never, no never, no, never incur a penalty against the Irish. It never has before.
ACC
Florida State finally played a game that had some meat to it. It was a lean cut piece of meat, not a NY Strip, grade “A”, perfect marble cut, but it was meat. The overrated Irish came into Tallahassee with their undefeated record and talk of taking down the crisis-fueled Seminoles. The visitors from South Bend jumped out to a lead and held it for almost the entire game. Almost. In the fourth quarter, with the Seminoles hanging onto a slim advantage, ND had the ball on the FSU two yard line. The Irish ran a double pick play, legal in basketball, illegal in football, to complete a TD pass. It’s illegal to run a pick, much less a double pick. Coach Kelly says they don’t “run illegal plays.” Even Lou Holtz, who sees EVERYTHING through Notre glasses, admitted it was a violation. Notre’s playoff possibilities took a tumble. FSU now has this week off, wonder what dunderhead move QB Winston will pull, and how Coach Fisher will cover it up? He will, and he will, rest assured.
Elsewhere within the ACC, Duke established control of the Coastal division by defeating Virginia. In Chapel Hill, NC, the most entertaining game of the conference was played between North Carolina and Georgia Tech. With the lead going back and forth all game long, the Tar Heels finally emerged victorious, with ten seconds to spare. Is this the start of another spectacular season-ending run by UNC?
Updates: Still no word from the Florida Athletic department on the status of Coach Muschamp, not sure what’s taking so long, but we are monitoring the situation. Also, Coach Kelly says his receivers did exactly what they are coached to do every day in practice, so there is no way that running a pick could be illegal.
Big 12, that only has ten teams
Leave it to the Big 12 minus two to provide the upset. West “By Golly” Virginia hosted high scoring Baylor and beat ‘em! The Mountaineers held BU scoreless in the fourth quarter, which had been known, especially at TCU, as the “Bryce Petty quarter”! WVU wasn’t even ranked, not only do the Bears fall out of the lead in the Big 12, that only has ten teams, but that loss pretty much knocks them out of playoff contention. For next year, maybe Coach Briles might want to look into what a running game is, and, possibly, maybe, just a suggestion, start building a defense. Just musing.
Biggest lesson learned for Saturday, “Don’t play mistake style football against a Bill Snyder coached team” Coach Snyder believes in coaching the fundamentals, like, don’t make mistakes. Some players didn’t believe him at first, see the Auburn game. Since that stumble, the Wildcats have been solid. OU has never worried themselves about fundamentals too much. Late in the 4th quarter, trailing by one point, the Sooners drove to the one yard line and hit a stone wall of Wildcat defenders. On 4th and goal, the Sooners sent in Mr. Automatic field goal kicker Hunnicutt. Wouldn’t you know it, he missed the go ahead chip-shot field goal. Heart just breaks for that kid. K-State won and now holds the undisputed lead within the Small Man’s syndrome Conference of the Big 12, that only has ten teams.
Elsewhere, same Big-12-with-only-ten teams, Texas beat Iowa State. Way to go, Coach Strong, I’m still not a UT fan but I like Coach Strong and what he’s doing. Kansas lost again, to Texas Tech this time, but they have been playing much better since Charlie Weiss, former coach of Notre Dame where they don’t teach illegal plays, departed. TCU exposed every weakness that Oklahoma State had on the way to winning, 42-9. It was not pretty. When do K-State and TCU play? That’s going to be a fantastic game! Battle of the Purples!
Updates: Will Muschamp’s tenure at Florida continues. On the Notre Dame Campus, Coach Kelly is thinking about filing a complaint against the NCAA. His premise is that all calls in the fourth quarter have historically gone in the Irish’s favor, so just who empowered these officials to not allow ND to get away with running an illegal pick? Double pick? It’s just not fair! “Where is my pacifier?” he was allegedly heard to mumble.
Great White North (Big Ten)
Michigan State played Indiana, who wore those peppermint stripes on chrome, eye-sore helmets, and the Spartans seemed to have a case of the slows. Inertia. Lead-foots, call it what you may. Maybe the SEC-conquering Hoosiers were going to give them a game. Must have been Leonidas speaking in their headsets, for the Greek Warriors rallied and rolled IU like they were the Persian left flank. Or, maybe it was the Trojan flank. Athenian? The Spartans fought everyone, and right now, there doesn’t appear to be another team within the GWN capable playing the same game as the men of SPARTA! THIS IS SPARTA!
With Halloween approaching, Purdue adopted the spirit early and scared Minnesota ‘bout to death.. The Gophers kicked a 52 yard field goal with 4:59 seconds left in the 4th quarter to ekk out a win. The Boilermakers are getting better, and Minnesota needs to develop a passing game to compliment their running game. Good game, even so.
