Give Me Mud, Give Me Snow, Give Me The Big Ten.
By Erie's Scribe on Nov 13, 2007 with Comments 2
Short sleeves in the snow? Can you say three yards and a cloud of dust?
Okay, I’ve bitten my tongue for long enough. I didn’t really care when I read the Big East and the ACC clowns saying their conference was the best in football in this space. I actually found it kind of entertaining to know that there actually are Big East and ACC football fans. It was cute. But who the heck does Mr. Major4Prez think he is, spewing his Big-12 gibberish around here? I’m sure he’s no different than all the other major conference deadbeats. Always grasping at strings to discredit the glory of the Big Ten.
Just look at this particularly inflammatory quotation from Friday’s post here at, The Legend, “personally, I look at the Longhorns and I see a team that would go undefeated in the Big-10.” Oh really, fool? Yeah, undefeated unless they played Illinois, Wisconsin, Purdue, Penn State, Ohio State or Michigan. I’ll give you that the Horns have a decent offense with that running back guy, and that QB with the cool name, but how is a team that plays zero defensive backs supposed to compete in the Big-10? Oh, they do use defensive backs? Could have fooled me. On the plus side, their pass defense is ranked right ahead of North Texas and 15 other not so stout areal defensive teams such as New Mexico St., Tulane, Rice and SMU.
The other conferences can try to wow you with their BCS rankings and whatever other crazy numbers they want to throw at you. Here’s the inherent problem with their logic, having these ‘power’ teams they all drool over makes for top heavy conferences, and really just exposes the complete lack of depth in those conferences. You mix that with the cupcake non-conference schedules favored by the Big-12, Pac-10 and SEC, and you get a picture of the current college football landscape.
While in the other conferences, a bunch of nobodies are running up the scores on a bunch of other nobodies, we’re beating the crap out of each other playing real, smash mouth football. Nothing is more beat than watching these over-glorified track teams from the other conferences run around, chucking the ball all around the field.
Hey fancy boys, why don’t you try bringing it in Camp Randall in November, or the Big House, or the Horseshoe, or in Happy Valley? Playing in the elements might put some hair on your chest! Let me tell you how the game will go: Big-10 team A will punch your conference’s team in the mouth, and then run the ball down your throats while [insert your team's name here] is huddled around the sideline heaters and shoving mud and snow in their mouths to stop the bleeding.
The unfortunate consequence of playing football like men instead of playing it like prepubescent teens is that it takes a toll out of you after tearing each others’ heads off all season. Despite that, you will find that the list of the top ten schools with recognized national championships includes three Big-10 schools (Michigan, Ohio State and Minnesota), the most out of any conference.
Ohio State has even managed to win one national championship and play for another over the past five seasons, despite a grueling Big Ten schedule. They’d probably be playing for another this year if the system didn’t penalize late losses more than early losses. Where is the coach from the best SEC team (LSU) going to land? That’d be in Michigan after another loss to the Buckeyes does in Lloyd Carr this weekend. So, coaching the best team in the SEC isn’t as alluring as coaching good old Michigan, is it? Speaking of Michigan, how consistently do they and Wisconsin just keep chugging along, producing top 20 teams year after year? And what about Penn State? If you don’t think that Joe Pa has another lights out run left in him, then you might be a damned fool. Joe Paterno should be every single coach in the nation’s idol. He believes in education! Yes, a football coach who believes in a good education. Oh yeah, he believes in winning too.
Purdue, Iowa and Michigan State all go under the list of teams I’d never, ever want to play against, especially on the road. They can knock off anybody. And that brings me to Illinois and Indiana. Ron Zuck’s A-list recruiting classes are coming into fruition with the Illini posting wins over traditional powers Penn State, Wisconsin and Ohio State. As for Indiana if you haven’t seen the talented QB/WR duo of Kellen Lewis and James Hardy, well congratulations, you’re in for a treat! They are electric.
Hey, even our ‘smart’ school, Northwestern isn’t too bad. That’s more than I can say for the likes of Duke (ACC), Baylor (Big-12), Stanford (Pac-10), or Vanderbilt (SEC).
Listen, you other conferences can clamor for all the attention you want. At the end of the day, I’ll sleep well knowing that when push comes to shove, our Big Ten teams will bust your team up, while we drink your beer and steal your girlfriends.
–H.Frye#1
Filed Under: Uncategorized
Finally a blogger that knows a lil’ something about college football! Whats not to like about HB Dive Right, playing defense, drinking beer and stealing girlfriends…?
-JoePa 4eva
JoePa 4eva, Iagreethere’s nothing not to like about that.
–ES