The national champion Ohio State Buckeyes

It was a completely dominant performance by Ohio State in clobbering Oregon in the national championship game. Final score: 42-20. Not quite as close as I thought it might be.

 

The story of the game was athleticism and pure brute strength and physicality. Despite four turnovers, the Buckeyes relentlessly punished the Ducks in all other facets of the game. Ezekial Elliott, in particular, was unstoppable. Oregon's defense had no answer for him, (and neither did Wisconsin or Alabama. Elliott's rushing numbers in the last three games are mind-boggling: 76 carries for 796 yards).

On the other side of the ball, Ohio State's ferocious defense anchored by Joey Bosa put enough pressure on Mariota to render the Ducks' offense largely ineffective. Oregon also made more mistakes (dropped passes, false starts, holding calls) than they had all year--probably due to the fact Ohio State was the best team they'd played all year.

 

Last year, I ripped Urban Meyer something fierce. I'm still not a big fan, because I believe he will do whatever is necessary to win, ethics be damned. In any case, there is no denying the man is a great football coach. He's a master motivator, and it's remarkable that he overcame the loss of Braxton Miller and J.T. Barrett to direct the Buckeyes to a national championship. When your second and third string quarterbacks are better than they guy who was supposed to be the starter before the season began, then you know you have something special going on. The Buckeyes didn't miss a beat with Barrett or Cardale Jones.

 

I have to admit I had no idea who to root for in this game. On one hand, it's great for the Big Ten's national perception to win a national title, finish 6-5 in bowl games, and go 4-0 in January bowl games. On the other hand, it also meant having to pull for Meyer and OSU, which for me is just slightly better than rooting for Michigan.

 

In the end, though, I was approving--if not necessarily happy--with OSU winning it all. There are some that may argue that this isn't good for all the other Big Ten teams. Listen, Ohio State will get great players regardless of how this game turned out. But why can't other Big Ten coaches use this to their advantage by giving it a positive spin? Tell potential recruits, "hey, if you want a chance to play against some of the nation's best players in the conference that produced the national champion, the come to [name the school]."

 

I admit that there's a big part of me as a fan who is jealous of Ohio State. If not for a game against the Buckeyes at Spartan Stadium in November that took a radical momentum shift in OSU's favor just before halftime, maybe it's MSU in that position.

 

But there's no use in stewing, and it's a sign of how far Dantonio has elevated MSU's program that I can even wonder--with a straight face--what it'd be like if MSU had beaten OSU and was in the college football playoff instead of the Buckeyes.

Back from my "bye week": Oregon post-mortem, and the upcoming EMU game

The Spartans had a bye week, and it turned out that I had my own bye week as well. I didn't intend on being away for so long, but so it goes.

As everyone already knows by now, MSU lost to Oregon way back on September 6. I wasn't surprised that the Spartans lost, but I was somewhat perplexed and disappointed with the way they lost. MSU got out of the gates slowly, had a tremendous second quarter in which they took the lead and appeared to have the Ducks on the ropes. This dominance looked like it was about to carry over into the second half, but then the game took an inexplicable and sudden downward turn.

Part of the problem for MSU in the second half was that Marcus Mariota remembered that he is a Heisman candidate and probable first round draft pick, and played like it. Unfortunately, some blown assignments by the Spartans secondary made the task easier for Mariota.

(There is a degree of historical irony in a Hawaiian quarterback wreaking havoc on the Spartans. In the 1950s and 1960s, Duffy Daugherty heavily recruited Hawaii, and had a "Hawaii pipeline" for several years. Players like Bob Apisa, Charlie Wedemeyer, and Dick Kenney--to name a few--were important contributors for the Spartans when Duffy was coach. I have a feeling that if Duffy were alive today, he'd be wondering how Marcus Mariota wasn't wearing green and white rather than green and yellow).

To paraphrase Mark Dantonio, football is about the inches: what team gets them and what team doesn't. MSU had a few opportunities to get those inches, but came up short. Oregon, on the other hand, converted when they had to do so. It all added up to a 46-27 loss.

Beyond the disappointment of the loss itself, what still irks me is the meaningless touchdown that Oregon scored with 1:25 left in the game. The Ducks can't really be faulted, it's not as if they threw the ball into the end zone for the touchdown. It was a simple running play that MSU didn't stop. Still, it changed what should have been a 39-27 loss to a 46-27 loss. (Yes, I know that a loss is still a loss, but perception is reality. Folks will look at that final score and assume the game wasn't as close as it actually was. That could end up haunting MSU at the end of the season).

So now a truly wretched Eastern Michigan football team heads into Spartan Stadium. The Eagles are so bad, they not only were hammered 65-0 by a rebuilding Florida team, but even lost by two touchdowns to Old Dominion. Now I don't know about you, but when I think of Old Dominion, I think of women's basketball and Justin Verlander (who played baseball for the Monarchs). I certainly don't think of football. Well, the Monarchs handled EMU quite handily.

I don't see EMU putting up much of a fight against what should be a Michigan State team itching to get back into action after the Oregon disappointment.

Duck season

I'm sitting in the sofa, half-watching ESPN College Game Day. Several minutes ago, I almost fell over when I heard Desmond Howard say...gulp...nice things about Michigan State.

The big game is today, and honestly I have no idea what to expect. I hope that, at the very least, it is a close game. As I wrote in my previous post, Marcus Mariota creates a big challenge for the Spartans (and as I write this, Game Day is playing a feature about Mariota's journey from Hawaiian high school player to probable first round draft pick playing college ball in Eugene, Oregon). On the other hand, it's not as if MSU has never been successful against a quarterback with a similar skill set as Mariota.

While all the focus has been on MSU's defense versus Oregon's offense, nobody seems to be talking about the Spartans' improved offense--though just as I write that, the Game Day guys have glowing words for Connor Cook. This Spartan offense is light years ahead of where it was last year. MSU should have the weapons to score points on the Ducks.

If MSU loses this game, it won't be due to lack of preparation. The Spartans literally cranked up the heat in their indoor practice facility to become acclimated to the unseasonably high temperatures expected in Eugene. To prepare for Oregon's uptempo offense, the Spartans had not one, but TWO offensive units on the field during practice. As soon as one play was over, the second offensive unit was already in place and snapped the ball almost immediately.

Well, younger son wants his computer back, so I'm signing off for now. If I don't make it back today, here's hoping the Spartans do some Duck hunting this evening.