A College Football Time Capsule

When writing about the death of Dan Jenkins in this space ten days ago, I made mention of the book you see pictured here, "Saturday's America".  It was an updated collection of long form articles that Jenkins wrote when he was covering college football for Sports Illustrated.  It was published in 1970, and I read the book when I was in college.   Jenkins' death prompted memories of that book, so I went to the library, checked it out and re-read it last week.

1970.  This book truly is a time capsule for college football fans.  To give you an idea of just how long ago 1970 was, College Football-wise, consider the following:

In 1970, Joe Paterno was in only his fifth year as head coach at Penn State.  In fact, at one point in the book, Jenkins referred to him as "the young head coach at Penn State".  When was the last time you thought of Joe Paterno being young?

In 1970, Nick Saban was playing defensive back at Kent State University.

In 1970, Pat Narduzzi was celebrating his fourth birthday, and Dabo Swinney was celebrating his first birthday. 

You get the idea.

Anyway, the book covers some great stories from throughout college football's first 100 years, with primary emphasis on the 1960's.  Here are some of the highlights covered in separate chapters of the book:

• The arrival of Ara Parseghian in South Bend, and how he revived the storied Notre Dame football traditions after the moribund coaching tenures of Joe Kuharich and Terry Brennan.  Also prominent in this chapter was a young QB out of Butler, PA, Terry Hanratty.
• Stories of a various college whiz kids of the era such as Tommy Nobis, Dick Butkus, Joe Namath, and O.J. Simpson.
• A great chapter about the "Game of the Decade" - the 1966 game between Notre Dame and Michigan State that ended in a 10-10 tie. The game where, as Jenkins put it,  Ara "tied one for the Gipper".
• "Pursuit of a Blue Chipper", a story about college recruiting that focused on the pursuit of a  high school QB out of Abilene, Texas, Jack Mildren.  If anything, recruiting has no doubt become even more of a blood sport fifty years later than it was back in the 1960's.  Mildren eventually ended up at Oklahoma where he was the main cog in OU's wishbone offense.  I remembered being at the game when Mildren and his Sooners - Greg Pruitt was the featured running back - blasted Pitt out of Pitt Stadium with that wishbone attack in 1971.  The final score was 55-29 (I had to look that up), and Pitt was never in the game.
• A story about the history of the Heisman Trophy.  This chapter seems remarkably quaint here in the 21st century ever since the Heisman Trophy was co-opted by ESPN and Nissan.
• An entire chapter about Woody Hayes, many years before he punched that kid from Clemson on national television.  He still came across as a complete and total horse's ass.

There's lots more, and if you are a fan of college football and it's history, it would be worth your while to seek out this one, although you can probably only find it in libraries and on dusty shelves in used book stores these days.  

If I had one criticism, it's the fact that Jenkins often resorts to folksy, Texas dialect when writing.  You know, quoting guys  who say "dadgummit" in every other sentence and refer to the game as "fooball".    That's okay in the occasional magazine article, but it gets old when your bludgeoned with it for 290 pages in a book.

A Three Star rating from The Grandstander.

College Football Thoughts

Some thoughts on the college football scene.....

• So it has come down to Clemson, Alabama, Michigan State, and Oklahoma.  After all the strum und drag that greeted the rankings each week, it seems to me that the Condoleezza Rice Committee got it right.  The titans of the Big Ten played each other to determine one entry, Alabama won the SEC, and Clemson remained undefeated.  the only question might be Oklahoma, whose conference has no championship play-in game, but they survived the cannibalism of the Big 12.  No problems with any of these.
• The only real drama that would have occurred would have been had North Carolina defeated Clemson in the ACC title game.  What would the Condoleezza Committee have then done with a 11-1 UNC team that had defeated an undefeated and number one ranked team?  We'll never know.
• I spent much of last night with the clicker switching among Clemson-UNC, Iowa-Michigan State, and Stanford-USC.   These are my thoughts on those games:

1. I have developed a big dislike for Dabo Swinney.  Yes, his punter made a dumb mistake, but Swinney's over the top and completely immature reaction to it put him squarely in the College Coaches Who are Easy to Dislike Club.  It is a very large Club, but he way.  All I can say now is, Go Oklahoma!
2. The final drive by Michigan State to win that game in the Big Ten was heroic, as was the goal line stand that Iowa put up that almost, but not quite, stopped the Spartans.  Fabulous finish.
3. The Pac-12 Championship game between USC and Stanford had no impact on the Playoff considerations, but it allowed me to watch a very good Stanford team for the second week in a row. While each of the four teams in the playoffs will be facing worthy opponents, I am sure there is a thought somewhere in the minds of those four coaches that says, "well, at least we don't have to play Stanford."
4. I am not sure what kind of pro potential Stanford's Kevin Hogan or Christian McCaffrey have, but, man, they are really terrific college players.  

• Both semi-final match-ups on New Years Eve look like they will be good games to watch, although it will be hard to top the theater that those Semi's were last year.
• As I sit here now, I am putting my rooting interests in the green and white of Michigan State.  I mean, who wants to root for Nick Saban and Dabo Swinney?  
• However, if I were to place a bet on it, I'd say that it will be those two surly guys on the sidelines in the Championship game, but I will save my official predictions for later.
• We also now await to see what Pitt's bowl fate will be.  As there was last year, some people are speculating as to the possibility of a Pinstripe Bowl match-up between Pitt and Penn State.  That would be fun, and it might make a lot of sense to make such a match-up, which is probably why it will never happen.
• Final question.  Should Clemson manage to win the whole ball of wax, will there be an entire generation of young men in South Carolina coming of age twenty or so years from now named "Dabo"?  One shudders at the thought.

