Sunset Vette

Did LSU show up to play last night, or did some other team sneak into town wearing purple and gold uniforms?

Frankly, I’m speechless. I turned off the game in the 3rd quarter.

Last night West Virginia – a team LSU beat on their home field earlier this year – destroyed Clemson in the Orange Bowl. Earlier Oregon beat Wisconsin in the Rose Bowl. Arkansas is probably favored to beat Kansas State in the Cotton Bowl, and of course LSU has already defeated Alabama once this season. If Arkansas does win, and even if Alabama wins the rematch, LSU will have defeated four of the winners of the top six bowl games. The didn’t get a chance to play Michigan, but is there any doubt they would win? The outcome against Oklahoma State would probably be in more doubt.

It would be interesting if someone with access to the data could crunch some numbers and see if there ever was a team that has played and defeated that many major bowl winners in the same season.

I think this is a great quote from Stewart Mandel, columnist for Sports Illustrated, talking about the SEC versus SEC match-up in the BCS championship game:

The game hasn’t even been played and the SEC has already won its sixth straight national title. Ah, but an SEC team will also lose a BCS title game, staining its thus-far spotless 7-0 record in the Big One. Finally, the voters found someone to beat the SEC.

Read the full article

Also Tyrann Mathieu got invited to New York City for the Heisman ceremony. That means he finished somewhere in the top five of the voting.

I should start off this post right away with an apology to LSU fans everywhere. You see, it was my fault that the Tigers looked so incredibly inept on offense for the entire first half of the SEC title game yesterday. I watched the game on TV, like millions of others, and like a large portion of those viewers I found myself wondering.

• Was LSU indeed looking past the Bulldogs to the BCS title game?
• Would we see Jarrett Lee starting in the second half to provide some offensive spark?
• What was going wrong with the Tigers?
• Or was Georgia really that good?

Georgia had even squandered a number of opportunities, including a walk-in touchdown pass that was dropped and a fairly easy interception in LSU territory that was not made. LSU did not make a first down in the entire first half, and looked even more terrible than that suggests. Only the phenomenal punting of Brad Wing and the special teams performance of Tyrann Mathieu kept the score reasonably close. It was 10-7 at the half, and it could have easily been 28 or 31 instead of ten.

Then I remembered.

For all of the big games for the Tigers this year I had worn my commemorative t-shirt from their championship season four years ago. At half-time I went upstairs, got my t-shirt out and put it on.

The rest is history. LSU scored the final 36 points in the second half and on paper the game looked like a blowout. You would never know that LSU only played the second half…

I will be sure to have my t-shirt on from the start of the game on January 9th.

It was LSU’s 9th game this season with forty or more points and pushed their average margin of victory against all comers to over twenty points. They have defeated 3 top-three teams and will face one more in their final game of the season. I heard some of the “talking heads” at ESPN suggest that this LSU team should be – if they can win the BCS title – discussed as one of the greatest teams of all time. I’m not sure I’m ready to jump on that bandwagon just yet. Ask me again in ten years. In any case, the Tigers have secured the SEC West title, and now the overall SEC championship for 2011. Next up is either Alabama (seems the most likely) or Oklahoma State.

Perfect Storm?

It has seemed for weeks that LSU and Alabama are on collision course for a rematch, and like many I am not really in favor of it. In order to avoid a rematch Oklahoma State had to do something they have not done in eight years – beat Oklahoma. They not only had to beat them, but do so in convincing fashion. And even that would not be enough as Virginia Tech and Stanford are both ranked ahead of OSU in the human polls.

Step one: The Cowboys put a serious beating on Oklahoma. I turned off the game when it was 44-3, and apparently Oklahoma got a garbage touchdown to make the final score 44-10. OSU certainly did their part.
Step two: Virginia Tech got blasted by Clemson 38-10 and didn’t look very good in the loss.
Step three: Stanford didn’t lose, but then again they didn’t play either. Stanford’s only loss was to Oregon but their resume is actually far worse than OSU.

