The College Football Czar

Week 6

 

 

Week five in review: It was a zany, topsy-turvy weekend of college football, and if you're interpreting that as a rationalization of the College Football Czar's abysmal record, you are correct. Three teams in the Top Ten were defeated, one of those being inevitable, with #4 Alabama bumping off #2 Georgia. Kentucky, which had come so close to upending UGA two weeks earlier, shut down #6 Ole Miss, and #10 Utah, without its starting quarterback, fell to visiting Arizona.

At least the Czar didn't lose the Liberty-Appalachian State game, because it was canceled due to the flooding in Boone, NC. After that announcement was made, LU quarterback Kaidon Salter posted a duck emoji, appearing to signify that ASU was ducking the Flames. According to Athlon Sports, this "has led to many calling out the quarterback for being insensitive to the millions of people affected by the hurricane." As of this writing, Salter has not issued an apology, and the Czar hopes he never does.

At worst, the QB was unaware of the extent of the destruction, which is understandable, considering how rare it is for a hurricane to do its worst damage so far inland. Remember that this was last Saturday, right after the storm hit, and not after images of the devastation dominated the news for several days. If Salter seriously believed they could have played the game in Boone on Saturday, it cannot possibly be that he knew how bad it was, but was simply indifferent to the victims. It would not exactly have been unprecedented for a game to be canceled unnecessarily. We've all seen how this works. As soon as somebody suggests calling a game off, anybody who questions the necessity of it will be accused of being insufficiently concerned for fill-in-the-blank. If that's what Salter had assumed to be the case, he would have been right three times out of four, just not this time.

It might be, however, that Salter completely understood that the game couldn't be played last weekend, and instead objected to the fact that App State immediately announced that it would not be rescheduled. Liberty is idle in Week 9. App State plays on a Wednesday in Week 9 and is idle in Week 10. Might they have rescheduled their game for Week 9, but bumped it until Sunday so that the Mountaineers could have an additional day between games? Could they have asked Conference USA and/or the Sun Belt Conference to adjust their schedules to create an open date for both of these teams? It would at least have been worth looking into, but instead Appalachian State said right away that its game against the Flames would never be played. If Salter says the Mountaineers are ducking his team because of that, the Czar fails to see any controversy in it. But then again, we don't even know that. All we know is that he posted a duck.

People who chirp "it's only a game" at every opportunity can be pretty callous themselves. Because App State won't even try to reschedule, Liberty will lose revenue. The players, whose careers aren't very long, will miss out on an opportunity to play. Liberty, which could be in contention for a playoff bid if it remains undefeated, has just had its chances diminished with the loss of a quality nonconference game from its schedule. Nobody is saying that these are matters of life and death, but neither are they completely insignificant.

Another person off whose case should be gotten is Lee Corso. As the season goes on, complaints are mounting about the way the 89-year-old coach is visibly struggling. We're not talking about the President of the United States, helplessly watching a Chinese spy balloon slowly waft its way across all of our military installations. We're talking about the co-host of a college football preview show. How big a deal is it if Kirk Herbstreit has to help him finish a sentence once in a while? It's not as if it affects our national security, or anything.

Yes, it's difficult to watch, but so what? Pat McAfee is difficult to watch. Nick Saban is difficult to watch. "Betting analyst" Stanford Steve is difficult to watch. Why be selectively annoyed by the one guy who's got an excuse? Lee Corso obviously loves what he does. For all we know, it might be the one thing that's keeping him going. Surely, it's not too much to ask the rest of us to tolerate that for as long as we have to.

The College Football Czar's record for the week was 7-12, and if that's not bad enough, he's tempted to score a bonus loss for himself because, at the end of his analysis of the Washington State-Boise State game, he mistakenly picked Wazzu to defeat Oregon State instead of BSU. The Czar will have to have words with the editor about that. In the meantime, his season record has fallen to 55-43, for a .561 winning percentage.

Oct. 4

Syracuse at UNLV

Sluka, schmuka. The Rebels got along more than all right without their controversial quarterback, as they clobbered presumptive Mountain West contender Fresno State, 59-14. Hajj-Malik Williams stepped in behind center, and if it sounds like there might be two of him, it looked that way too, as the new starting QB rushed for 119 yards, to go along with 182 through the air.

