The better question might be, What’s happening away from Amherst this fall?
Before the 2012 college football season began, I surveyed the schedules of some of the teams I wanted to see in live action. While I must’ve noticed the common opponent on the Vanderbilt and Michigan schedules, it wasn’t until I heard a broadcast of UMass at Western Michigan that I knew there had to be a story here. Who won’t these guysmen play? (And, more generally, UMass has a football team?) Keep reading…
We’re into the meat of the 2012 football season with heavy games for most teams from here on out. It’s also the time when teams’ reputations for the year become solidified. One such team is Auburn, which fell to 1-6 on the season, 0-5 in conference with a 17-13 loss to Vanderbilt in Nashville. Four years ago, I watched these teams play under the lights in the same stadium. In 2008, Auburn was 5-0 and highly ranked, but the game outcome was the same. This year’s win over the TIgers/Plainsmen/Eagles won’t do as much for the Commodores’ strength of schedule, but it does push them to 2-3 in the conference, and it’s an important win to kick off the second half of a schedule that should be easier than the first.
While Vanderbilt took a necessary step in the positive direction Saturday, Michigan State took another step toward a lost season with a 12-10 loss to Michigan in Ann Arbor. More on that game later in the week. Back to the SEC for a moment, where the Eastern division is one of the most power concentrated and confusing divisions in the nation. Florida swamped South Carolina, 44-11, to go to 7-0 (6-0), while Georgia escaped Lexington with a 29-24 win over Kentucky. If Florida’s going to lose a game this year, it will be next week when they host Georgia, because the rest of their schedule is soft cake (Missouri, Louisiana-Lafayette, Jacksonville State, and Florida State). In the SEC West, LSU and Texas A&M renewed their rivalry in a compelling game featuring early Aggie control and a Tiger comeback win.
Elsewhere in the top 25, Alabama and Oregon rolled. Two quick notes on Oregon: 1) I’m worried that Florida’s #2 rating in the first BCS, together with their easy finishing schedule, will mean that we don’t get to see Alabama and Oregon in the national championship game, a matchup that feels very compelling and intriguing; and 2) the ALDLAND staff is still waiting on it’s autographed Oregon cheerleader calendar. Jog back to the SEC West, where Mississippi State is the most unheralded undefeated team in the country. After beating MTSU Saturday, though, they’re unlikely to stay that way, finishing with Alabama, Texas A&M, LSU, Arkansas, and Ole Miss. Of course, nothing is more perennially unheralded than the Starkville Dogs, and that schedule only has something to do with it. Most of the rest of the top 25 won, including Clemson, Oregon State, and Stanford in important conference games. The upstart Texas Tech Red Raiders survived in triple overtime to beat TCU, and the very impressive Kansas State beat West Virginia in Morgantown 55-14 in a game in which I’d only somewhat jokingly predicted WVU would score 100 after being embarrassed the week before. Dana Holgorson’s air raid offense appears to be out of jet fuel.
On Sunday, the Vikings continue to mount an increasingly compelling challenge to those who would dismiss them by going to 5-2 with a win over flash in the pan Arizona. RGIII continues to impress despite another close loss, this week to the Giants. The Saints doubled their win total by beating Tampa Bay, and the Raiders came back to beat the ailing Jaguars, who lost Maurice Jones-Drew and Blaine Gabbert, sending out the bat signal for David Garrard (I hope). The Patriots beat the Jets in overtime, although VSL’s Bobby O’Shea, a noted Jets fan, thinks that something is wrong in New England, and I’m inclined to agree. Whether it was the defensive injuries Baltimore suffered last week or Houston’s push to come back from a loss, the Texans returned to 2012 form with a 43-13 win over the Ravens.
In baseball, the World Series is nearly set. The Tigers are in(!), and the Cardinals and Giants are playing a game seven right now, which the Giants are winning 7-0 in the fourth. In other current news, Ndamukong Suh just separated Jay Cutler’s neck from the rest of his body. Bears 10, Lions 0 in the first half.
ALDLAND was in Nashville last weekend (as if it isn’t always there) for the Florida-Vanderbilt game and sundry Music City revelry. I was at the game on Saturday night. Bdoyk could not take a break from forty-eight straight hours of honky tonking to attend. Magalan was supposed to be in the stadium too, sitting a row behind me, but I never did spot him on the inside, which likely was due to my inability to visually identify him in his Gator colors.