It is certainly conceivable that OSU will jump over both Stanford and Virginia Tech, but will they jump over Alabama?

OSU lost only one game all season. Alabama lost only one game all season. OSU lost on the road, Alabama lost at home. Both games were in overtime. The difference was that Alabama lost to the #1 team (LSU) and OSU lost to an unranked opponent (Iowa State). Instead of looking at the losses, I think folks have to look at the wins. By just about any measure I can find, OSU has a much higher strength of schedule than Alabama, which means there should be more weight for the games they have won than the one game they’ve lost.

Where does that leave us? I guess we’ll find out tonight.

I spent Friday telling everyone I met not to talk to me about the LSU game as I had recorded it to watch later. I stayed off of the Internet, didn’t read email, and never watched anything on TV that wasn’t targeted to the under 10 crowd. (Think Disney channel.) On the drive home I did not go into any of the gas stations because I did not want to run the risk of seeing any newspaper headlines. The good news is that it worked. I got home without knowing anything about the game, and was able to sit down and enjoy watching it.

I will admit that I feared for the worst. One of my neighbors usually flies his LSU flag after the game, and he did not have it out. I was afraid that meant that the Tigers had lost. That was reinforced when Arkansas jumped out to a 14-0 lead after an early fumble by LSU was returned for a touchdown. However, the Tigers outscored the Hogs 41-3 for the rest of the game. Mathieu made two huge plays – a punt return for a touchdown and yet another forced fumble. One article I read said that he already has 11 forced fumbles (an LSU school record) for his career and he’s only a sophomore. More importantly to me, he played under control. I felt like Arkansas might try to get into his head because he plays with such emotion but he played well.

Jordan Jefferson suffered his first interception of the season but he also played well. He’s no Andrew Luck or Matt Barkley but he played well enough to win. LSU has won two titles in the last ten years, and neither team had a true star playing quarterback. Overall LSU won with – no surprise – a great defense, great rushing offense, and excellent play on special teams. As Jimmy Johnson was frequently quoted as saying (during his time as Dallas Cowboys coach) there are three aspects to any football game. If you can win two of them, you have a good shot at winning the game. LSU won defense and special teams for this game. One of the quotes made during the broadcast was that LSU’s opponents are averaging 21 inches per punt return! LSU had three different running backs score touchdowns in this game, and for the season the Tigers have four running backs with at least six touchdowns.

As an interesting footnote: LSU has passed Arkansas as the top scoring offense in the conference.

Next up: Georgia Bulldogs in the SEC title game. I have read more than one article that suggests that LSU could even lose this game and still play for the national championship, but I hope they don’t go that route. If they beat Georgia they will have won the SEC outright, they will have defeated the (presumed) PAC-12 champion Oregon, and defeated the (potential) Big East champion West Virginia.

Next we start the “rematch” talk, and I have to say I am not in favor of playing Alabama again. I think we should play the top team from either the Big 12 or Big 10, which would be Oklahoma/Oklahoma State winner or the Wisconsin / Michigan State winner. However, I doubt that will happen. It seems that most writers are accepting that the perceived two best teams in the country are LSU and Alabama, and that those two teams should be playing in the title game. One announcer suggested that LSU should get awarded at the very least a split championship because they have finished the regular season undefeated, would would mean that the AP voters would have to leave LSU #1 no matter what they did in their bowl game.

Any way you look at it, LSU had one of the best seasons that I think I have ever seen as far as who they played, when they played, and how they played in those games. Seven of the teams they defeated this year were ranked at the time we played them. We played three top five teams (Oregon #3, Alabama #2, Arkansas #3). We won one of those on a neutral field, one at home, and one away. If we complete the sweep we will have defeated another top team (Georgia) on a neutral field (or at least as neutral as Atlanta can be for a Georgia Bulldogs game) followed by another top ranked team on another neutral field (as far as New Orleans can be considered neutral for LSU). That’s a heck of a resume.

And not to get ahead of myself, but LSU retains a lot of their starting team other than quarterback. What might next year look like?

