Here’s what Indiana linebacker Jeff Thomas remembers about last year’s game at Wisconsin. “It was really loud,” Thomas said. “And it was a lot to a little.” Yep. That just about covers it. The Indiana-Wisconsin game made national news last fall because of the final score. As Thomas said, Wisconsin had a lot (83 points), while Indiana had a little (20 points). Indiana allowed the most points in team history and tied for the largest losing margin in team history with another 63-point defeat in 1915. Wisconsin scored the most touchdowns (11) in team history, put up the third-highest total in a Big Ten game in league history and racked up the most points in a Big Ten game since Ohio State scored 83 against Iowa in 1950. For Thomas and his teammates, it added up to one very painful afternoon. “It was pretty tough,” Thomas said. “You never want to lose by that much. I’ve never really been on that side of the ball before. But there’s nothing you can do about it now.” Indiana returns to Camp Randall Stadium on Saturday to face No. 4 Wisconsin. While the Hoosiers have plenty of reasons to gear up for the game, revenge isn’t at the top of their list. “The motivation we’ve got going right now is we’re 1-5, and we want to win,” Thomas said. “That’s motivation we need to address more than beating a team that beat us pretty bad last year. Just wanting to get a win in the Big Ten, that’s more motivation than anything.” Indiana coach Kevin Wilson wasn’t in Madison last year. Wilson, then Oklahoma’s offensive coordinator, spent the day enjoying a lopsided, 45-7 win against Texas Tech. As part of his effort to change the culture at Indiana, Wilson hasn’t spent time discussing the team’s past struggles. But he has been on both sides of blowout games, and he has seen different approaches to rematches. “Every time I’ve used the revenge word or been around coaches that did it, I don’t know if we got the [desired] outcome,” Wilson said. “We’re a team still trying to find our identity. … We’re preaching more about how we want to keep moving forward instead of what happened a year ago.” Last year’s game sparked questions of whether Wisconsin ran up the score, especially after Badgers coach Bret Bielema faced similar accusations following a game against Minnesota earlier in the season. Bielema reiterated this week that the claims about running up the score stemmed in part because of the perception Wisconsin has a team that rarely puts up such point totals. Thomas harbors no ill will about what happened. “It’s just part of the game,” he said. “They kept scoring. They obviously didn’t have their starters in, so it’s our job to stop them on defense. I’m not really mad about it. You keep scoring until somebody stops you.” Indiana has tried to foster a new attitude on defense this year, and while the wins haven’t come, there have been some promising signs. The defense forced four turnovers against Virginia in Week 2 and had a 54-yard fumble return for a touchdown by Lawrence Barnett. Indiana recorded two red-zone takeaways against Penn State in Week 5 and limited the Nittany Lions to 16 points. Wisconsin poses a much greater test and many are forecasting another beat-down, but Thomas and his teammates are excited to face the Badgers. “It’s a potent offense, and it’s our job to stop ‘em,” he said. “It’s a huge opportunity.”
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IU downplays revenge factor vs. Badgers
Filed under Football, News by on Oct 12th, 2011. Comment. 
The Big 12 tried to put on its Sunday best at its Thursday night Big 12 revival. After it ended with everyone confused, it’s clear that not much has changed. There’s still fighting — this time Missouri and Oklahoma sending mixed messages — and Texas is sitting satisfied. Thursday night, OU and Mizzou held simultaneous press conferences. Oklahoma president David Boren said all remaining schools — except for Texas A&M — “agreed” to give a six-year grant of their first- and second-tier television rights to the Big 12. That means that all revenue from the top television games — shown currently on networks owned by ABC/ESPN and Fox — would continue to go to the Big 12 even if a school bolts to another league. Signing over those rights would mean that Oklahoma, or any other school, would not be paid directly for media revenue, regardless of which conference it was in
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One voice needed for Big 12’s next step
Filed under Football by on Sep 23rd, 2011. Comment.