The 3-1 Orange hit the road for five of their next six games, after playing their first four at home. Around this same time last season, they hit a patch of three consecutive road games, and lost them all badly, to North Carolina, Florida State and Virginia Tech, by a combined score of 119-20.

There had been lots of sitement at the big S after a 31-28 upset of a then-ranked Georgia Tech team, but since then, the Cuse has been beaten at home by Stanford, and scored a mundane 42-14 win over Division I-AA Holy Cross.

As college football fans learned last week, what happens in Vegas does not necessarily stay in Vegas. Those who say it does must be confusing it with Syracuse, so maybe that town ought to be the destination for people who have something to hide. Or for people who are afraid of accidentally meeting Penn and Teller. Whichever.

UNLV 44, Syracuse 39

Oct. 5

Pitt at North Carolina

The Panthers are looking to go 5-0 for the first time since 1991, when they fell to 6-5 by the end of the season, and did not get invited to a bowl game. The College Football Czar would say they should therefore strategically lose this game, if he were a lardhead.

UNC leads the overall series 12-5, and has gone 7-0. In the four games they've played in Kenan Stadium since Pitt joined the ACC, they held a second-half lead against the Tar Heels in every one, only to go home empty-handed yet again. What's different this time is that this might be the most demoralized Carolina club they've ever visited.

In taking a 20-0 third-quarter lead at Duke, the Heels looked as if they had put their defensive disintegration against James Madison behind them. Then, they gave up three second-half touchdowns and lost, 21-20. Longtime coach Mack Brown says he didn't mean it when he asked his players if he should resign after that 70-50 JMU defeat. Of course they said no, but to a lot of the UNC faithful it sounded like a pretty good idea.

Last game, against Division I-AA Youngstown State, Panther coach Pat Narduzzi wore a tie in honor of his father, who was head coach at YSU from 1975-85. A lot of other coaches were probably thinking it's too bad his dad did not also wear a sock in his mouth.

Pitt 41, North Carolina 31

UCLA at Penn State

On the brink of getting blown out in the first half, the Bruins put up a pretty good fight in a 34-13 loss to Oregon. Quarterback Ethan Garbers was hobbled in the fourth quarter, however, which was exactly what they didn't need as they face a second consecutive Top Ten opponent, this time on the road.

The Nittany Lion defense surrendered a scoring drive on the opening possession last week, but then stifled the Illinois offense the rest of the way through a 21-7 victory. Before the season, the College Football Czar figured that a weak schedule would keep PSU out of the playoff, because if they finished tied for third in the conference, they would lose out to the other team. At this point, it sure doesn't look like Michigan can keep pace with them, which means they could be in a commanding position if they can win next week at USC. Not that they're looking past this week's opponent, but how could they not?

Last week, Penn State defiled its uniforms by putting numbers on the helmets. This week, they unveiled a new logo, which looks like a golf club head cover. Perhaps the school will soon eschew its traditions in other ways, such as the following: welcoming visiting fans; calling the police when the law requires it; having the nerve to insult somebody without being backed up by eleven other guys; either waving pom-poms or trying to flex muscles, but not both simultaneously; understanding the difference between beating Michigan and beating East Shlobobia State.

Scratch that last one. The Czar forgot that the East Shlobobia State game is the Super Bowl!

Penn State 28, UCLA 3

West Virginia at Oklahoma State

At this point in the season, it should come as no surprise that there are twelve teams in contention in the Big XII, but who would have thought the Cowboys would not be among them? OSU fell to 0-2, and they fell hard, in a 42-20 trouncing by Kansas State. It looked as if it would be the anticipated breakout game for RB Ollie Gordonii, but his carries dwindled as his team drifted farther behind, leaving him with a modest total of 76 yards.

One game after blowing a very late ten-point lead in a four-point loss to Pitt, the Mountaineers found themselves with an eleven-point deficit with less than six minutes to play against Kansas, and came back with two Garrett Greene TD passes to win, 32-28. In the KU possession between those two scores, WVU watched the Jayhawks make the same mistake they had made in that previous game, by basically conceding a three-and-out when they couldn't possibly wind enough time off the clock to make it worthwhile.

