See also Nick Saban leaving the Miami Dolphins to go to Alabama. :shifty:

Its funny though because as soon as this dies down, the talk will shift to "Ok what MAC or C-USA coach can we get to come to Cincy"

BRB. Gonna google the coaches at UCF and USF.

USF is in the Big East

Rich Rodriguez did this to WVU just before the Suger Bowl too.

Huh....what is with Big East Coaches leaving just before the Suger Bowl anyways?

Sorry Fiesta Bowl.

Jim Harbaugh's going to Kansas for double the money Stanford was paying...wont be coaching them in their Bowl game.

I bet he ends up as a bust there..but since he's the brother of John Harbaugh, I hope he does good.

yes, what Kelly did is shitty, but it happens all the time. It's part of college football. Like Supreme said, it's Notre Dame, so the media is all over this one.

Great signing though for the Irish. I like Kelly. Now they just have to make up thier minds if they want to be Florida or if they want to be Harvard. Can't be both.

It's interesting to note that Kelly only spent 3 years at CMU and UC. That means he's never coached a senior class that he recruited. It means he hasn't proven that he can recruit. He might end up being a huge fraud.

He's an offensive guy though, ND's problem isn't their offense. Should have hired a defensive coach, like the D-Coordinator from Florida. Not a big name but I think it would have been a better move. Instead they hired another big name guy who is cashing in on that big name. I dunno it might work but I wouldn't be surprised to see it fail. As for not being able to recruit I somewhat agree, ND the last few years has got some of the biggest top recruits in the nation, however they have struggled with securing depth.

I know he is going to make a lot more at ND but I think I would have rather just stayed at Cinncy. I feel the same way about Rich Rodriquez at Michigan, I know he's making a lot more at Michigan and has an opportunity to get that program back, but I would much rather put a program on the map for the first instead of bringing a program back onto the map.

I'm also really hyped for the BC/USC bowl game. I know most people probably don't have the same feeling but I've been following the BC program a lot recently since I am from the area and a former teammate is a captain there. I also follow the USC program because I am big fan of Pete Carroll's coaching style and use a lot of his ideas with my own team. On top of that they are playing the San Francisco Giants' stadium, which creates an interesting dynamic since the lay out is a lot different than the usual football stadium.

The post-game celebrations of Army-Navy game is probably one of the best things about college sports and pro sports. Biggest game of the year for either school and yet when its done both sides literally come together to support each other in songs and respect.

Gerhart should have won, lost by a measly 5 votes..

At least Tebow finished dead last.

<font color=goldenrod>I'm happy with the result...woulda been happy with Gerhart and Suh as well.

Kinda was pulling for Suh just because defensive players get no respect...but knew he wouldn't win.</font>

Surprised at McCoy being in 3rd since him and Tebow had a "down" year similar to Bradford before he got hurt. Also a bit surprised at Suh being in 4th since its rare for a defense position to be nominated for the Heisman.

Good choice with Bama's RB as winner since he basically was the "powerhorse" for Alabama this year.

McCoy lost it in the Big 12 Championship game, where as Ingram won it in his conf. championship game. I figured McCoy was still going to finish 2nd though

Glad Ingram won. Definitely didn't want McCoy and especially Tebow. Wouldn't have minded the Nebraska defender, just for something different, but I don't like Nebraska.

In general though, I think Ingram was the best choice for a year in which there wasn't really any definitive choice.

<font color=goldenrod>Urban Meyer is stepping down. Wow.

For personal reasons...gotta assume something health related with the family or something.</font>

Tim Tebow.

He knows what next year is gonna be like...they'll absolutely suck.

No way he is leaving cause of Tebow.. It's either an illness or he's going to the NFL..

I was thinking the same thing, Tim Tebow was leaving.

But as I'm watching ESPNews right now, I'm hearing an illness of some sorts.

Hope all is OK.

He said something about ignoring his health and a new finding that made him reevaluate his life in his statement..

If BC had a decent QB they would have been pretty good this season. Was still a pretty cool bowl game though with it being in the Giants Stadium. Made it a bit interesting

Who's that saftey BC has. He looks pretty tough.

