I'm taking a quick study break to watch South Park, so I wanted to toss up a quick post for your discussion tonight and tomorrow, as I likely won't have time to post anything new tomorrow.
Prince is already under contract until 2011. His combined record is 12-13. He has two wins over Texas and a bowl appearance. He also has zero wins over Nebraska, KU and Mizzou.
Read the article and let me know what you think of this.
Former K-State running back James Johnson and current linebacker Chris Patterson were injured in an altercation in Manhattan last weekend (or here at GoPowercat, $). My best to both, and I'm encouraged to hear the injuries apparently aren't serious. Let's hope this remains an isolated incident during this football offseason.
I apologize for not updating in the last few days. It was my intention to get a new post up last night, as I was supposed to fly into KC by 7 p.m. Alas, I didn't even take off until after 6:30 p.m., so needless to say I didn't make it to KC by 7 p.m. Runway construction is the scourge of the flying earth.
Anyway, as you might surmise from my travels, I'm headed out to Manhattan tonight and will be at both the women's and men's games tomorrow. Hope to see some of you out there.
Anyway, there is a lot to catch up on, so let's go right ahead.
Unless you are religious about abstaining from recruiting sites, or really any news source, you certainly know that college football's signing day was Wednesday. All across the nation, 17 year olds signed their John Hancock to a piece of paper and wet football dreams were born for men twice their age.
If you've read this site for a long time, you will know that I am not very big into recruiting. For those who want that information, go to GoPowercat.com. I don't have the resources to cover it, and frankly I consider the whole process a bit of a crapshoot. Sure, I hope my team brings in good players, but I ascribe to the theory that coaching, player development and maturation is much more important to team success than "star ratings."
As to our little corner of football recruiting, Coach Ron Prince announced a 26-player class. It's interesting that KC Star article says 26, because on this KC Star article, there are 31 players listed. Any of you who know more about recruiting than I do--and that's pretty much all of you--feel free to explain that one to me.
Anyway, as all of you know, the big story of our recruiting class is that we signed 19 junior college players to this class, which apparently is a lot. OK, I'm not that dumb, I realize that really is a lot of JuCos. Others have been anxiously awaiting my input on this issue, so here we go. I promise to try to construct a cogent argument here, but it may come off as rambling.
We'll start with the criticism. The Omaha World Herald's Lee Barfknecht apparently has a creepy obsession with K-State's football recruiting, because he has felt the need to write about it twice--for a Nebraska newspaper, mind you--in the last two weeks. So either he's obsessed, or he's not very good at coming up with story ideas. Anyway, it started with this column on January 28th. One thing I've never understood about Barfknecht is how and why he can't seem to stay away from the potshots that should be left to their rightful place on message boards rather than in publications that supposed to raise the level of discourse.
It's time to dig out the old jokes about the football program in Manhattan, Kan., being renamed "Kansas State Community College."
Just for your information, and for all Husker fans out there who consider themselves the Yale of Nebraska, it's not any harder to get into Nebraska than it is to get into K-State.
Then we jump ahead to today when Barfknecht decided he needed to remind everyone that K-State had actually signed a lot of JuCo players, whereas two weeks earlier they were just recruiting them. Here is the ultimate display of lazy journalism, not that he would have received any response to this question had he actually posed it to other Big 12 coaches...
Walk into any Big 12 coach's office today and ask his first impression of someone who takes 19 junior college players. The response 95 percent of the time would be "that guy is feeling the heat."
So on to the analysis. Is Ron Prince feeling some heat? Probably. I've written here, and it's been said plenty of other places, that K-State fans are not happy with the end of last season. What looked like a certain bowl season evaporated with losses, most of them blowouts, to Iowa State, Nebraska, Missouri and Fresno State.
Is the pressure so high that Prince feels like he needs to win big next year or he will be out? I kind of doubt that. Now if he were to not make a bowl next year there would be a strong movement to force him out. But Tim Weiser and Jon Wefald are not the type of men to make change without lengthy consideration. (Sorry, I know that's a crappy link) Given Wefald's reluctance to fire coaches, and the fact that Weiser is tied to Prince, I have to believe they are committed to giving him four years barring a disaster this season.