In that Pitt game, when the West Virginians tried to kill the clock, it wasn't so much a tactical decision as one driven by their hatred of things they don't understand.

Oklahoma State 23, West Virginia 21

Missouri at Texas A&M

Mizzou may be 4-0, but it has not backed up its Top Ten ranking so far. In two games against competent opposition, the Tigers barely staved off Boston College 27-21, and then needed double-overtime to put away Vanderbilt, 30-27.

The Conjunction Boys are all alone in first place in the SEC, with a conference record of 2-0, although the five teams that trail them by half a game are probably not terribly concerned. Freshman QB Marcel Reed is reading defenses well enough not to have been picked off yet, but he's competing barely more than half of his passes.

When those two defected from the Big XII to the SEC together in 2012, A&M was the marquee team, while Missouri was an afterthought, but the Tigers have been to two conference title games, and the Aggies none.

The fans in College Station are known for holding yell practice, but what do they yell? "&! &! &! ... &! &! &!"

Missouri 21, Texas A&M 19

Iowa at Ohio State

It's Week 6, and the College Football Czar is just now getting around to picking a Buckeye game. Perhaps that's because he has decided it's time to pad his record a bit. But seriously, the Hawkeyes are OSU's first competent opponent. It really doesn't matter anymore who is ranked #1, but for anyone who cares, a team that has beaten up on Akron, Western Michigan, Marshall and Michigan State obviously doesn't belong at the top of the rankings over Alabama and Texas.

The Hawkeyes have to count on their defense to keep them in this game, but so far, it is only seventh-best in the conference. In their loss to cross-state rival Iowa State, they uncharacteristically let a 13-0 lead slip away, yielding 20 points in the second half.

The Iowans don't stand much of a chance in this game, but at least they can spell the name of their state, unless the people at O-goal post-triangle-O. They never have mastered the alphabet over there at Katzenmoyer U.

Ohio State 31, Iowa 10

Boston College at Virginia

Brown looked better than expected on the teal turf at Myrtle Beach, as Cavalier RB Xavier Brown better than doubled his previous career high with 171 yards on only 9 carries against CCU. The Cavs as a team are now averaging 5.1 yards per carry.

BC quarterback Thomas Castellanos missed last week's 21-20 win over Western Kentucky with an undisclosed injury. It appears that he is going to return this week, but if he doesn't, the only dual-threat on the field would be UVa sophomore Anthony Colandrea, who scrambled for 46 yards in a 43-24 victory against Coastal Carolina, while completing 13 of 20 with two TDs. This week, he'll have to contend with Eagle DE Donovan Ezeiruaku, who leads the nation with eight sacks. Against WKU, he recorded three of them, among his 14 tackles.

It's a little-known fact that when the Eagles hired head coach Bill O'Brien, they were really just trying to order Beef O'Brady's. When the non-English-speaking DoorDash guy showed up with the former Houston Texans coach instead, it wasn't worth arguing with him, so they just accepted the delivery.

Boston College 25, Virginia 21

Michigan at Washington

The 4-1 Wolverines and the 3-2 Huskies square off in the most anticlimactic national championship rematch you'll ever see. Compared to this game, that 34-13 Michigan victory in the CFP final will seem downright interesting.

The maize and blue have won both games since making a change at quarterback, even though new starter Alex Orji is about as torturous to watch as Eyes Wide Shut. So far, Orji is completing only 55.6 percent of his passes, even though he has yet to have a completion over 16 yards.

Last Friday's 21-18 loss at Rutgers was positively revolting for Grady Gross. The Husky kicker missed three field goals, although the last-second 55-yarder was literally a long shot. That outing was an aberration, though. Gross successfully booted 18 field goals out of 22 in 2023, and 6 of 7 this year, prior to that game.

For legendary director Stanley Kubrick to return after more than a decade just to produce that shallow, 160-minute snobfest was about as sad as Deion Sanders coming out of retirement to play for the Baltimore Ravens.

Michigan 23, Washington 10

Virginia Tech at Stanford

In spite of having their winning touchdown against Miami taken away, the Gobblers looked last Friday like the team they were supposed to be this season. At 2-3, they have lost to Vanderbilt in overtime, to Rutgers on a field goal with less than two minutes remaining, and last week to the Hurricanes, when an overrule after a long review nullified a last-second 30-yard TD reception by Da'Quan Felton.

