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Did You See That? Week 5, Big Ten Parity and Dabo Thinks He Won The National Title

J Money

There are some weeks when it looks like there are going to be a bunch of blowouts and so you think the aggregate CFB product won’t be as awesome as it usually is – and then you wind up getting some great games anyway. Sure, there’s definitely merit to the argument that CFB are now getting to be far too long (shorten halftime – just do it, already), but as of now, Saturdays from noon to midnight are just about perfect. In the Big Ten

Ohio State 34, Indiana 27 – After pushing hard for GameDay and failing, IU put on a game worthy of everyone’s attention. The question was whether this close game was a result of IU actually being good or OSU being bored. When it came to crunch time, OSU did that thing that uber-talented teams do – they simply exerted their will and put some distance between them and their opponent. IU simply wouldn’t go away, though, even when our old friend Zander Diamont was pressed into service. All I can say is good for them and I hope our boys take the Bucket back and ruin the end of their happy season.

Northwestern 27, Minnesota 0 – Another game where it’s hard to know what to make of it. Is Northwestern this good? Is Minnesota this vulnerable? Perhaps the answer to both is yes. At what point do the Cats start dreaming of the Playoff? Minnesota is up next for Purdue and already there are rumblings that it’s a must-win for Coach Hazell. Minnesota is still a well-coached program, so a win would indeed be significant for the Boilers.

Iowa 10, Wisconsin 6 – Continuing the storyline…is Iowa this good? Is Wisconsin’s Paul Chryst not very good? Those ideas have been persisting for a while now and after five weeks, it’s hard to argue Iowa is anything but a very good team. For Wisconsin, the jury is still out, but this isn’t a great start to the Big Ten season.

Michigan 28, Maryland 0 – I guess Harbaugh really is a witch. His black magic has the Wolverines believing and shutting teams out in back to back games for the first time in fifteen years. I also think it’s now officially confirmed that Maryland is not good, but Michigan is just becoming that efficient, mistake-free Harbaugh machine that we all thought it might take a few years to become. They meet surging Northwestern next at home.

Penn State 20, Army 14 – Penn State is a paper tiger. I’m not sure what more evidence is needed at this point. Also, James Franklin, walking in the pouring rain in your suit doesn’t make you tough. It makes you look like an out-of-towner who is resisting buying an umbrella at a NYC souvenir shop.

Christian Hackenberg was pedestrian again, going 10/19 for 156 and a TD. A 68.2 QBR isn’t going to do much for you in the NFL, Chrissy.

Illinois 14, Nebraska 13 – Oooh, this is just absolutely delicious. As I’ve said for a while now, if only I didn’t like Mike Riley so much, I’d be enjoying this even more. He seems like a good man, a good coach, and he doesn’t deserve abuse. However, ignorant Husker fans and their administration who think averaging over 9 wins a season isn’t enough deserve a Bill Callahan-like season, frankly. The Huskers are now 2-3 (0-1) and, well, I guess Mike can’t lose any more games this season. Yes these dopes still are taunting Bo Pelini. As for Illini, as I said on Twitter, good for them, for reals. Bill Cubit is at a loss for words:

 

Elsewhere

Florida 38, Mississippi 10 – Florida looks to be back. At 5-0 (3-0), they’ll now take the mantle as great SEC team that “would win [insert conference here].” It’s interesting how when the top teams in the SEC get cold-cocked by teams below them, it means the SEC is super-awesome, but when OSU and MSU are challenged by IU and Purdue, it means the Big Ten sucks. Weird.

TCU 50, Texas 7 – Did Gary Patterson do his in-state coaching rival a solid? TCU was up 30-0 at the end of the first quarter in this one. At halftime, a Texas DB retweeted a tweet about him transferring. The Texas Rangers twitter feed (and, really, people associated with the Rangers should worry about their own issues) also tweeted something about firing Charlie Strong, and our hyper-sensitive society for some reason means the underpaid guy doing it needed to be fired. Texas football – so bad, they’re also killing people’s careers in MLB. How long can Strong survive this? Purdue nearly beat the #2 team in the country – Texas got positively embarrassed by the #4 team. Given the chasm in resources between Purdue in Texas, you can begin to understand how unacceptable this must be in Austin.

Baylor 63, Texas Tech 35 – You want offense? You’ve come to the right place, my friend. How’s about 1400 yards of total offense combined? Fifty-three first downs. Tech threw for 530 yards while completing 62% of their passes. Baylor rushed for 368 yards. Just fire both defensive coordinators, if they even have defensive coordinators. Mercy.

Clemson 24, Notre Dame 22 – This wasn’t even a really good game, but it was fun in that ND fans got their hopes dashed repeatedly before almost pulling off the most Notre Dame-ish of lucky, out-of-their-asses comebacks… only to have the knife plunged back into their guts. Clemson, for their part, is only delaying the inevitable Clemsoning that we all know is coming. They had a two TD lead early and then had a 21-3 lead entering the fourth. Notre Dame turned the ball over four times and yet – AND YET – the Domers were handed several opportunities in the fourth to bring this back to a tie. But it was a battle of who wanted to give it away more. After scoring early in the fourth, Brian Kelly went for two to make it 21-11 instead of 21-10, when most people would agree you only go for two when it’s necessary. An 11 point deficit is still just a FG and a TD and 2-pt conversion. So that failed and with Clemson managing just a field goal in the final 29 minutes, ND had to go for two when they inevitably tied it in the final seconds. Notre Dame then called a weak QB read and it was stuffed. And then the fun began.

Dabo Sweeney began a sermon that seemed like it might never end and was going to end with me dialing a number and pledging $1,000 to a megachurch. But then SportsCenter engineers apparently had enough.

 

Leaving aside the oddness – and how long it lasted – of the cut-in to SC anchors prepping for their broadcast, let me just say… Dabo, brother… calm down a bit. You just won a game your team tried to give away – the way Clemson teams always have – and you should honestly be pissed at them for squandering that lead. And yet you’re going to go in and dance like a buffoon?

 

 

Yes, yes, you are. Hey, Dabo, you’re 4-0, man. Lonnnnng way to go.

Alabama 38, Georgia 10 – It must really suck to get whipped by Alabama all the time. Georgia spent years being a bridesmaid to Florida when UF was really good. Now they get upstaged by Alabama all the time. But I can’t imagine anyone was thinking Georgia was really a title contender…

 

Oh, I see.

Texas A&M 30, Miss State 17 – This is where I again remind you that Sports Illustrated picked A&M to finish last.

Stanford 55, Arizona 17 – Yeesh. Maybe celebrating RichRod as a genius was premature.

 

Miscellaneous

What are you doing, Hawaii? 

 

From what I can gather, these were slated to be a throwback uni for their game at Ohio State, but they appear to have stuck and were worn at Boise. That’s a whole lotta colors going on there in Idaho.

Meanwhile, in Champaign…

This tweet from Rodger Sherman says it all:

This is on the students. Sack up, Illini students! Your team is 4-1! Go to the MFing games!

And finally... There must be some sort of accounting error. 

The problem, of course, is that nobody with an SEC education passed Accounting.