Given all that, I disagree with the assertion that this is a pure desperation ploy by a man who believes he is on the way out unless he wins big next year.
On the other hand, let's not forget that Prince's argument in support of his position isn't without holes, either. Unsurprisingly, Prince looks in the rearview mirror to Bill Snyder's tenure at K-State, back when the school got tagged with the "JuCo U" name Barfknecht is so fond of.
Prince recently ran into former Syracuse coach Paul Pasqualoni, who reassured Prince that taking a junior-college approach can have its benefits.
"He quickly reminded me that there were seven people that played against him in the bowl game that were not on the spring roster," Prince said of K-State’s team that hammered the Orangemen in the Fiesta Bowl. "And I don’t think 1998 (the following year when K-State reached No. 1 in the coaches’ poll) would be perceived as a panic year."
The only little problem with that argument is that Snyder brought in 12 JuCo players in 1997, whereas Prince brought in 19 this year. In a recruiting class, that's a significant difference. Enough of a difference to give me concern about what will happen in three years even if it does turn out these players do have a positive efffect on the program while they're here. In Snyder's case, his 12 JuCo recruits went 11-2 in 1998, then 11-1 in 1999, and then the next recruiting class started out 11-3 in 2000. Snyder, despite what most thought was "too many JuCos" struck a balance that led to sustained success.
I question whether 19 players is too many to maintain that same or a similar level of success. Even if half of these players turn into impact players this year or next year, they will have to be replaced at that point. We will have fewer players who have spent four years in the system and know it backward and forward. Of course, given the turnover at the offensive coordinator position under Prince, one can reasonably quesiton whether we're getting that anyway.
What's the grand point of all this? Sorry to say, I don't really have one at this point. And if you run into someobdy who tells you they know exactly how this is going to turn out, run away from them as fast as you can. Barfknecht definitely got one thing right in his article.
We'll start to know in September. That's when lighted scoreboards answer all questions.
I realize I sound like the wishy-washy law student I am, but there really is no way to tell how this turns out. My gut reaction is that I don't like it, it's too many JuCo players, and we may get stuck in a vicious cycle of mediocrity with turning over a majority of our roster every two years. With the departure of two assistant coaches this offseason, in addition to the defections last year and the product we've seen on the field, I was already growing skeptical of Ron Prince. This is another decision I question, but I've fallen short of giving up on Prince.
While the JuCo debate is just that, a debate, there's something else about Prince's recruiting that I am downtright disappointed in. In the weeks leading up to signing day, we had to players decommit from K-State because Prince asked them to grayshirt rather than offering an immediate scholarship. For a full explanation of what grayshirting means, see this excellent piece by MaconDawg over at Dawg Sports. Boiled down to the very basics, grayshiritng means a delayed scholarship offer, which means the recruit pays his way for a while before being placed on scholarship.
If you look at it that way, grayshirting doesn't sound so bad. Sure, you have to pay for a while, but you're still way better off than pretty much everyone else who goes to college. If that was all there was to it, I would have no problem with Prince asking players to grayshirt.
But there's a little more to it than that, and to illustrate we need to look a little more closely at the two decommits we had because of the grayshirting issue. The first one is Wichita offensive lineman Brayden Burris.
So when Kansas State offered him a scholarship in September 2006, he happily accepted.
But less than two weeks before Wednesday's signing day, K-State coach Ron Prince asked him to grayshirt.
In other words, for nearly 1.5 years, Burris thought he was going to be a scholarship athlete at K-State. Other schools had interest in him, but he had committed to K-State. Obviously, that was a non-binding verbal commitment, but with him apparently locked up, other teams that would have offered him went ahead and filled up their recruiting classes with other players. As it turns out, he managed to find an offer from Iowa State, which is fortunate for him. The worst part of the story is the following quote from Burris...