LSU, Alabama, and Arkansas are rated 1-2-3 in the BCS as expected after the mayhem that took place last weekend. Who is really the best team? I though I would play with some numbers and see if there are any indications. Continue Reading »

Three of the past four years, including the last national championship year in 2007, LSU has lost to Arkansas. They’ve found all sorts of ways to lose… a triple overtime upset when LSU was last ranked #1 in 2007, a one-point defeat in 2008, and by allowing a last-second score at the end of the first half in 2010 which changed their end-game options. This year the Hogs visit Baton Rouge with the SEC’s top rated offense as well as very effective special teams play. LSU maintains their position near the top of the league as far as defense goes after shutting down Ole Miss 52-3. Who will come to play? If LSU wins out, they go to the championship and complete their first ever undefeated run through the SEC. If Arkansas wins, it adds a whole lot more chaos to what we’ve already seen in the last three days.

Specifically, we have seen Iowa State (27 point underdog) take down previously undefeated Oklahoma State in double overtime. That dropped the Cowboys from the ranks of unbeaten teams and certainly had to give extra incentive to the other top-tier one-loss teams. Then again, you would not have known it as Oregon (15 point favorite) lost to USC and Oklahoma (another 15 point favorite) lost to the Baylor Bears on a last-second touchdown pass. Alabama got by Georgia Southern but allowed 21 points. Arkansas whipped Mississippi State, which could conceivably end up with three SEC West teams being ranked 1-2-3 in the BCS after the big reveal tomorrow night.

Fortunately LSU managed to avoid the so-called “trap” game and take care of business rather handily in Oxford. In fact things went so well that Les Miles had the Tigers run four straight knee-down plays from the one yard line… with five minutes still to go in the game.

Houston remains unbeaten but is hardly a blip on the radar given their relatively weak schedule. Too many folks are thinking of what Hawaii did a few years back (or didn’t do, as the case may be) when they got a BCS bid to attend the Sugar Bowl. (They lost to Georgia 41-10.)

Here’s the worst case scenario: Arkansas beats LSU next Friday, and Alabama wins at Auburn. At this point we have 3 top SEC teams all with one loss, and only one can go to the SEC title game. (Silly rules say we have to allow a team from the Eastern division to play, and Georgia has locked that up.) The final tie breaker involves looking at head to head record if the two top-ranked BCS teams are within 5 spots of each other, so it would all depend on how far LSU falls if they end up losing to Arkansas. Alabama only fell one spot (#2 to #3) but that was primarily because the game was so close. If it’s a blow-out (and with the offensive firepower that Arkansas has you never know) then LSU would almost certainly drop further. And with Alabama already projected to be sitting at #2, then ‘Bama would go to the title game. Then what? Who knows.

From a ‘Bama perspective this coming week shapes up really nicely. They will already know the outcome of the LSU / Arkansas game (which is played on Friday) before they take on Auburn in the annual Iron Bowl. If Arkansas wins, you can be sure that the Tide will attempt to pour it on at Auburn to impress the voters. Remember that ‘Bama stomped Arkansas 38-14 back in September before losing to LSU 6-9 a few weeks ago. I know the transitive property doesn’t apply in college football, but that doesn’t mean people don’t still try to apply it…

As a Tiger fan, I hope that LSU can take care of Arkansas next Friday and move on. As a fan of college football who really wishes we had a playoff system, wouldn’t it be awesome if we ended up with this scenario? Suppose LSU loses to Arkansas, leaving Alabama to head to the SEC title game. Suppose ‘Bama loses a close game to Georgia, leaving the Bulldogs as the SEC champion and the associated Sugar Bowl berth. That leaves LSU and Arkansas with only 1 loss (’Bama has two in this scenario, having lost to Georgia) and end up playing for the BCS championship in a rematch, which LSU wins. The rest of the country howls because their teams got shut out of the title game, and we had two teams playing that didn’t even win their own conference. Nothing screams playoffs more than this mess.