When Nebraska left the Big 12 for the Big Ten, few questioned the Huskers ability to compete in their new league. Being one of college football’s most storied programs with five national titles in 40 years carries with it respect. But Texas A&M? The Aggies move has drawn criticism from plenty as the historic underachievers (relative to resources) , and have plotted a move to college football’s top conference. The program hasn’t enjoyed a 10-win season since 1998, but the best way to combat those criticisms? The answer for everything in college football: Win. A&M’s move isn’t official yet, but much more so than Nebraska, Utah, Colorado, Boise State or TCU’s recent moves, the perception of Texas A&M’s decision will be heavily colored by its results in 2011. The Aggies closed the regular season in 2010 in style, with six consecutive wins. But early struggles prevented the Aggies from truly winning big. “Our offensive line didn’t really jell. We just put in a new defense, we had a freshman tackle, we had a young group of linemen,” coach Mike Sherman said. “We just put our defense in that spring, and we were feeling our way through that as well.” Texas A&M lost close contests to Oklahoma State and Arkansas before being blown out by Missouri on its home field. At 3-3, the Aggies looked like they were headed for another disappointing season and a third consecutive losing season under Sherman. “They didn’t panic. They continued to work hard. They looked to the next game. They didn’t wallow and feel sorry for themselves. I thought they demonstrated an eagerness to pull themselves out of it,” Sherman said. “I’m as proud of them in those three weeks in how they worked and how they prepared as I was in the ensuing weeks when they won.” That freshman left tackle, Luke Joeckel, emerged as one of the league’s best at his position. The Aggies benched an injured Jerrod Johnson for Ryan Tannehill . And the defense further grasped new coordinator Tim DeRuyter’s 3-4 defensed, buoyed by the leadership from Johnson and linebacker Von Miller, whose freakish athleticism spurred the defense, too. “The tempo picked up,” running back Cyrus Gray said. “The main thing I don’t think people realize is our offensive line jelled. They were able to help open running lanes and help protect the quarterback even better, so it was a big thing for our team.” But those early struggles are what prevented the Aggies from winning the Big 12 South outright. Instead, they settled for a share of the division and a night at home while Oklahoma battled for a Big 12 title and a spot in the BCS. “We learned we can fight through adversity. A lot of teams can’t do that. We beat some good opponents,” Gray said. “The 12 th man really helped us. You can see, like in the Nebraska game, they really helped pull that game out for us.” If Texas A&M is going to exit the league in style, it has to avoid those kinds of early struggles. The good news about this year’s team? It’s simple make-up is built to avoid those same pitfalls from a year ago. “We’re a little bit more experienced. When you start the season and you’re playing with a true freshman at left tackle and we really haven’t solidified the offensive line and we had a brand-new defense in there, and that won’t be the case this year,” Sherman said. “That element should not be a problem for us. … . Even still, with everybody coming back, you still haven’t played a game against an opponent in some time, and until you step on that field, you really don’t know where you’re at. We’ll find out Sunday night.” The Aggies national reputation depends on it.
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Pressure is on for Texas A&M this season
Filed under Football, News by on Sep 1st, 2011. Comment.
CBSSports.com’s Dennis Dodd took a look at the 2011 coaching hot seat ratings, and as the temperature outside heats up, now is as good a time as ever to check the gauge for the Big 12’s coaches. Dodd’s system of ranking is on a 1-5 scale. 0-0.5 — don’t even think it — can’t be touched 1-1.5 — very safe — change highly unlikely 2-2.5 — safe — solid position 3-3.5 — on the bubble — you never know 4-4.5 — warm seat — feeling the pressure Here’s how Dodd ranked them, complete with comments from yours truly. Bob Stoops, Oklahoma (129-31, 13th season) Stoops rightfully earned a 0.0 rating, the only Big 12 coach to do so and one of just 14 coaches nationally with zero heat. One national title. Seven Big 12 titles. Eight BCS appearances, two Heisman winners and two more Heisman finalists. Fans can cry about the 6-6 bowl record and BCS failures all they want, but Stoops returned Oklahoma to the glory days after some dark days post-Barry Switzer. When teams like Florida and Notre Dame are (reportedly) courting you, you’re untouchable in your current spot. Bill Snyder, Kansas State (149-80-1, 20th season) Snyder drew a 0.5, rightfully one of the coolest seats of any Big 12 coach. Snyder’s second go-around in Manhattan finished with a bowl berth last season, the Wildcats’ first since 2006. Snyder wants to “calm the waters” for his replacement, and he’s on the way to doing it. K-State looks unlikely to win any championships this time, but there’s no way Snyder gets the program moving in a direction that ends with his unwilling exit. Gary Pinkel, Missouri (77-49, 11th season) Pinkel drew a 1.0 rating. He has quietly accrued some impressive tenure at Missouri, sticking around in his current job longer than every coach in the league other than Mack Brown and Bob Stoops
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Checking the Big 12 coaching hot seats
Filed under Football by on Jun 29th, 2011. Comment.
In the end, a decision by Texas to remain in the league saved it. Anyway, that’s the perception. In reality, Texas athletic director DeLoss Dodds deserves a huge amount of credit. If the Longhorns had elected to go to the Pac-10 , OU and OSU would… Source: Tulsa World
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A year later, the Big 12 is looking strong
Filed under News by on Jun 12th, 2011. Comment.
