The regular season ended last weekend, and once again Alabama sits atop the Select 17 heading into the BCS Championship Game. Is it 2011 or 2012?
(Searching)
Yep, it’s 2012; the Razorbacks do not appear on the bowl schedule. Sad to say, for the first time since 2008 the Hogs are home for the holidays. The upside, of course, is that some smokin’ hot wife has a husband that wants to coach here. Enthusiasm is already surging throughout Razorback Nation, but we need to put a cap on this season before looking ahead to spring practice and kickoff against UL-Lafayette on August 31, 2013 – which is 267 days from now.
So back to the teams still playing…
If you ever wondered whether or not ESPN controls the world, go ahead and look at the BCS Championship Game. Alabama versus Notre Dame for all the marbles. Can you imagine two teams that mean more to the history of college football squaring off for the title? This game will KILL any previous record for ratings of a college football championship game. The Vatican may very well provide free ESPN for all American Catholics. The Alabama National Guard will likely run coax from border-to-border, stealing cable from their neighbors in Tennessee, Florida, and Georgia. (They won’t even try to get it from Mississippi for obvious reasons.)
Perhaps the price we pay for such a great matchup in the title game is a slate of crap for the rest of the bowl season. In total there may be 5 other games I care to watch. I will, of course, probably watch all or part of 90% of the games (aided by the fact that I’m on vacation during Bowl Week), but I will bitch about it all the while.
As for the final Select 17 rankings, you’ll find a theme that repeated itself all season show up once more. The SEC dominates the list, placing six teams in the rankings including three of the top four. We began the year with 5 SEC teams in the rankings with Alabama and LSU occupying the top 2 spots. The more things change, the more they remain the same.
To the numbers…
| Rank | Team | Votes | LW |
| 1 | Alabama (3) | 147 | 2 |
| 2 | Notre Dame (6) | 145 | 1 |
| 3 | Florida | 122 | 5 |
| 4 | Georgia | 117 | 3 |
| 5 | Oregon | 116 | 4 |
| 6 | Kansas St. | 110 | 6 |
| 7 | LSU | 91 | 7 |
| 8 | Texas A&M | 85 | 8 |
| 9 | Ohio St. | 77 | 10 |
| 10 | Stanford | 76 | 9 |
| 11 | South Carolina | 67 | 11 |
| 12 | Oklahoma | 58 | 12 |
| 13 | Florida St. | 46 | t13 |
| 14 | Clemson | 34 | t13 |
| 15 | Oregon St. | 26 | 16 |
| 16 | Northern Illinois | 17 | NR |
| 17 | Boise St. | 9 | NR |
Others Receiving Votes: UCLA 7, Jeff Long 6, Nebraska 6, Wisconsin 6, Utah St. 5, San Jose St. 2, Kent St. 1, Louisville 1
Blog Hawgs Stat Geek–Movin’ Time Edition.
Posted by Adam Butler on December 6, 2012
Driving into work yesterday, I decided to flip through the dial of my satellite radio to see if any national shows were discussing the new Arkansas coaching hire. I landed on FoxSports radio at the top of the 7:00 hour to hear their question of the day, “Why is Arkansas a better job than Wisconsin?”. While that question would never have been posed one month ago, the fact that the question was even asked as a matter of fact speaks volumes.
I won’t rehash the numerous national columnists’ reactions (below on this site) on Arkansas’ hiring of former Wisconsin Coach Bret Bielema.
However, there has been a question posed that piqued my interest and put me into action to check out the answer.
Someone asked: How many times has a coach of a team headed to a BCS bowl left for a different college team? At first there were two obvious answers that immediately came to mind: Brian Kelly and Urban Meyer.
After a little research, it seems that since 1998, there have now been 8 instances:
· 2012 Bret Bielema: Wisconsin (Big10) for Arkansas (SEC) after 3 straight BCS bowl bids
· 2010 Randy Edsall: Connecticut (Big East) for Maryland (ACC)
2012 Dave Doeren: N. Illinois (MAC) for N.C. State (ACC)
· 2009 Brian Kelly: Cincinnati (Big East) for Notre Dame (Ind) after 2 straight BCS bowl bids
· 2007 Rich Rodriguez: West Virginia (Big East) for Michigan (Big 10)
· 2007 June Jones: Hawai’I (Mountain West) for SMU (Conference USA)
· 2004 Urban Meyer: Utah (Mountain West) for Florida (SEC)
· 2004 Walt Harris: Pitt (Big East) for Stanford (Pac10)
· 2002 Mike Price: Washington State (Pac10) for Alabama (SEC)
Nice work, Jeff Long
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Posted in Commentary, Sports | Tagged: bret bielema, Brian Kelly, The Arkansas Razorbacks, Urban Meyer | Leave a Comment »