"It seems, I don't know how you want to call it, it seems shady."
I don't ever want my alma mater to be considered shady, but our football coach gave this kid every justification to use that term.
The second story is remarkably similar to the first. Colorado offensive lineman Joe Caprioglio had been committed to K-State for a long time, then decided to look elsewhere when Prince asked him to grayshirt. He eventually signed with Colorado State.
I absolutely would not have a problem with this if the coaching staff had told these guys up front that they would be asked to grayshirt. If that had been the case, they would have known where K-State stood, and where they stood. But all indications are that Prince led these players to believe they would be on full scholarship from Day 1 at K-State, only to change the game plan less than two weeks from signing day. This is not a good practice and it needs to stop, or high school players will not trust an offer from K-State.
I'm really, really tired of talking about recruiting. Don't expect to see any more of that for a while.
Let's move back to the sport that is actually in season right now. I want to give a lot of respect to Coach Frank Martin for taking the entire team down to Norman, Okla., today to be with Clent Steart and attend the viewing for his mother, Vanessa. A lot of coaches would have said they didn't have time for that with a game coming up Saturday, but Martin apparently realizes there are more important things in life than spending all day Friday preparing for Oklahoma State. Things like family, loyalty and supporting a teammate through what is undoubtedly the worst time of his life.
Well done, coach.
For a fascinating look at what the NCAA selection process is like, check out this live-blog over at Double-A Zone.
Using the projections from these guys, K-State looks like a No. 5 seed right now. I'd rather move up a little to avoid that dreaded 5-12 game, but things are looking good. For purposes of making the exercise "real" they are projecting a KU/Texas A&M Big 12 championship game. I hope we have something to say about that.
That's probably not all the news and commentary I've missed, but it's close. We'll be back later with a very short "Kicking the Tires" to get ready for Oklahoma State, and the open game thread will go up today as I will be leaving for Manhattan tonight. So Long Saloon better make sure it's not running short on anything.
National Commitment List Rankings by Rivals.com
OU - 7th
TX - 10th
TX A&M - 15th
MU - 21st
OSU - 25th
CU - 26th
NU - 29th
KSU - 30th KU - 35th
TTU - 40th
BU - 54th
ISU - 66th
First, a basketball update. I apologize for not getting up an open game thread for the Pitt State game today. K-State won, 76-66, and the KC Star has a recap here.
It sounds like the team showed some effects from only having one day off between games, trailing by 12 at one point in the first half. The positive news is that we showed the ability to make a run when necessary, going on a 24-3 tear to take control.
Michael Beasley watch: 30 points, 14 rebounds
Bill Walker started, but left the game with a leg injury. It just makes me sick how rough the going has been for Walker, he just can't stay healthy. Let's hope it's not serious.
On to what passes for football around here these days, here is my breakdown from yesterday's game.
"I, TB, as proprietor of this blog, Bring On The Cats, do hereby promise that I will never complain that an opposing team has run up the score on my team, the Kansas State Wildcats."
Here is why I will never make that complaint: K-State is too good to make that complaint. I don't mean that in an arrogant way, because we obviously weren't good enough yesterday. But complaining about running up the score is a loser's mentality, to me. It takes the focus away from the real problem, which is what you're own team is doing wrong, and focuses on the big mean guy on the other side who is doing exactly what he is supposed to be doing: trying to beat you. I laughed at Bo Pelini for confronting Bill Snyder about it in 2003, I laughed at Gary Barnett's failure to accept Bill Snyder's apology for a late touchdown, and I laugh at the reporter who asked Bill Callahan about it in 2007.
This is conference play, folks, and conference play is supposed to be among teams that are roughly equal ( except in revenue and revenue sharing). As such, it is our job as K-State to stop the other team from scoring. It is not their job to stop themselves, although that option is certainly open to them should they so choose. When it comes to conference play, nobody should expect quarter from the opponent. The beautiful thing about conference play is, you're almost guaranteed to get your shot at some point. Nebraska ran up 60 and 70-point scores on teams for decades, so nobody feels sorry for them now when K-State puts up 49 or KU puts up 76.