For those of you who may not know, I spent the last year on the college football nation blog at ESPN , where a big chunk of my time was devoted to covering TCU and the non-AQ schools. With TCU joining the Big East next year, I thought it would be a good idea to give you some of my thoughts and impressions on the program. What can be expected from TCU? Great defense. TCU has led the nation in total defense three straight years . In fact, TCU has now finished first in that category more times (five) than any other program since the NCAA began tracking statistics in 1937. Coach Gary Patterson expects to be just as good in 2011, though one point to note — its top defensive player, Tank Carder, will be gone just in time for 2012. TCU runs a 4-2-5 defense , which allows it to take better advantage of the speed on defense. It is an excellent alignment to run against spread teams, which means TCU will be prepared to face the likes of Pittsburgh and West Virginia. How about on offense? TCU is loaded in the backfield this season with Ed Wesley and Matthew Tucker , and that should help take the pressure off new starting quarterback Casey Pachall . The quarterback does run in the TCU system. Andy Dalton broke for some big gains throughout his career there. The Horned Frogs have some young talent at receiver in Josh Boyce and are looking forward to several freshmen coming in, including Brandon Carter, LaDarius Brown, David Bush, David Porter and Cameron White. TCU must replace four starters on the offensive line this year, but keep in mind — the bulk of its offensive starters will return for 2012. Where will TCU wind up in Year 1 in the Big East? I definitely think TCU will have to be considered one of the favorites. Go ahead and roll your eyes, West Virginia and Pitt fans and everybody else. I understand the perception that TCU has been in a non-AQ conference and therefore has beaten up on inferior competition like UNLV, Colorado State and New Mexico. But the Horned Frogs have proven to be up to the task in all their major tests. They won the Rose Bowl over Wisconsin. They have beaten Baylor, Texas Tech, Oklahoma and Clemson. It is really difficult to go undefeated, no matter the conference. Patterson has done a nice job building his program into a Top 25 outfit by recruiting athletes and then fitting them into his schemes. Plenty of offensive players have come in and been turned into stud defensive players. Will there be an adjustment period? Sure. There are no easy outs in the Big East. But TCU has what it takes to make an impact immediately. Oh, please. Well, I am just being honest. But I do want to see two things in 2011 before I make any solid judgments. First, how TCU is going to look with Pachall at quarterback. Losing Dalton is potentially huge. Secondly, how Utah fares in the Pac-12. The Utes are going to be the guinea pigs for non-AQs moving on up the ranks. Utah and TCU are different, yes. But the big knock on the non-AQs is that they do not play the same grind of a schedule as all the AQ conferences. We shall see what affect that grind has on Utah this year. This is all good for the Big East, right? Yes. I am of the opinion that adding TCU was a slam dunk, no-brainer decision. You have a school that has gone undefeated in the regular season in 2009 and 2010 with two BCS appearances — a school that brings major credibility to the table. Whether fans agree or not, that was in question last season with an 8-4 team representing the league in a BCS game
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TCU in the Big East
Filed under Football by on Jun 2nd, 2011. Comment.
Bowl games are rewards for successful seasons. At least that’s the theory. But what if you lose your bowl game? What does that say about that so-called successful season? If you’ve watched college football for many years, you know bowl games often operate as a season unto themselves. And the team that wins is likely the one that is more motivated, not necessarily the more talented team or the one that posted the best regular season. Some teams tank in a bowl game because they are just happy to be there. Others treat it like a vacation and lack focus. And others wish they were somewhere else — think of California’s flat and uninspired performances in the 2004 Holiday Bowl against Texas Tech after the Bears got Mack Brown -ed out of the Rose Bowl. It’s hard to call a bowl game a “must-win” because it’s really not — rarely does a bowl, for example, determine a coach’s fate. But it seems reasonable to measure the four Pac-10 bowl games in terms of “need to win.” So that’s what we’ll do, starting at the bottom and working our way up. Bridgepoint Education Holiday Bowl, Dec. 30, 10 p.m. ET (ESPN) Nebraska Cornhuskers (10-3) vs. Washington Huskies (6-6) The set up : The Huskies are trying to prove they are ready to rejoin the national discussion. The feeling in the preseason — with quarterback Jake Locker leading 20 starters back from a 5-7 team — was they were on the cusp of breaking through in Year 2 under coach Steve Sarkisian. Some even saw them as dark-horse conference contenders. And a certain Sept
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Pac-10: Who needs to win their bowl game?
Filed under Football by on Dec 21st, 2010. Comment.