It was a crazy game.. Alot of weird fumbles and whatnot.. Too bad USC won though..

Urban Meyers decides against resigning and wants to take the year off instead.

Makes a bit harder to believe its just stress or health issues when everyone knows Florida is going to be in rebuilding mode without Tebow and a few other players. Also a bit unfair on the interim coach since he's basically in a lose-lose situation because if Florida struggles, they will blame him and if Florida is back to being a power, Meyers comes back and takes the job away from him.

The whole Urban Meyer thing is pretty odd, with him now apparently not resigning? But I doubt it had anything to do with Tebow etc.

A program like Florida over the past couple years doesn't just disappear because some star players left. They are in a boat with USC now, in my opinion. USC was still very relevant after Leinart and Bush, and will probably be back in contention for a national championship again before long after this season.

I'm sure he thought about it before this season, but how could he leave when he had that team around him?

It's silly to think he's just doing it to hide from a rebuilding year. They'd still be in the running for the SEC title.

Spot on, really.

Bowman, he had a real good game against USC.

This Urban Meyer thing is pretty stupid, could have waited until after the season to do this. Now he isn't even resigning. I think its dumb how much attention is being paid to it now, hopefully Cinncy goes out there and smashes them now.

It's pretty crazy how much stuff is happening to both coaching staffs for the Sugar Bowl.

UC head coach- left for Notre Dame
UF head coach- leaving after game
UC offensive coordinator- staying for game then going to Buffalo
UF defensive coordinator- left for Louisville

Can't forget about the Big 12 and their coaches the last 2 months:

Kansas head coach - resigned due to player abuse complaints
Texas Tech coach - suspended due to player abuse complaints

the Mike Leach stuff at Tech is such bullshit and now ESPN is running with it because the kid's dad is an analyst

Texas Tech fires Mike Leach because of it.

That is terrible. This morning CBS Sportsline published a good handful of e-mails written by Texas Tech current and former players. They all vouched for Leach's credibility and blasted Adam James as being an entitled, lazy jackass.

http://dennis-dodd.blogs.cbssports.c...70202/19238949

But reading the story on ESPN, I have to wonder if either Texas Tech is really fucked up with internal politics and whatnot, or if they actually did discover something about Leach that justified firing him. But the statement from Leach is pretty scathing:

If Leach is to believed, Texas Tech is absolutely retarded and Leach will probably come out ahead. We know he is a great football coach. Almost any other Big 12 or Big Ten team would give him better resources, and I'm sure he could find a good fit in a lot of other conferences as well.

I just think that if Texas Tech fires a guy who has been an institution at their school, respected by many, and really put the program on the map, they better have a good reason. I believe Leach had one of the longest tenures of any Div. 1 coach.

After reading those CBS e-mails, this just really came out of left field to me.

lol @ the Adam James cellphone video

Leach got fired the day before he was guaranteed $800,000. CONVENIENT

He is a weird ass dude

Bowling Green-Idaho was really good today. Then Nebraska beat the fuck out of Zona. Whatup RoXer

WOO! The playing field has become slightly more balanced for this Saturday's game with my Michigan State Spartans facing Texas Tech...I'll mark the fuck out if we win.

Air Force's Triple Option and #1 rated pass defense destroyed Houston's Spread. The Mountain West remains undefeated in bowl games this season, with TCU the only team left in the conference to play a bowl.

Florida State wins final bowl game for Bobby Bowden, 33-21 vs West Virginia.

DUCKS DUCKS DUCKS QUACK QUAACK QUACK SCHOOL SPIRIT YEAH

Florida is killing Cinncy, really wish a TCU or Boise State was playing UF.

Jesus, this is a great sendoff for Tebow.

As a Florida fan, I'm glad to see the Gators dominate but I can't help but feel for Cincy in regards to their coach abandoning them right before their biggest bowl game to date. Gives me another reason to root against Notre Dame.

