Another weekend of college football is in the books, so let’s go through who let themselves down on the gridiron with my Week 12 Villains.
ESPN Australia-New Zealand
One game of football on a Sunday in November, and football pre-empted by replayed soccer? Unforgiveable.
Coverage is going downhill when it should be on the up as we enter the final crucial weeks of the season. College football fans are being sadly short-changed by a network that generally serves them well. Not so much recently, though.
Notre Dame
Boy, as a USC fan, I love seeing the Irish lose. More than that, I like seeing their promising season come to a crushing apocalyptic end.
A week after being blown out by Arizona State mostly because they failed to execute the football fundamentals – you know, not throwing insanely stupid interceptions, not protecting the ball when under pressure in the pocket and not collecting a snap to make a hold for a field goal try – they were doomed by turnovers at the worst possible time.
How’s this for a rundown from hell? The normally sure-handed running back Cam McDaniel fumbled late as Notre Dame were trying to run out the game, a mistake that led to a game-tying field goal for the Wildcats.
Earlier, the Irish went for two in the fourth, when Brian Kelly later admitted their chart said kick the conversion. They also had a missed conversion returned for two points by Northwestern. The old, fierier Kelly would’ve lost his mind. The newer, calmer one just about did, too.
Washington
Led 17-7 against Arizona, turned the football over with 1:26 to play, up 26-24, and then watched head coach Chris Petersen call a time-out as Arizona kicker Casey Skowron missed. It didn’t count, due to the stoppage, and Skowron didn’t miss a second time. Washington fall to a disappointing 2-5 in the Pac-12 this year.
Minnesota
Couldn’t take advantage of three Ohio State turnovers and couldn’t stop quarterback JT Barrett on a snowy Saturday afternoon in the Twin Cities. Had they been able do to a little of both, they might’ve beaten the Buckeyes. Instead, they went down by a touchdown, 31-24.
Mississippi State
Not only did the Bulldogs lose 25-20 to Alabama in Tuscaloosa, some of their best wins of the season – LSU, Texas A&M and Auburn – were beaten today, devaluing those earlier victories. After subpar wins against Kentucky and Arkansas before this week, I wonder if Hail State will slip from the number one spot when the next College Football playoff rankings are released.
Texas Christian
Yes, the Horned Frogs won 34-30, but they trailed woeful Kansas 13-10 at the half, and then were forced to rally from down 10 points in the third quarter to escape Lawrence with a very sketchy win. Let’s see what that does to their perception in the new playoff rankings. Honestly. As the fourth-ranked team in America, and as bad as Kansas have been since Todd Reesing graduated, they should have won by 60 or more.
Florida
Up 17-10 against South Carolina and looking like a different team to the one that’s appeared in these columns in recent weeks, the Gators proceeded to then take their place here for another week, succumbing 23-20 to South Carolina in overtime.
How? Well, the Gamecocks blocked a Florida punt with 39 seconds to play, and ended up in the end zone and headed to overtime 17-17. While Florida kicked a field goal, they gave up a touchdown run to South Carolina quarterback Dylan Thompson, and almost certainly lost Will Muschamp his job.
Nebraska’s defence
The Cornhuskers are going to see Melvin Gordon trampling them in their dreams – actually, their nightmares – for about a month. In fairness, the way the Wisconsin back was toting the rock, Alabama’s recent championship defensive units might’ve struggled to get him down, but still, the numbers are bad: 581 yards rushing against.
The Cornhusker defence is going to be the answer to a football trivia question one day soon. They were gashed and mauled and ripped in every imaginable way.
Duke
Three turnovers were converted into the 17 points that Virginia Tech needed to beat the Blue Devils 16-17, and now Duke must win their final two games in a wild and unpredictable ACC Coastal Division.
They have North Carolina and Wake Forest to come, both winnable games, but so was the Hokies game. As an aside, VT are great at season-wrecking wins. Remember, they dealt Ohio State its only loss back in September.
Andrew Kitchener
Roar Guru
Fingers crossed ESPN help us out. But I won't be surprised if they don't. Game selection has been poor this year.
King Of Swing
Guest
Yeah, I've checked the schedule and with the Cotton Bowl and Outback Bowl as the early games, Rose Bowl (1st semi-final) as the mid-afternoon game and the Sugar Bowl (2nd semi-final) as the evening game, ESPN Australia would be absolute fools not to broadcast these games live. Then again there might be a European soccer qualifier between Andorra and San Marino on that day that they are dying to show and then repeat 3 times that might bump the bowls from their schedule.
Andrew Kitchener
Roar Guru
New Year's Day - or January 2nd here - will be interesting. We don't have the luxury of so many ESPN-branded networks for all the big games. Over there, they have ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU, ESPNews and ABC.