The last outing for the Ferd was such a comedy of errors, it was not unlike a Ferd'nand comic strip. In their 40-14 loss to Clemson, junior quarterback Ashton Daniels only completed 9 of 19, with three interceptions. If you're too young to remember Ferd'nand, it was kind of like a still-frame version of Mr. Bean. And please don't tell the College Football Czar that you're too young to remember Mr. Bean.

Rumor has it that the Netflix reboot of Ferd'nand will be called Da'Quan. That's because the test marketers have scientifically proven once and for all that apostrophes are funny.

Virginia Tech 15, Stanford 12

Baylor at Iowa State

The Bears are only 2-3, but in those three losses, they blanked Utah in the second half, only lost to Colorado after a series of unlikely events, and nearly came back to beat BYU. If they can win at least one of these close games, they'll be able to take advantage of a soft November schedule.

The Cyclones shut out Houston last week, which is apparently about as great an accomplishment as getting past the first screen in a game of Space Invaders. Nevertheless, they are 4-0, with remarkably little standing in their way between now and the week before Thanksgiving. If they win the Big XII championship and its accompanying playoff bye, while Georgia has to play a first-round game, the playoff cultists will demand expansion to at least 16 by next season. And all the media toadies who now tell us the 12-team format is ideal will immediately adapt to the New Truth.

ISU running back Abu Sama III ended the 2023 regular season with a 276-yard, three-TD performance in a snowy road victory over Kansas State. So why is he getting so few carries this year? The sophomore scooter is averaging 5.6 yards per carry, but he is only handling the ball ten times a game.

Thank heaven there aren't really any space invaders, or else we would be putting them on public assistance and registering them to vote.

Iowa State 37, Baylor 33

USC at Minnesota

Each team has lost to Michigan by a score of 27-24. For the Trojans, that defeat was a tremendous disappointment, whereas the radiant rodents seem to have drawn inspiration from it. Those contrasting expectations ought to tell us something.

The Golden Gophers rallied from a 21-point deficit to trail Michigan by three, when they seemingly recovered an onside kick, only to have it nullified by an offside penalty (correctly, in the College Football Czar's judgment). Reactions to the call have been largely irresponsible and stupid. Fox studio analyst and former Boise State and Washington head coach Chris Petersen said after the game, "I just hate to see this when the officials are making something up. Like, I don't know why they would throw that flag." He's not even arguing that it was a blown call. Instead, he charges that the officials concocted the whole thing, So the game was fixed, right? Either that, or the officials just find P.J. Fleck really annoying and made the call to spite him.

After the game, Fleck requested a review from the Big Ten, which is reasonable enough, but the league's response was not. Demonstrating a fundamental misunderstanding of the entire concept of a rule, the Big Ten Coordinator of Officials declared the play to have been "too tight to flag." That cannot be. Either it was a penalty or it wasn't. If so, then it doesn't matter how close it was, or who feels that it should not have been called. The Czar thinks the video shows that linebacker Matt Kingsbury, who proceeded to recover the kick, was indeed offside. It also looked as if the ball might have been touched before traveling ten yards, which would disallow the recovery all the same. Nevertheless, the league validated the criticisms by declaring a rule modification, requiring that the line judge and head line judge be positioned on either side of the restraining line for onside kicks.

The Czar doesn't know which officials were in those positions for this controversial play, but there was clearly one on either end of the 35, at a perfect angle to make the call. To pass a rule requiring two different officials to be there suggests that the ones who were in those positions were not competent to judge when a helmet breaks the plane of a yard line. It should not have mattered to the Big Ten that the video, without a camera looking straight down the line, made the call look "tight." As long as it didn't refute the call, the league should have stood by its on-field officials, instead of insulting them.

Although the competition was intense, the Czar has decided that the Lardhead of the Year Award nomination goes to Fox officiating analyst Mike Pereira, for having a rare chance to justify his employment with that network, and opting not to do so. As usual, he did not offer any clarification of the rule, but only narrated the replay, which we had already seen for ourselves. He said without explanation that he did not think the play was offside, and left it at that. Had he explained to the viewers (and to Coach Petersen) that the position of the player's feet is not the relevant factor on an offside call, and that most of the time offside is called on a kickoff, it is because a player is leaning forward over the restraining line, then the overreactions might not have gotten so carried away.