The Big Ten would like to have a word about not being able to keep up with the speed of other conferences. Wisconsin dominates Miami, Penn State knocks off LSU, and Ohio State puts together one hell of a defensive effort holding Oregon to 17 points. They're a one point loss by Minnesota to Iowa State and an overtime loss by Northwestern away from being unbeaten in bowl play (that was one of the craziest games I've ever seen, BTW -- Northwestern's QB threw the ball 75 times). Pretty impressive given the amount of shit the conference as a whole gets.

Tebow, with 4 seconds left in the first half : 20-23, 320 yards, 3 TDs

Yea, not gonna lie, I've been pretty down on the Big 10 this year but they've stepped it up in bowl games this year. A convincing Iowa win over GATech would cement the Big 10's success this year.

Never would have thought that the two best bowl conferences this year would be the Mountain West and Big 10.

Michigan State is gonna have a real good shot at beating Texas Tech too with all this Mike Leach stuff going on.

14 of Michigan State players are suspended though.

haha seriously?

Jesus, the Bearcats got blown away. Either Tebow and Meyer wanted to go out with a bang. Or Brian Kelly was the brains behind Cincy's run this year.

I think this would've happened regardless. Florida was just way more talented. Good thing Kelly left when he did.

Like 85% of the bowls are being played in half full stadium. After watching a regular season of seeing all these teams play in jammed out stadiums it just doesn't seem right to end the season this way. I understand why it happens, but still.

ESPN News has been doing the Tebow career montages for the last few hours like he is the greatest player ever in NCAA when they already did the same before with USC Leinhert and Bush and players before that.

<font color=goldenrod>UConn</font> :)

I dunno Tebow's definitely one of the 10 best college football players ever. And this is ESPN we're talking about.

Houston Nutt

I don't blame ESPN or Florida for building his hype up except for the fact that during his time there, the RBs never got much chances in the Red Zone and he kind of killed off Chris Leak's NFL potential after the 1st title win.

ESPN already got burned before when they over-hyped players such as Leihnert (and Bush to an extent) last time they pull off the recent greatest player ever.

Yeah some of the players got in some fight like a month and a half ago.

I am quite proud of my Uconn Huskies today. Almost went flawless and kicked shit out of "The Old Ball Coach" and his Gamecocks.

Jasper must have been smiling upstairs. :'(

I still can't believe a kid I played football with (he actually backed me up) now starts for UConn at guard. He was a year younger than me but still, I wasn't exactly an all state performer lol. Guess it pays to be 6'5 280 pounds when you are in high school, college teams are willing to take a gamble on it. He's really advanced a lot thanks to their weight training program, he's a beast now.

They are playing the Texas Tech/Michigan State game at the Alamo Dome, I didn't realize it was still around. I know the Spurs don't play there anymore - so what else do they use it for? The rodeo? Seems like there would be a lot of overhead associated with keeping a stadium open without a regular professional/college using it.

Maybe they're waiting for another hurricane so they can get the Saints back

I see it's sponsored by Valero. Wrote a nice little case study about that company in one of my graduate management classes a few weeks ago. Dunno if sponsoring a bowl game is that great of a business move for them!

Sadly, that's what scouts are like these days. They look for the tall guys then build them up from there. This guy I played rugby with 2 years ago, he was a Tongan so naturally big and had the potential to be a monster if conditioned properly. He was never anything spectacular. I started over him as flanker, fast forward to today he plays professionally for the Gwent Dragons. It's crazy.

Bottom line is, you could have all the skill and ability in the world, but if you're not tall or big then 99% of the time the big clubs won't even look at you. Same with a guy a year below me in school, he always had an awesome boot on him but average in overall play. The Dragons have had him under their wing the past few years and made him into an all round great player with a hell of a physique, and he's on the verge of turning professional.

I watched the Cotton Bowl today. What a fucking mess.

From Texas Tech's administration, paraphrasing: "The person to blame for Mike's firing is Mike."

:shifty:

...Vince McMahon didn't screw Mike Leach. Mike Leach screwed Mike Leach.