Steelers 42 - Bengals 21, and Other Football Thoughts

There are very few absolutes in life - the sun will rise in the east, the Pope will always pray for peace, the Yankees will always spend vast amounts of money.  That's about it, but there is another one that you can take to the bank with as close to absolute certainty as there is in professional sports, and that is this: with rare, very rare, exceptions, the Cincinnati Bengals will almost always revert to being, well, the Cincinnati Bengals.

Facing the a home game against the Steelers wherein a victory would just about put a death knell on the Steelers playoff aspirations, and increase their own playoff possibilities, the Bengals took a 21-17 lead into the fourth quarter and proceeded to allow the Steelers to score 25 straight points in the space of about nine minutes.  That ain't easy, but if any team has shown a historical propensity for such happenings, it is the Bengals.  I don't want to sell the Steelers short here.  They thoroughly earned this victory in what, for three quarters anyway, was a close, hard fought, and pretty good football game.

The Steelers are a flawed team, especially on the defensive side of the ball.  They give up too many long plays, often for scores  - it happened twice today - but the offensive unit sure seems to be peaking at the right time of the season.  Ben Roethlisberger continues having one of his best seasons ever (despite some inexplicably bad games this season), Le'Veon Bell and Antonio Brown are having Pro Bowl seasons, and the offensive line appears to be among the best in the league.  Can they make a deep run in the NFL Playoffs?  Given the weaknesses of the defense, probably not, but the trick is to get into the Playoffs.  To do that they will need to win at least two of their remaining three games, with one of those wins coming in the season finale against the Bengals.  Once you get into the Playoffs, anything can happen, as the KayCee Royals can tell you.  I know, I know, different sport, but still a good analogy.

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Because Marilyn and I went to a play this afternoon, I only watched the Steelers game via my DVR recording, beginning at around 4:45.  Did you realize that you can watch an entire NFL game in about ninety minutes or so this way?  Terrific.

Anyway, this circumstance meant that we listened to the radio broadcast of the game for the twenty or so real time minutes of the fourth quarter that transpired during our drive home.  It would take a writer much, much, MUCH better than I to describe just how incredibly bad the radio team of Bill Hillgrove, Tunch Ilkin, and, yes, Craig Wolfley is.   On the long incompletion  that Andy Dalton threw to A.J. Green with Cincy down 28-21, Hilgrove described it as, and I may not have it exactly here, but the gist is correct: "A guy came and knocked the ball away, pushed Green out of bounds and another guy almost intercepted the ball."  The two "guys" in question were, I might add, Steelers with whom, presumably, Hillgrove is familiar and should be able to identify by name.  I might also add that Tunch made no effort to step in a identify who those two Steelers defenders were.

Awful, and the Steelers and their broadcast partners should really move onto some fresh blood next season.  The glory days of "turn down the TV sound and listen to Fleming and Cope on the radio" are long gone.

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I see that the college football playoff committee has settled on Alabama, Oregon, Florida State, and Ohio State as the first ever college football final four.  I think it's a just line-up.  All the pre-weekend hype centered on whether or not TCU should be ranked ahead of Baylor if all teams held serve over the weekend.  All teams did hold serve, and all but still undefeated FSU won in blowouts, including fifth ranked Ohio State.  It seems to me, and to some knowledgeable football people out there, that as the season progressed, it became apparent that Ohio State, despite playing in a weak Big Ten, was certainly among the four best teams in the country, and maybe even the best team.  The advanced metrics crowd will surely argue that this is not the case, but they passed the "eye test" to me, and, apparently, the twelve person committee, so I like the line-up.

I also like that Alabama and Ohio State will be matched up in one of the semi-final games.  With two such cheerful, outgoing, and likable coaches like Nick Saban and Urban Meyer going head to head, gosh it's going to be tough to decide which guy you would like to win more.

Saturday's America *

* Title of this blog post shamelessly stolen from a terrific book about college football written by the great Dan Jenkins back in the early 1970's.

Some observations on a most interesting College Football Saturday......

• Pitt needed a win yesterday and they got a most convincing one over Temple yesterday, 47-17.  Paul Chryst's Panthers are now at  .500.  Temple is better than it used to be, but, still, a win over Temple doesn't exactly stir the heartstrings.
• Ohio State really thumped Penn State yesterday in what Gene Collier ingeniously called "The Battle of the Banned".  I fear that my praise of Matt McGloin last week may have jinxed him yesterday, as he showed some flaws yesterday.  On the other hand, Ohio State may simply be a better - much better, perhaps - team.  QB Braxton Miller sure was impressive.
• If there were any doubts that Notre Dame was the real deal this season, the Irish put them to rest with that convincing win at Oklahoma last night.  The biggest test before them now seems to be USC in Los Angeles, and now even that seems to be becoming less and less of an impediment.
• Looks like it is going to be a very long day for the Panthers in South Bend next week.
• Will be interested to see how the BCS standings shake out after #2 Florida's defeat.  My guess is that it will be Alabama, Kansas State, Oregon, and Notre Dame.
• I am guessing that ESPN would love to see an undefeated ND play in the BCS Championship game in January.  How will it that maneuvered if all four of those teams remain undefeated?
• How about Rich Rodriguez' Arizona Wildcats beating USC yesterday?  Rodriguez seems to have regained his touch after that less than successful stint in Ann Arbor.
•  Did you see where UCLA beat Arizona State yesterday.  As my buddy Dan Bonk says, ASU Coach Fraud Graham has no soul.
• Nick Saban, Urban Meyer, and Brian Kelly all coach undefeated teams yet you watch them during a game and hear them interviewed after a game, and they all seem to be a grouchy and dyspeptic bunch, and this is not untypical of college football coaches.  Why is that?  They are at the very top of their professions.  Can't they be HAPPY about that?