King Of Swing
Guest
ESPN Australia's bowl coverage has admittedly been excellent the past two seasons. Last season, they broadcast about 30 bowl games including the National Championship game.This year, ESPN/ABC in the States will be broadcasting 36 out of the 39 bowl and National Championship semis and final. Whether ESPN Australia/NZ picks up most of that coverage again this year remains to be seen.
Andrew Kitchener
Roar Guru
ESPN Australia has shown CBS games in the past - the SEC Championship most every year and also the #1 vs #2 Alabama vs. LSU Game a few years ago. Also, some of the primetime NBC Notre Dame games have got a run here this year. That was a surprise.
Brendo
Guest
I've never looked into the ratings that ESPN/Foxtel get for College Football coverage, but you'd think it would be fairly decent, in terms of comparability to other sports at that time of the day. What else is on in terms of live sport on a Sunday morning? I know that the few other guys I've gotten into American Football, it's been done by telling them to watch College ball on a Sunday. Given that the product is great, the atmosphere of the games, traditions etc, and the time slot for viewing in Aus, it makes me wonder why ESPN doesn't show more/better games. Additionally, why Fox Sports wouldn't try and obtain the feed for some of Fox Sports (US) coverage, (maybe the CBS games). I'm not 100% on the rights deals etc. Not to get into a code war or bashing argument, but I feel that NCAAF and then the NFL are far and away a much better spectacle than any of our codes on offer.
Andrew Kitchener
Roar Guru
Seems strange that their coverage is trending downward in terms of games per week when it should be going the other way at this end of the season. Bowl season might be a bit of a disaster.
Andrew Kitchener
Roar Guru
Or replayed games. No need for that in this day and age.
Andrew Kitchener
Roar Guru
I do notice that there is more live mainstream sport than what there used to be on FUEL. I love my motor racing: mostly sports cars and some NASCAR but SPEED is basically the same channel, just numbered different and with different branding.
King Of Swing
Guest
College football is by far my favourite sport to watch on TV but I also like soccer and various other sports and don't mind if they occasionally forfeit their coverage of college football to broadcast a big soccer match but when all they are showing are repeats of such heavyweights as Montenego v Faroe Islands or England kicking San Marino's ass, then thats what makes my blood boil. Thank the Gods that illegal internet streams exist.
King Of Swing
Guest
Those 2 'extra' sports channels that Foxtel have implemented are really just a cheeky bit of false advertising to make it seem like we are getting more than we actually are. They've scrapped the SPEED and Fuel TV channels but the content from those now non-existent channels has just been mixed in with regular Fox Sports programming. As someone who dislikes Motor Sports, surfing and the like, its annoying that we now have have to sift through all this instead of it all being on its own separate channels.
Brendo
Guest
Completely agree. I lived in the UK for 2 years. Had BT Sport (basically ESPN). They showed all of the major college games. I checked the guide on the weekend, and they had a whole range of live games including Bama vs Miss St. Then, to make matters worse, ESPN go and delay Redzone this morning by an hour. They advertise it as being 'see every touchdown of every game'. Well, we didn't see every touchdown this morning did we? Really disappointing...
Andrew Kitchener
Roar Guru
I remember seeing a game in Mt Pleasant, MI a few years back. When Dan LeFevour was making guys look dumb. Go Chips! That was the school where Brian Kelly first rose to prominence, too.
KiwiDave
Roar Guru
110% with you on that. Fox just advertised they have 2 more sports channels so why the hell couldn't they put the bloody soccer on those channels or maybe even the college football. Only game this week was the Florida State one when so many great match ups were being played this week. Auburns offense needs a mention here. Aside from the opening drive they were non existent. The same offense ran 35 in against Ole Miss which is arguably the best defence in college football. Although winning 34-27 I would put Central Michigan's coach in this list. 2 minutes to go, on the opponents 40. You have 4th and inches. You have been rushing with ease all day and your offensive line dominating. Rather than a run play and burning the clock entirely they punted it away. Opponent got the ball back at the 20, marched deep into the red zone with ease and CMU had to stop 7 plays deep in the red zone. If the coach had just the tiniest amount of balls he could have saved a lot of stress for everyone on the ground and iced the game. Even if they didn't get the 4th down Miami Ohio would have had to go 60 yards. Not too much difference from having to go 80 yards in the 2 minute drill
Andrew Kitchener
Roar Guru
I disagree with ESPN showing replays of events pre-empting live sport. I mean, in this day and age of PVRs it isn't necessary when there's a live event going on opposite.
King Of Swing
Guest
Agree about the abysmal coverage of the games this weekend but I suppose there are some soccer and tennis fans out there who would disagree. One great website I use every weekend to stream games is Wiziwig. They have a stream available for just about every Div 1A and AA game (multiple streams of varying quality for games involving major teams) and they are generally pretty reliable. In other news, Muschump has now been fired from Florida. I wonder who they will try and hire to replace him. Dan Mullen, RichRod, Hugh Freeze? Along with Brady Hoke's probable termination at Michigan it'll make for an interesting few months in the coaching ranks.