Well my friend who is about my size ended up getting a scholarship to play at Boston College so it's not all tied to size. I get what you are saying though, if you have unusual size it can definitely help make up for a lack of skill. Especially when it comes to offensive line play at the ocllege ranks, they can develop a kid who is 6'6 300 pounder into a good player. They can't really do with 6'0 215 pound high school offensive tackle

Michigan State is wildin' out right now

Just ran a fake FG then the following play a WR took a direct snap in the "wildcat" and threw a TD pass.

Yeah, it's not like ESPN was calling for his head, despite a BLATANT conflict of interest. Or that Texas Tech's administration was looking for a reason to fire him anyway.

I would've fired Mike Leach too

but for being a really weird apparent douchebag

A shame about Leach, but it is starting to sound like Leach was starting to become kind of a mess there himself. Hopefully he can find a new place, and I hope Texas Tech becomes a miserable program for the foreseeable future.

As far as Kelly, as they said during the game, it's a shame, but it's not his fault. If you are going to switch coaching jobs, especially in that situation, Notre Dame isn't willing to wait. You have to go. The announcers were saying something has to be done, and I think implementing a rule that you can't begin talking to other schools' coaches until after the bowls would be fair.

Well I think the worst thing is hiring a new coach before Cincy even played in the bowl game. I would think it makes a bit weird for the players, since they 100% know for sure that the head coach for the bowl is only the head coach for that one game. I just think that would be a bit of an odd situation as a football player.

Well Cincy's interim coach went to Buffalo, so they knew he was only coach for a game anyway.

I thought a different assistant went to Buffalo, not one named the interim coach.

TCU and Boise is going to be very good tonight I think

Nah it was the interim coach/offensive coordinator

This Troy/Central Michigan game is great.

Texas is fucked without McCoy.

This game is over and there is like 5 minutes left in the 1st half.

Does anybody know why the GMAC Bowl was the second to last? It really is embarrassing to the bowl system that something like that happens. I understand this year was different with New Years Day being a Friday and then having a whole weekend to spread the games out. But something really has to be done to put the good games back on New Years Day.

To be fair, since New Years Days its been pretty much the "good games," other than that one.

Its pretty lame that McCoy is out in this game. They aren't gonna make up 18 points.

Also heard that the back judge in this game does local EMass high school football games on his "off" weekends. There's a (slim) chance he reffed one of my games that I either played in or have coached in. That's pretty cool I guess?

OMG..he kicked it right off the Alabama player and it bounced right back to Texas..

Amusing way to get back in the game after that 44 yard TD

That was an amazing onside kick by Texas. Almost never see the kicker try to deflect the kick from a defender (tough to do if defender is aware).

Guess I was wrong about this game being lame

Business has kind of picked up.

Alabama hasn't done anything in the 2nd half after it looked like they would run away with it. Pretty amazing game.

Yeah Texas defense is what's keeping them in the game since Bama's been a bit too bland with all the predictable running. You can tell for a while Bama just wanted to run out the clock or use their dominate running backs to end the game faster.

I dont think Texas has enough time for a TD but they could get in FG range.

It would be epic if this went OT.

and just like that, Alabama's D shows back up and seals the deal.

C'mon hold them to a field goal.

Saban looked pissed off after the Gatorade bath...

Well, another great season comes to an end, and it couldn't be a more fitting one for 'Bama, and their legendary coach, Nick Saban, who on this night became the only man to coach 2 separate teams (who was the other? LSU?) to National Championships in Division I college football.

My hat is off to you, Mr. Saban. Kudos on a great year!

Saban on jumping between teams all the time: (paraphrased) "Wherever the big money trail is! Bye now!:wave:"

Ya it was LSU

lol @ the Gatorade bath

I didn't realize the SEC was 6-0 in BCS title games and is the only conference with a winning record in BCS title games. I think they also have had more different teams make it than any other conference (Tennessee, LSU, Florida, Alabama). That's pretty stunning.

South Florida fires Jim Levitt for allegedly grabbing a player by the throat and smacking him in the face.

At least he got his money's worth.

I've also read that 2 of the last 4 SEC Title Games were more closer than the National Title Games.

The point I think is more than New Years Day used to be the day. That's undoubtedly one of the reasons why the NHL Winter Classic is so successful.