Now when it comes to non-conference games against lesser teams, it really shows a serious small-man syndrome to leave the starters in late just to put up points. And even in conference play, I prefer to see my coach take a knee and run the clock out, but especially against the teams who have humiliated K-State for so many years, I will always get a little satisfaction at giving some of it back. But as promised, I will never complain about an opponent scoring a lot of points and continuing to run its offense late into the game.
What went right...
What went wrong...
I talked with readers JSchwarz and mystman last night, and both of them said essentially the same thing: there was no spark, no fire, no heart shown yesterday. That's a pretty much spot-on observation, but the question is where it went? There was no shortage of excitement in Auburn, Ala., on opening night. There was no shortage of emotion in Austin, Texas, on September 29th. There was plenty of heart displayed in Manhattan, Kan., against Colorado in October. But the last few weeks, this team has gone flat, and I'm not really sure why.
The good news about it, maybe, is that it has brought out a little vocal leadership from Jordy Nelson. All season we've heard that Nelson leads by example and that's wonderful, but every once in a while a leader has to get in somebody's face when they're not getting things done.
"People aren't doing what they're supposed to do," Nelson said. "It's something you can't see as a whole right now. But if you turn on the film, everywhere there's a different person doing the wrong thing."
I can't help but wonder if there hasn't been some loss of faith in the coaches. I'll start on defense: the original game plan, which appeared to focus on blitzing the piss out of Joe Ganz, wasn't a bad idea in theory. Ganz was in his second start, and had thrown four picks the week before against KU. If a blitz could put some pressure on him, it might have forced some bad decisions and led to some big plays.
The problem was, it didn't work.
Nebraska's line suddenly looked like an impenetrable wall, and yet we still brought pressure on nearly every play, sending linebackers on a mission of doom, putting no pressure on Ganz, and leaving our depleted secondary exposed to Maurice Purify, Frantz Hardy and Nate Swift. After about the first quarter, it would have been a really good idea to say hey, this blitz thing isn't getting any pressure on Ganz, so maybe we should try to generate pressure with the front three and vary a single linebacker blitz while dropping back and blanketing the field.
On offense, the playcalling was atrocious, to put it mildly. We have a running back by the name of James Johnson, who is averaging 6.0 yards per carry on the year. Let me repeat that: Johnson is AVERAGING six yards every single time he carries the ball. What is Johnson's reward for that solid per-carry average? Less than 15 carries per game. On the season...
James Johnson, 10 games, 143 attempts (14.3 per game), 863 yards, 6.0 yards per carry
What's all the worse is, a strong running game and a commitment to the running game would have been huge in this game. Nebraska defensive coordinator Kevin Cosgrove obviously decided he was going to blitz the piss out of Josh Freeman, much like he did in the NU-Texas game a few weeks ago. And, much like the game against Texas, the blitz worked really well while K-State was trying to stick with the passing game. Freeman was on the run constantly, and was sacked four times.
Question: So what did Texas do to solve the blitzing problem?
Answer: Jamaal Charles RUSHING the football. It only worked to the tune of about 248 rushing yards in the fourth quarter alone.
I'm not saying K-State needs to permanently adopt the zone read as its predominant offense, but using it as a change of pace wouldn't be a bad idea. Hell, Freeman scored a touchdown off a zone read play in the third quarter. Freeman isn't the most mobile QB ever, but neither is Colt McCoy, and the zone read has worked pretty well for UT the last couple weeks.
Anyway, apart from just the zone read, a little more running game in the first or second quarter against Nebraska would have been welcome. When Nebraska played Texas, the Huskers did not react well to the Longhorns change of emphasis to the zone read. A little more running might have seen us pull the same thing, with our running backs running right by the blitzing linebackers and on to freedom.