The Czar did not want to hand out multiple nominations for this one episode, because that would be a cop-out, like selecting an entire offensive line as the MVP. There were so many possibilities, however, that choosing only one among them was like being a kid in a lard store.

Okay, let's say the kid is Larry Mondello, and lard stores are something they had back in those days, like butcher shops. So who are you, the analogy police?

USC 38, Minnesota 31

Ole Miss at South Carolina

South Carolina beat Kentucky, and Kentucky beat Ole Miss. Therefore, South Carolina will beat Ole Miss. Or so one would think, were one a lardhead.

Since "The Sip" lost on the home field that calls them that, perhaps they'll reject the new nomenclature, but the Czar does not think so. The university has obviously decided to start calling the team something other than the Rebels, and they'll eventually settle on something, however embarrassing. If they wouldn't get sued over it, they'd even rather call themselves the Bay City Rollers.

The Gamecocks' only loss has been a wild seesaw game against LSU, and the 31-6 bruising they put on Kentucky looks a lot more impressive in hindsight. Most recently, they ack-acked Akron 50-7, as senior scrambler Robby Ashford threw for 243 yards, and ran for 133 more, with a total of three touchdowns.

The Rebs won't lose two in a row. The fortunate thing about being The Sip is that it means they suck only a little bit.

Ole Miss 22, South Carolina 16

Duke at Georgia Tech

The Yellowjackets were the toast of college football after their Emerald Isle Classic victory against Florida State. Now, they're in danger of simply becoming toast. Already having two losses, and with games remaining against ranked opponents Notre Dame, Miami and Georgia, they need very badly to halt their two-game ACC losing skid.

This Blue Devil team is another one that could go a long way, thanks to poor schedule strength. Their 21-point second half rally to beat North Carolina improved their record to 5-0, with victories against I-AA Elon, Northwestern, Uconn and the MT-heads. If they can pass this critical road test, a 10-win regular season will be a real possibility. One big stumbling block could be their ground game, however. Considering the level of competition, a team average of 3.5 yards per carry is alarming.

Bobby Dodd Stadium is the oldest facility in major college football, having been built in 1913. Bobby Dodd was only four years old at the time, but evidently they had the utmost confidence in him.

Duke 16, Georgia Tech 13

SMU at Louisville

In the Cardinals' 31-24 defeat at Notre Dame, they were officially only minus-1 in turnovers, but they also got stopped on fourth down four times. Why did they keep going for it when they weren't succeeding? Analytics must have said they were due. If they can keep from coughing it up, they stand a fair chance of returning to the ACC championship game, led by a defense that is allowing only 271.5 yards per game.

Southern Methodist smashed Florida State 42-16, in its first-ever ACC home game. It was the first time they've been willing to let QB Kevin Jennings open up the passing attack, which he did with 254 yards and three TDs. One of those was on a 42-yard flea flicker, which makes the College Football Czar not want to meet anybody who gets a lot of practice flicking fleas.

Mustangs are not really red, and Kentucky grass is not really blue. Those are misperceptions that came about when these teams last met in Old Cardinal Stadium back in 1984. Must have been a Mizlou production.

Louisville 29, SMU 20

Rutgers at Nebraska

The 4-0 Scarlet Knights were statistically dominated by Washington last Friday night, but they stopped the Huskies on downs twice, and watched them miss three field goals, in a 21-18 upset. Of their own 299 total yards, 132 came from running back Kyle Monangai, who is already more than halfway to 1,000 yards in only a third of the season.

The N-men pounded Purdue 28-10, holding the Boilermakers out of the end zone until only a minute and a half remained. Earlier in the fourth quarter, Cornhusker linebacker John Bullock scored on an interception return. Bullock did not need to be taught how to play football by Sandra Bullock in a blonde wig, which is a good thing, because he doesn't own one.

Hopefully, the Knights will not accidentally fly to Hong Kong to play in this game, instead of Nebraska. If a brilliant football mind like Coach Tim Walz can get those two places confused, then so can anybody.

Nebraska 30, Rutgers 17

 

 

The College Football Czar

a sports publication from The Shinbone