The Vanderbilt defense seemed to encounter the same challenge, demonstrating difficulty stopping the Florida run game in general, and mobile quarterback Jeff Driskel in particular. In my game preview, I suggested that the relevant analogy for this VU opponent was Georgia. Instead, the game probably was more similar to Vandy’s game earlier this season against Northwestern. While the Dores grabbed an early lead in this one, they were unable to maintain it. Still, the game was exciting throughout, the home team rarely beyond a one-score deficit until Driskel’s back-breaking touchdown run at the end of the game.
A bright spot for VU was wide receiver Jordan Matthews, who had eight catches for 131 yards and a touchdown. The spotlight also shone on Coach Franklin and his staff, though, and the Commodores’ inability to run plays quickly at the goal line late in the game was a little concerning. Still, in a game in which Driskel topped Tim Tebow’s school rushing record, the little things aren’t going to be outcome-determinative.
One last printable highlight of the weekend came before the game started, when top golfer and Vanderbilt alum Brandt Snedeker stopped by our tailgate for a chat with some of his old buddies on his way into the game.
We find ourselves late on a Monday after another weekend of close games. On Saturday, woefully underachieving Michigan State lost in overtime to Iowa as a result of what one local radio host called the worst coaching he had ever seen in his life, and the man is neither young nor inexperienced in the field. In a real upset, LSU threw a monkey wrench in the SEC East race and beat South Carolina 23-21, Kansas State escaped Ames with a 27-21 win over Iowa State, Notre Dame beat Stanford 20-13 in overtime, and Texas A&M squeaked by Louisiana Tech 59-57. Even the Florida-Vanderbilt game was close into the fourth quarter before the Gators and their quarterback ran away with it. More on that game later this week.
Saturday had its share of blowouts, naturally, and the notable ones included Alabama’s 42-10 win at Missouri, which remains winless in its new conference, Texas Tech’s 49-14 embarrassment of one-time national championship contender West Virginia, still-undefeated Oregon State’s 42-24 win over BYU, and Michigan’s 45-0 muddy execution of Illinois on Wolverine homecoming. Michigan hosts Michigan State in another ALDLAND outing, more on which toward the end of the week.
The NFL had its share of close contests too, including the Lions’ overtime win over hapless Philadelphia, Buffalo’s 19-16 overtime win over Arizona, whose kicker hit a 61-yarder to tie the game but subsequently missed a 30-something yard kick to win the game in the final seconds, the Seahawks 24-23 win over New England, Atlanta’s come-from-behind win over Oakland to become the league’s final undefeated team, Miami’s 17-14 victory over the Rams, and Baltimore’s 31-29 capitalization on the Dallas (ongoing) Disaster. Baltimore payed a long-term price for its win, though, sacrificing defenders Ray Lewis and Ladarius Webb at last to the football devil (no, not the commissioner– separate office) in payment for their past defensive successes. Lewis and Webb are out for the season. Other high-flying teams went down in spectacular fashion on Sunday, including San Francisco, 26-3 at the hands of the Giants, and Houston, 42-24 to Green Bay on Sunday night.
In off-field NFL news, Jonathan Vilma, the embattled New Orleans Saint, reportedly will be allowed to play as soon as this weekend, although it isn’t clear if he will. Vilma continues to maintain a defamation suit against Roger Goodell.
In baseball, the final four is set and in motion. Detroit seized a 2-0 lead over the Yankees as the series heads to Detroit with AL strikeout kings Justin Verlander and Max Scherzer yet to pitch for the Tigers. The other road team, St. Louis, has a 1-0 lead in the NLCS battle of the two most recent defending World Series champions, though the Cardinals are down 5-1 in the fourth as I write this.
Duality abounds this weekend, when ALDLAND takes you live to Florida vs. Vanderbilt in Nashville on Saturday evening.
Magalan and I will be in the stadium, along with VSL‘s Bobby O’Shea, for another game against another nationally ranked SEC East opponent. Indeed, it appears it will be the third time this season that Vanderbilt has played a top-ten team, and each of those opponents– South Carolina, Georgia, and now Florida– has been an SEC East foe.