Apparently Whitlock thinks K-State has a bunch of spoiled fans, and that is why the Wildcats didn't get to the national title game in 1998. The essence of the column is that Mizzou and KU fans are taking the correct approach to this season by not complaining that they are getting a lack of respect from the national media, which wasn't the case with K-State back in 1998
First of all, neither team has any real gripe at this point, as Whitlock rightly points out. Mizzou has played some good competition, but has lost to the only consensus top-10 team it has face--Oklahoma. KU has done everything asked of it, destroyed weak opposition, won ugly, won pretty, you name it. But the 'beaks haven't played a top-10 team yet. They will, when they play Mizzou in Kansas City in two weeks. But until then, they can't legitimately be called a national title contender because they haven't been tested against an elite team. The teams they've beaten, such as K-State, Colorado, Texas A&M and Oklahoma State, either are or were pretty good teams, but they're not top-10 teams this year, or even top 25. So while KU certainly deserves its top-5 ranking, at this point they are going to have to show a little more for the national media to reocgnize them as a threat to get to New Orleans.
Whitlock recognizes all that. Where he goes wrong is comparing this year's KU team to K-State in 1998:
The Jayhakws remind me of the 1998 Kansas State Wildcats; only so far Kansas fans have handled their success better than Wildcats fans. That Kansas State team was as good as any team in the country. Unfortunately, K-State fans spent all season whining about a lack of respect. The team wound up reflecting the arrogance of its fan base, gave away the Big 12 title game and thought it was too good to play in the Alamo Bowl.
There are at least three important differences between the 1998 Wildcats and the 2007 Jayhawks.
Previous performance: In 1998, K-State was coming off an 11-1 season in 1997. This year's KU team was 6-6 last year, and failed to make a bowl.
Previous performance, part II: While one could write off that 11-1 season as typical K-State of that era, scheduling a bunch of patsies and then losing the only important game of the regular season--to Nebraska--that would be an inaccurate characterization. True, the Wildcats did lose handily to Nebraska that year. But they also managed to make what most would consider a pretty decent bowl: The Fiesta Bowl. The opponent there was none other than Syracuse, quarterbacked by some guy named Donovan McNabb, who only threw for 2,488 yards, 20 TD/6 INTs, and also ran for 404 yards and six TDs. The Orangemen were 9-3 and ranked 14th coming into that game. K-State sent them packing, 35-18.
K-State WAS too good to play in the Alamo Bowl in 1998. Ask any K-State fan, and they'll tell you the biggest disappointment of 1998, by far, was losing to Texas A&M in St. Louis. The game in San Antonio meant nothing to the players, or the fans, and that's not arrogance. That's disappointment. The team had a national title game appearance right in its fingertips, so you tell me the Alama Bowl was an acceptable substitute.
Three teams came into the conference championship game weekend undefeated in 1998: K-State, UCLA and Tennessee. Tennessee won, guaranteeing a berth in the title game. Both K-State and UCLA lost, meaning one of them should have played Tennessee, right? Wrong, that honor went to Florida State, who had two things going for it: it had lost early (to an NC State team who lost to...Baylor), and the name Florida State.
You're right, Jason. K-State fans have no reason to be bitter over what happened that year. Going undefeated, blowing out teams, Heisman trophy candidate at quarterback, and yet wasn't even guaranteed a national title berth even with a win in the conference championship game. You're right. The system worked to perfection that year.
On Saturday, November 10th, 2007, the "Game That Used to be Great" will take place in Lincoln, Neb. You remember that game. It gave us moments such as this...
1998
I have to say, I kind of miss Keith Jackson.
Oops.
2000
I love that shot of Willie on the pressbox.
2003
Can't get enough of Darren Sproles "chugging" his way into the end zone.
Ahh, memory lane is a fun place.
But anyway, moving back to the present. I have no doubt that, in the next few days, Bill Callahan will actually be asked about the upcoming game this weekend, rather than his own job security. When he is asked such a left-field question, I predict we will hear something like this:
"We're developing a game plan to stop the pass rush of linebacker Antwon Moore. He's got some real quickness getting into the backfield, and we'll have to deal with that. Also, that big guy in the middle, uhh, Steve Cline, we'll have to work hard to move him around if we want to run. What was that? Huh? Really? They're both injured? Well, I guess it's back to the drawing board."
