Since (Division I) college football doesn’t have a playoff system, what fans get instead is Bowl Season. It coincides with the holidays, providing a welcome respite—be it for Christmas, Hanukah, Kwanza, or Festivus for the rest of us—from shopping and parties and visiting relatives, and makes the season more palatable for the (unconverted) Scrooges and the Grinches of the world.
This year the regular season was extended one extra weekend so that the Army/Navy game would stand on its own instead of competing with the conference championships. I think this scheduling move was pretty brilliant, since it gave everyone who has a vested interest in a conference championship the chance to actually watch this historic rivalry game, AND it gave the die-hard college ball fans one last game on one last weekend. Plus, this year the match actually had bowl-season consequences: if Army had won, they would have been headed to the Eagle Bank Bowl on December 30 (since they didn’t, UCLA will accept the bid).
Despite having two generations of Navy servicemen in my family, I was rooting for Army. Why? Because I would have loved to see all three of our service academies reach a bowl game in the same year. Why? Because they are elite schools who have high academic and personal standards for their cadets—including the players. In a day and age where many schools cater to the academic abilities (read: lack thereof) of players with tutors galore and easy majors, the schools who don’t lower their standards are pretty much always underdogs, at least when pitted against the titans of football. I wanted Army to get to a bowl for the same reason I root for Vandy in the SEC, the same reason I watched five of the last six games Wake Forest played two years ago when they ended up winning the ACC. (Also I might just like to root for the black and gold—Geaux Saints!!!) I LOVE to see an academically elite school be competitive despite that handicap.
Except Notre Dame. I’m probably going to get hate for this, but I’ll stand by it—EXCEPT NOTRE DAME. Personally I think they are still trading on the glory of their history and not any recent achievements. I guess it’s the football fan equivalent of old money vs. nouveau riche, but when your team is guaranteed a BSC berth just for finishing in the top 8, even if you played no one but fluff teams all season, you had better go into that bowl and win, not get your asses handed to you a la the 2007 Sugar Bowl against LSU. If you’re a Boise State at number 8 with no losses but a long list of no-name opponents, you’re looking at getting shut out unless enough of the big-conference teams beat each other up and leave an open door for you. (Why we need a playoff system, what?) But not if you’re Notre Dame. Just join the Big 10 already and earn your spot like everyone else. Maybe their recent hire of Cincinnati’s coach, Brian Kelly, will get them back to winning games. Maybe next year I’ll have better things to say. But I’m not holding my breath.
Anyway. Back to the topic at hand, which is this year’s bowl season. It kicks off this Saturday, December 19th, with Wyoming v. “anyone, anytime” Fresno State.
Let me reiterate: BOWL SEASON KICKS OFF THIS SATURDAY!
All of you who are playing the bowl confidence game this year (predict every bowl with a unique confidence designation of 1-34 due to there being 34 bowls): if you haven’t made your picks, then you need to get a move on! You’ve got 34 outcomes to predict and 595 points to use!
And if you’re not playing some sort of prediction and/or betting game with your friends/co-workers/family/girlfriend (well, only if she’s awesome enough to make good predictions), but you ARE reading this column…why aren’t you playing? It gives you a vested interest in every game; you’ll find yourself watching Bowling Green v. Idaho on the edge of your seat, texting your competitors like mad when your pick is beating theirs…or sometimes when the pick you both chose is losing, when your confidence point was 1 and his was 15, and that difference will put you back in the lead. It makes Bowl Season even better. Trust.
I agree about Notre Dame, this isn’t the 1940s anymore. Also, even though I live in the Midwest now, allegiance is strong: GO DUCKS!!!
Truly, you have a dizzying college football intellect.
You might have also mentioned the Ohio State blowout of Notre Dame in the Fiesta Bowl a year before…or the 2001 loss to Oregon State in same bowl, or the 1996 loss to Florida State in Orange…or 95 Colorado loss in Fiesta. 1994 was their last bowl win until last year over Hawaii. Yep, 1 in 9 since 95…and 0 and 5 in BCS Bowls. Just fyi…not hating or anything. Just don’t like the welfare program ND is on. Someone needs to make sure they get a job before getting paid!