Vanderbilt was a play away from beating both Georgia and Florida last year. This year, Georgia destroyed Vandy. Will the Commodores’ rematch with the Gators go the same way? Many are calling this a trap game for Florida, sandwiched between an emotional home win over LSU and a big game against South Carolina next week. I don’t think Florida is as good as the national commentators say they are, but Vanderbilt has more problems than its coach and fans want to admit as well. Their win at Missouri was a big boost, though. My reasonable hope for this game is that it goes like the season opener against South Carolina: VU plays UF close all game and has a chance to win it in the fourth quarter.
A final note on similarities between the Georgia and Florida games is the photograph at the top of this post, which, like the one in the Georgia preview, depicts a game between these two teams on nearly the same day, sixty-six years ago. Also like that old Georgia matchup, Vanderbilt beat Florida in this one, 20-0. Looking forward to their meeting tomorrow. Stay tuned here for coverage after the game.
As noted, last Saturday’s college football games featured a number of games between top-ranked teams. As discussed in this space before, every game generally is going to end with one team on the winning side and one team on the losing side, games being athletic events between two teams. This means that a bunch of ranked teams lost this week, and boy did they.
Being in existence for little more than a year, there really isn’t much of an “ALDLAND Vault” at this point, but week six necessitates a new approach to game previews. There wasn’t much in the way of top-25 matchups last weekend, but it’s a different story this weekend. Some highlights, in chronological order:
Chrysler hit rock bottom in 2009, plunging into bankruptcy and succumbing to a takeover by Fiat, the Italian brand American drivers used to call “Fix It Again Tony.” It was a dismal time for the iconic U.S. auto maker, but it wasn’t the end of days some had predicted. The unified company recovered financially and this year unveiled its most significant new product: a spry compact designed to help Americans learn to economize with style and zip.
Designers called it the Dodge Dart, after the company’s 1960s stalwart, and backed it with a burst of bold advertisements. The car is Chrysler’s phoenix moment. If you are human, it’s hard not to root for the Dart.
This weekend, as 20th-ranked Michigan State takes on No. 14 Ohio State, the Spartans football program also has emerged from decades of tailpipe-dragging performance. A team that hasn’t had a Rose Bowl season since 1987 or a national title since 1966 is cruising along nicely. The Spartans shared the Big Ten Conference title in 2010 and just produced their first-ever back-to-back 11-win seasons.
They are gaining cred, too, losing the quarterback that led them to a 2012 Outback Bowl victory over Georgia, Kirk Cousins, and still entering this season ranked No. 13. A glass-fronted addition to the football building and a handsome players’ lounge with obligatory pool table show a willingness to keep pace in facilities. The acres of empty seats are filling in. The Spartans have banished the rattles and squeaks. … Read More
(via WSJ)
Plenty of below average songs about Miami came to mind when I woke up this morning and learned that the Heat had won the NBA championship, but I thought it would be better for everyone to raise the level of geographic generality a little bit to broaden the options. Having done that, and recalling that the first day of summer was this week, the choice was pretty easy. Here’s “Mainline Florida,” the last cut off of the great early summer album, 461 Ocean Boulevard:
Please ignore the video uploader’s errant comma and make like Mike Miller and don’t let your troubles keep you from having a great weekend.
The uproar and controversy of Urban Meyer’s stunning recruiting coup at Ohio State settled in and Stefon Diggs, still on the Buckeyes’ wish list, was debating his future.
Diggs, the second-highest rated wide receiver in the country, had narrowed his list of potential schools to Maryland, Florida and Ohio State. For more than a week following National Signing Day on Feb. 1, and before Diggs eventually signed with Maryland, Meyer relentlessly pursued Diggs.
Multiple sources told Sporting News that Meyer—who won two national championships in six years at Florida and cemented his legacy as one of the game’s greatest coaches—told the Diggs family that he wouldn’t let his son go to Florida because of significant character issues in the locker room.
Character issues that we now know were fueled by a culture Meyer created. Character issues that gutted what was four years earlier the most powerful program in college football. … Read More
(via Sporting News)
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Urban renewal: Once Meyered in the Swamp, a Buckeye nut returns to his roots
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