So anyway, later this week, the K-State football team will roll north on U.S.-77. At 11:30 a.m. on Saturday morning, the two teams will get together. Here is how I see it going...
Pre-Game
Josh Freeman is heartily booed by most of the crowd as he takes the field for the first time in Memorial Stadium. However, a few Nebraska fans don't boo him, and actually make their way down to the field to pick up an autograph. While they're down near the field, they walk by the Huskers, as they feel it is their duty to remind those players that they have been so pathetic this year that they don't deserve to wear that illustrious "N" on the side of their helmets.
The only Husker player to survive such torment is now-starting quarterback Joe Ganz. In pregame drills, Ganz will throw for 200 yards, which is impressive, considering most of the snaps come from about the 20 yard line. Equally as impressive, he throws four interceptions to defenders who are merely walking through pre-game drills.
Both teams retire to the locker room for final instructions, only to reemerge and, for the first time in college football history, both teams are booed as they take the field.
1st Quarter
Very much like last week, an orgy of points are scored early in this game. On the opening kickoff, James Johnson will fumble the ball and Nebraska will pick it up and run it in for a touchdown. On the ensuing kickoff, Johnson again receives--there is a strong wind such that stud kicker Adi Kunalic is not able to boot touchbacks--but this time romps 94 yards, untouched, for the tying score. After 20 seconds, the score is tied, 7-7.
For the rest of the quarter, the teams trade possessions, and scores. When K-State has the ball, Freeman throws to Jordy Nelson on every passing play, because he is covered by one of Nebraska's fourth-string linebackers. In a classic example of Nebraska defensive coordinator Kevin Cosgrove's 'bend-but-don't-break' scheme, Cosgrove considers it sufficient to allow Nelson to catch the ball as long as there are two players standing right next to him, ready to make the immediate tackle. Sometimes his players execute the tackle, and sometimes they don't. Nelson finishes the first quarter with 13 receptions for 190 yards. Not-so-mysteriously, however, K-State is forced to settle for field goals every trip down the field, scoring only 22 points (kickoff return TD plus five field goals) in the quarter.
On the other side, Nebraska finds it is very easy to run the ball. With Cline out, K-State's front three averages about 240 pounds, meaning Josh Freeman may become an option at nose tackle. Marlon Lucky, Quentin Castille and Roy Helu gash the K-State defense for 210 rushing yards in the first quarter, contributing to two Husker touchdowns. At the end of the quarter, the score stands at K-State 22, Nebraska 21. The home crowd finds itself placated, and momentarily leaves its own players alone.
2nd Quarter
For K-State, the second quarter brings more of the same: lots of completed passes to Jordy Nelson, lots of field goals. In the middle of the second quarter, on his eighth field-goal attempt of the day, kicker Brooks Rossman strains a leg muscle and is unable to continue playing. That's okay, though, because it allows Ron Prince to go for it on every fourth-down play in the red zone. At one point, Prince pulls out the wide receiver-pass play, and Jordy Nelson throws his third touchdown pass of the season. On the sideline, Cosgrove slaps his head and screams, "I can't believe Prince ran that play! I'd have figured after running it 47 times this season, he'd never figure it would work again!" A fan passing by the Nebraska sideline hurls a box of Valentino's pizza at Cosgrove's noggin, narrowly missing.
Meanwhile, the Huskers move away from running the ball on offense as Bill Callahan grows increasingly impatient with the slow pace of scoring only once every three plays, and can't believe his offense is only averaging 22.5 yards per carry. Plus, he feels like he's "preparing Ganz for next year" as he firmly believes he will still be the Husker coach in 2008. While the pass-happy approach has moderate success, producing a touchdown and a field goal, it also results in an interception and many vicious hits on Ganz, some of which are actually be legal.