Elsewhere in the soon-to-be frozen north, newcomer Maryland upset longtime member Iowa, 38-31. I did not see that one coming. Ohio State’s offense showed a lot of improvement as they buried the other newcomer to the GWN, Rutgers. Nebraska ignored the “Curse of the Hat” and doubled up on Northwestern. Enough piddling around, time for ….
S-E-C! S-E-C!
Are you familiar with the poem, “Casey at the Bat”? Somewhere in this hallowed land… people actually say that the SEC is not the best college football conference in the nation. Not sure what they are smoking or taking, but I’m will to bet it’s illegal, even in Colorado. As I mildly hinted at the beginning of this story, the most traditional performance of the entire weekend came for ALABAMA!! The Tide offense meshed and by halftime Bama held a 45-0 lead. Everything was working, the running game was unstoppable, even Blake Sims was throwing the ball downfield and completing long passes. We, and Texas A&M, had no idea he could do that. Traditional Alabama defense reappeared, they were lights out, scary, crushing the Aggies in a humiliating shutout. Alabama would have beaten anybody in the nation Saturday. Now, we’ll see if they can keep it up as they go to Knoxville.
The other defensive story came from Oxford, MS. The Ole Miss Rebels smothered Tennessee. The Vols rushed for 0 yards total. Like Michigan State, the Rebels offense started off slowly. Then in the second quarter the light came on and Ole Miss won, 34-3. Author’s thought here, how much better would the Rebels be if they had just one power running back? I’m thinking, pretty darn good!
Georgia has been a surprise by playing even better with Chubb replacing Gurley. Maybe the Bulldog team is playing this TEAM game. Chubb ran for 202 yards against the Razorbacks! Arkansas scored 32 points, but the issue was never in doubt. Even 32 was too little, too late. The Hogs’ SEC losing streak continues. Coach Bielema is having a tough time as an SEC head coach, Bless his heart.
Missouri, coming off a crushing defeat by Georgia last week, visited the Swamp and beat Florida. But the Gators held the Tigers, Show Me state style, to one offensive touchdown. Let me say that again. Florida held Missouri to ONE offensive touchdown, but yet the Gators lost, 42-13! UF turned the ball over six times! Mizzou scored on punt returns, kick-off returns, scoop and scores, pick six, …. Have I forgotten any? Oh, yeah, Kick-Six, but we won’t mention that. Thus the reason for the Muschamp updates. How he keeps his job I don’t know.
Elsewhere, South Carolina was favored over Furman and the Gamecocks won, 41-10. Kentucky had an opportunity to take down a relatively weak LSU, but it didn’t work out, and the Cats lost, 41-3. I guess even a weak Tiger can beat a strong Wildcat.
Update: Coach Kelly has stormed into the ND athletic department and confronted the athletic director, screaming that he should be more like Pat Hayden, at USC. When a call is made against ND, correctly or not, the AD should run down to the field to yell at the officials. Kelly allegedly hinted that the AD might be on the Committee next year if he did this. (Is Pat Hayden still on the Committee?)
PAC-12
Oregon wore throwback uniforms and they actually looked like college football uniforms! Against Washington the Ducks were back in style, winning 45-20. That’s 11 straight wins over the Huskies. Marcus Mariota threw for 336 yards and two TD’s. The defense played better than any other left coast team this weekend.

Arizona State ruined Notre Dame’s signature win by rolling over Stanford. (Coach Kelly is trying to reach Coach Graham by phone to question his motives for doing that to the Irish)(By the way, on that pass play, that “missed assignment”, where the Irish receiver caught the late TD pass to beat Stanford, there wasn’t a pick involved, was there? How about a double pick? Where were the ‘right’ officials when you need them, Coach Kelly?) The Sun Devils led 14-0 by halftime, and there was little doubt about the outcome. ASU won 26-10.
Elsewhere UCLA and California played a fascinating game! It was a great Bear fight! One team would swipe a paw against the other only to have that team respond with a smack of their own. The ursines fought nose to nose. UCLA Bruins won, 36-34. USC was not upset by Colorado, winning 56-28. Whoever called for the Buffs to pull an upset? That, would be me. On Thursday night Utah upended Oregon State, 29-23.
Update: Coach Kelly has screamed, stomped his feet, held his breath, thrown himself on the floor in a fit of rage and crying and tried blubbering, but the NCAA will not change the rules for Notre Dame to run picks on defensive backs and award ND the win against FSU. At least, not this year. If Kelly continues to NOT teach illegal plays at Notre Dame, look for the spineless NCAA to revise their rules in the future. After all, if you can’t believe the coach of Notre Dame, whom can you believe, Jimbo Fisher? Bad example, sorry.
Muschamp is still Gainesvilly employed.