It will be very interesting to see the BCS rankings come out tomorrow, as the voters start to adjust their votes based on who they think they want to see in the title game, rather than who necessarily deserves to be there.

And ultimately I hope LSU beats Arkansas and takes it all as an undefeated / undisputed champion.

Ole Miss suspended their starting quarterback for the game this week against LSU, and potentially for their season ending game against Mississippi State as well. On the surface this would seem to continue a trend for LSU as they seem to get teams right at the worst time. On the other hand, there’s not much film for LSU to study on the backup who will be starting.

I’m thinking of another top-ten team that lost to a backup quarterback this season… Nebraska. They lost to Northwestern and that cost them their chance for the Big 10 championship.

Please, LSU, don’t let the backup quarterback knock you out of the top spot.

With apologies to Arkansas, but I’m not going to overlook this week’s game against Ole Miss. Have they won an SEC game yet this year? No. Do they have a lame duck coach? Yes. Is there anyone on the planet that thinks Ole Miss will be able to defeat LSU when they host the Tigers this week? Probably not. But as the cliche says we have to play one game at a time. However I like what I have seen of Les Miles this year and I think he’ll have the team on an even keel going into Saturday’s game in Oxford. Only after they take care of business there will they start talking about the post Thanksgiving match-up against current #6 ranked Arkansas.

Oklahoma State remained undefeated at #2 after shellacking Texas Tech in the “Devil’s Game” where the final score was 66-6. You can figure out where I got the name of the game from. It makes the Texas Tech win at Oklahoma all that much more mystifying. Should Oklahoma beat Oklahoma State in the final game of their season, what does that do? I think that puts Oklahoma back into the championship game, pitting the early season #1 team against the late season #1. Somehow that bookend feeling makes sense, even if you’re an Alabama fan. Speaking of Alabama Continue Reading »

The wildcard for me is coaching: I think Les Miles brings a certain unpredictability aspect to the game, so if Sabin can get into his head that could impact the outcome of the game.

That’s what I wrote last week while thinking about the LSU versus Alabama game that took place last night, and as amazing as it is to say, I think that’s exactly what happened.

Except in reverse.

I think the Mad Hatter’s reputation got Sabin worried, and he reached. How else can you explain the trick play where Maze tried an option pass that was intercepted on the one yard line? And then putting Maze (on a bad ankle) out to return a punt that ended up rolling by for a 70+ yard effort? How else can you explain the terrible play calling in the first overtime? Les Miles, on the other hand, coached a very conservative game. After seeing the effect the LSU defense was having on the ‘Bama offense he apparently realized it was going to be a slug-fest. Back up on your own goal line? Run three times and punt. Down inside the five on fourth down? Points are going to be hard to come by so take the safe field goal and eschew going for it on forth down. LSU made yards running up the middle, made yards running around the end, passed when they had to, and punted extraordinarily well (with one notable exception). Alabama missed a bunch of field goals (including one in the first overtime) and had another blocked.

Turns out that was enough to win the game.

It would not have been enough had Eric Reid not gone up and taken away the pass that Maze threw. If Reid doesn’t get that ball, Alabama sets up on the one yard line and certainly scores from there.

One article on another sports network was titled “Les Drama” and had a subtitle that read “Coach Les Miles left the tricks behind as No. 1 LSU beat No. 2 Alabama at its own brand of football.” It was an interesting turn-about as Les – in my opinion – clearly out-coached Sabin in a game that most likely determined the fate of the two teams. At this point LSU still has to get by Arkansas in order to make it to the SEC championship game, but if they win out they’re heading back to New Orleans for their third attempt at a national title, and ‘Bama will be going to the Sugar Bowl.

On the negative side, I was extremely disappointed in the play from the “honey badger.” He took out a ‘Bama player on the ultimate cheap shot on a punt return, costing the Tigers only a 15-yard penalty as a result. If this were the NFL he would be facing a fine. I suspect LSU might suspend him for a game or two, but somehow he’ll be back against Arkansas.

Around the rest of the country Continue Reading »