The crowd starts to grow restless with the newfangled passing attack, but the Huskers score just enough to keep the masses at bay. At halftime, the score stands at K-State 39, Nebraska 31.
Halftime
Fans of both teams break out their flasks, and realize that they didn't bring nearly enough booze to get through the game.
3rd Quarter
The K-State offense begins to look thoroughly inept as the Husker defenders finally start to realize that Josh Freeman doesn't even look at his other receivers on the field. Pretty soon, Nebraska's players, against Cosgrove's orders, start rushing two, and the other nine players chase Nelson around the field. This results in two interceptions--which lead directly to points--but also results in two touchdowns for K-State, as passes into the masses around Nelson are tipped and Deon Murphy happens to run by at an opportune time and takes them in for scores. It could have been three touchdowns, but Murphy drops one of them. Those are the only points scored by the Wildcat offense in the quarter, because they continue the proud tradition of getting stuffed at the opponent's five yard line.
Late in the quarter, the home crowd starts to come apart at the seams. Callahan continues with the pass-heavy attack, believing his team is falling behind and must throw to catch up, despite still averaging more than 20 yards per carry rushing the ball. It all comes to a head late in the quarter when, on consecutive possessions, Callahan has Ganz drop back into his own end zone and throws swing passes. K-State defenders throw the receiver for a safety both times. Approximately 5,000 people have gathered behind the Husker bench to unkindly remind their players that they don't deserve to have an "N" on the side of their helmets. Maurice Purify has to be physically restrained from attacking particularly abusive Alpha Tau Omega.
After three, it's K-State 57, Nebraska 52.
4th Quarter
On K-State's first drive of the final stanza, Josh Freeman connects with Deon Murphy for a 45-yard touchdown pass. The Husker players have continued to blanket Nelson, and Freeman, while turning to avoid the pass rush, has to take his eyes off Nelson for a second, and when he looks back up, sees Murphy standing all by himself on the far corner of the field.
As Murphy goes in for the touchdown, Freeman makes a kissing motion with his hand and then slaps his hindquarters while looking at Bill Callahan, giving him the classic "kiss-my-pitoot" sign. Just as he does so, the Nebraska fans rush the field, and the TV and radio announcers are sure that they are going after Freeman, thinking he made the gesture at them. However, they run right past Freeman--one stops to ask for his autograph--and proceed toward Cosgrove. The red horde has finally had enough bad defense. Callahan manages to avoid the initial scrum and runs for the fence behind his players' bench. Once he gets there, he makes a throat-slashing gesture, trying to get the fans to stop and leave his friend "Coz" alone. When that fails, he loses his cool and screams, "You're all a bunch of f*cking hillbillies! You all need to get a f*cking life! This is the dumbest team I've ever had, and I used to coach in OAKLAND! I hate you all and I hate that crusty old f*ck that used to coach here! I'm going back to California to get away from you goddamned farmers!"
Needless to say, Callahan does not make it back to California.
In the aftermath, the game is declared a forfeit as the field is unusable after the melee. Ron Prince comments after the game that it was a great win for his program, and has contributed to their "callousness" for going into tough environments.
And although it may have a different flavor this year, with neither team in contention for the division crown, it's still K-State vs. Nebraska. As such, I bring you YouTube highlights of the three K-State wins over Nebraska during my four years at K-State...
2002
2003
2004
Also, because we've received so much grief about the Power Towels and Willie's Chant video, I bring you the following Nebraska videos to prove that crappy videomaking is not relegated to the Sunflower State...
This program was hit by a storm that was equal parts Cyclone and Wildcat yesterday. The result is that this season is in a shambles right now, and nobody really knows what we'll do with the pieces. Will we pick them up, put back together what we can, and get to seven wins (I can't see us beating Mizzou)? Or will be sit on the curb, head in our hands, and mail it in to a 5-7 finish?
Next week we travel to Nebraska, where we win about every half-century or so. We will be taking on a Husker team that is on a five-game losing streak, which also happens about every half-century or so. Thus, we are left with next week's pillow fight between the two teams that used to own the North.