The SEC is king in college football after producing each of the last four national champions. That won’t change until a team from another league hoists the crystal football. But the SEC has a reason to look over its shoulder this season. Several of them, in fact. The Big 12, Pac-10 and Big Ten are trying to catch the SEC, and all three leagues can make cases for being the nation’s No. 2 conference right now. According to the ESPN Stats & Info conference power rankings , the Big 12 is No. 2, followed by the Pac-10 and the Big Ten. Which conference is right behind the SEC? Bloggers David Ubben (Big 12), Ted Miller (Pac-10) and Adam Rittenberg (Big Ten) weigh in. Adam Rittenberg: What the Big Ten lacks — an undefeated team — it more than makes up for with incredible depth. The league boasts three 1-loss teams in Wisconsin, Ohio State and Michigan State, all of which could finish 11-1. It also boasts a veteran Iowa team that no one wants to face in a bowl, in addition to decent squads like Northwestern, Penn State and Michigan. Even Illinois has made some major strides from 2009. This is the deepest the Big Ten has been since 2006, when it entered late November with the nation’s No.
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Press coverage: The nation’s No. 2 league?
Filed under Football by on Nov 17th, 2010. Comment.
A year from now, there won’t be a Big 12 North and South. Welcome to our world, says Oklahoma State, Texas Tech and Texas A&M fans. Uh-oh, responds the North. Namely Kansas State’s Bill Snyder, who received some light ribbing at Big 12 media days for his desire to keep two five-team divisions and a championship game. A look down the past six years’ Big 12 champion reveals what everyone already knows: Texas and Oklahoma rule the Big 12. But with the departure of the other most historically successful program, Nebraska, the Big 12 will battle the perception that it’s a weakened league. And in the immediate future, it will be. This year’s preseason coaches’ poll tells us at least that, with three teams in the top 10 — including the Huskers — and no other Big 12 teams in the remainder of the poll. To keep the league from becoming top-heavy over the next decade — a Big 2 and Little 8 — another program or two must become a mainstay in recruiting rankings and weekly polls. The most likely candidates are the same ones who received votes in this year’s preseason poll: Texas Tech, Missouri and Texas A&M. Texas Tech has the coach to do it in Tommy Tuberville, who’ll bring his sense for brick wall SEC defense and years of success to Lubbock. Missouri has a five-year bowl streak and 30 wins the past three seasons on its side, and both schools made late-season visits to the BCS rankings’ top 2 in 2007 and 2008. The big difference between the two is their success against the powers. Texas Tech has beaten Oklahoma and Texas in successive seasons. Missouri’s Gary Pinkel has never beaten neither. That will have to change for the Tigers to climb the Big 12 ladder.
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Crossroads: Responsibility falls on Tech, Tigers, Aggies
Filed under Football by on Aug 9th, 2010. Comment.
ATHENS, Ga. — Now that it’s done, Georgia coach Mark Richt doesn’t care what the perception out there is. He doesn’t care how many people were connected to his lengthy search for a new defensive coordinator. He doesn’t care how many people received big, fat raises because they were connected, and he doesn’t care that some of the people who were connected were never formally offered the job in the first place. All he cares about is that Todd Grantham is on the job. “My only goal was to get the right man,” Richt said. “My prayer was regardless of what path I took that in the end I’d get the very best man for the job, and we got that in Todd. I’m 100 percent convinced of that.” A new era for Georgia’s defense begins later Thursday afternoon when the Bulldogs open spring practice. Grantham, who comes over from the NFL, brings a 3-4 defense with him that is becoming the rage in college football. It’s very similar to the two defensive schemes we saw in the BCS National Championship Game this past season. Alabama runs it, and so does Texas. The common denominator there is Nick Saban. Texas defensive coordinator Will Muschamp worked under Saban, and so did Grantham at Michigan State. In fact, Saban tried to hire Grantham as his defensive coordinator when Saban took the Miami Dolphins’ head coaching job. But Grantham picked the Cleveland Browns’ coordinator job instead because it was closer to his family’s home in Pulaski, Va. “I worked under Dom Capers, and he’s a 3-4 guy, too. So is Wade Phillips,” Grantham said. “They all have their things you take from them.” Simply, it’s a defense predicated upon hitting the quarterback and making that guy’s life miserable on Saturday afternoons. And the only stat that really matters to Grantham is winning. “We want to attack people,” Grantham said. “And when I say that, that doesn’t mean you’re always blitzing. You’re attacking them mentally and physically. The most important guy on the field is the quarterback. If you look at all the teams that win, usually at the end of the year, their quarterback probably played well. “So, defensively, you have to stop the run, but you also have to affect the quarterback. You can do that multiple ways. One is with pressure and the next way is by disguise
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Richt: Grantham right man for the job
Filed under Football by on Mar 4th, 2010. Comment.
