COLLEGE FOOTBALL BOWL NOTES: We lived our little drama… And stars fell on Alabama Last night Yes they did. The Crimson Tide rolled out and Ohio State rolled in and the Buckeyes beat Bama, 42-35, in a great Sugar Bowl game in New Orleans. It came down to one Hail Mary but Mother Mary wasn’t in at Dial A Prayer and Bama won’t be winning its fifth National Championship since ’09. No, no, no. The South is out and the North, 150-years after Appomattox, has won again, and the title for best in college football will go to a Northern team – Oregon or Ohio State. And while God doesn’t take sides in football games – this will surprise a lot of alumni, coaches and players – he/she is probably okay with the South out and the North in. The star of the OSU/Bama game was Ezekiel “When the walls come tumbling down” Elliott, who was handed the football 20 times for OSU and carried it forward for 230-yards and two TDs, including the game winner, 85-yards down the left sideline for OSU’s 41st point. Total yards in the game: 944, resulting in 44-first downs. One of the game’s more impressive stats: OSU’s punter, Cameron Johnston, averaged 46.5 yards per kick (despite one badly shanked), while Bama’s punter, JK Scott, put up out-of-this world numbers, averaging 55-yards on seven punts. THE STARS THAT FELL ON BAMA ALSO FELL ON AUBURN, WHO LOST TO WISCONSIN IN OT, 34-31. Melvin Gordon, the nation’s leading rusher, added 251-yards to his 2,336 regular season total for the Badgers – ending with 2,587 and 29-TDs in 14-games! The Badgers and Tigers played another wonderful and entertaining game, but only 44,023 showed up at the Outback Bowl. That would be 36,298 fewer than Madison’s 80,321 Camp Randall Stadium; or 43,428 fewer than Auburn’s 87,451 Jordan-Hare Stadium. THE BIG 10, IN DANGER NEW YEAR’S DAY OF BECOMING THE LITTLE 10, actually ended up with three winners, OSU, Wisconsin, and Michigan State, with Minnesota the only loser, 33-17, to Missouri. Going into today’s Iowa/Tennessee game, the Big 10 has five wins and only two losses, and if the Hawkeyes win, is there anyone ready to still raise a hand for the SEC? Good, because that would be foolish. Oh, I wonder now how the Wizards at CBS feel with their exclusive SEC TV contract? With the Edward R. Murrow/Walter Cronkite network losing David Letterman and the SEC on the decline, 2015 may be a hazardous year at Black Rock. And Verne Lundquist may have to shill down his shilling for the SEC. WITH BAYLOR UP 41-21 OVER MICHIGAN STATE IN THE COTTON BOWL ENTERING THE 4TH QUARTER, I turned away from TV to read the three newspapers on my lap – NY Times, LA Times, and the U-T San Diego. I was therefore surprised to find that MSU scored 21-points in the 4th quarter to pull out an amazing win over Ken Starr’s Baptist Bears to win it with only seven ticks on the clock. But even in losing, Bryce Petty, Baylor’s GS1 QB, was mighty impressive, as he completed 36-passes of 51-thrown for three TDs and 550-yards. The 6’3, 235-pound kid from Midlothian, Texas, throws as accurate a long pass as any QB in the USA, including the NFL (and the San Diego Chargers should pay attention). NOW, TO THE GRANDDADDY OF ALL BOWLS, THE ROSE: Well, if all you know is the final score, 59-20, you might surmise a boring, one-sided game. In that you would be wrong. It was not boring! The Ducks of Eugene beat the undefeated Gators of Tallahassee, as they scored 41-second half points to rip open a game that had them up by only five at halftime. 91,322 watched the tear-down in the game’s final 30-minutes, as Oregon scored 27-3rd quarter points and then added another 14 for the 4th. In the vaunted matchup of the two Heisman winning QBs, Jameis Winston of FSU and Marcus Mariota of Oregon, it came to this: Winston completed 29 of 45 passes for 348-yards, with one TD and one interception. He ran eight times and lost 15-yards. Mariota completed 26 of 36 passes for 338-yards, with two TDs and one interception. He also ran the ball eight times for 62-yards and a TD. Mariota’s game totals were 400-yards gained and three TDs; Winston’s, 330-yards gained and one TD. For the 2014-15 season, Winston completed 305-passes of 467-thrown for 3,907-yards, resulting in 25 TDs and 18 interceptions. Mariota completed 280-passes of 408 thrown for 4,121-yards, resulting in 40 TDs and only three interceptions. Both won the Heisman Award, but while statistics may mislead they don’t lie, and Marcus Mariota is the better QB. And if you’re betting on who becomes the better NFL QB, I think you draft Mariota. NOW IT’S ON TO THE NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP GAME – OHIO STATE VS. OREGON. I’m a West Coast guy and I want the Ducks to win, but I’m not betting against Urban Meyer, the two-time winner of National Championship games (at Florida), or against – Thee Ohio State University. HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Posted on: Fri, 02 Jan 2015 16:28:19 +0000