Don't watch the following video if you're likely to be offended by women in their underwear having a pillowfight...
The last three weeks of this season are going to be very interesting. I had figured we were on our way to a record at least as good as last year. And we still do have games against Nebraska and Fresno State, two teams who won't strike fear into most this season. Mizzou looks like it's on a roll, our best chance is catching them looking ahead to the collosal showdown with KU the weekend after our game. The problem is, no matter the opponent, K-State is capable of losing any game by beating itself.
Sorry I didn't get around to doing a "the good" and "the bad" from yesterday's game. To sum it up: "the good" = Jordy Nelson, "the bad" = everything and everyone else.
Because of my extremely pissed-off mood and the large bottle of Crown sitting on my counter right now, look for some entertaining posts this week. Also, stop in at Corn Nation to keep track of the disaster to the north.
The Contenders (Note: Colorado is technically still alive, but I didn't want to make this any more confusing than it already is.)
K-State (3-2, games remaining at Iowa State, at Nebraska, home to Missouri)
Mizzou (3-1, games remaining at Colorado, home to Texas A&M, at K-State, neutral vs. KU)
KU (4-0, games remaining home to Nebraska, at Oklahoma State, neutral vs. Mizzou)
(1) Comparisons of the round-robin records of games played between the co-champs
(2) comparisons of the co-champs' records within their division
(3) comparison of the co-champs' records against the next-highest placed division opponents
(4) comparison of the co-champs' records against all common conference opponents. Once the tie is whittled to two teams after any step, the head-to-head tiebreaker between those schools determines the title-game participant.
There are other tiebreakers in case these don't work, but they mostly involve incantation and other hocus-pocus that I don't really want to deal with at the moment.
What Must Happen
K-State needs to win out.
Mizzou needs to win out, except for the matchup with K-State.
KU needs to lose to Nebraska and Mizzou.
If those three things happen, each team is 6-2 in conference play. The first tiebreaker doesn't work, because each team would be 1-1 against the other co-champs (K-State: loss to KU, win over Mizzou, Mizzou: Win over KU, loss to K-State, KU: Win over K-State, loss to Mizzou).
The second tiebreaker compares records within the division. In this scenario, each team would be 4-1 (K-State: wins over CU, NU, ISU, MU, loss to KU; Mizzou: wins over ISU, NU, CU, KU, loss to K-State; KU: wins over CU, NU, ISU, K-State, loss to MU). Thus, the second tiebreaker fails as well.
The next tiebreaker looks at how each team fared against the lower teams in the division. Each team would be 1-0 against Colorado, Nebraska and Iowa State in the scenario mentioned.
Finally, we look at the overall record against all common conference opponents. Among K-State, Mizzou and KU, those teams are listed below:
Nebraska
Iowa State
Colorado
Under the scenario mentioned above, K-State would be 3-0 against those opponents. Mizzou would also be 3-0. KU, by losing to Nebraska, would be 2-1, and thus eliminated. That leaves K-State and Mizzou, and under the scenario posited above, K-State owns the head-to-head over Mizzou.
For K-State's coaches and players (not that they read this), all they need to do is focus on winning. For us fans, it means we need to start sticking pins in little (OK, humongous) Mangino kewpie dolls and harrassing helpless chickens. Oh, and you can bet I'll be the biggest Nebraska fan in the world this Saturday from about 11:30 p.m. until about 3:30 p.m.
A Couple Other Scenarios to Ponder
I think it is also possible that we are the North representative if KU loses to Iowa State instead of Nebraska, and all other conditions mentioned above hold. In that scenario, each team would still be 6-2 overall and 4-1 in the division. However, now KU would be 1-0 against Nebraska and 1-0 against Colorado, but 0-1 against Iowa State. K-State and Mizzou would own wins over each of those teams, meaning it would again come down to the head-to-head, which under the scenario K-State would own.
So we're pinning our hopes on Nebraska and Iowa State. God help us.
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