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The Rematch/No Rematch Thread

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First things first there should never be a rematch in the same season of this game. This is why there is not a big ten title game. If you think about it how long the big ten confernce has been around tOSU and scUM have won a majority of the Big Ten titles. This is also why this rivalry is played once a year at the end of the year. This game is the Big Ten title game. A rematch would not only be unfair it would in turn be disrespectful not only to tOSU, but also the rest of the nation. If a team doesn't win their conference championship or share they should not be able to get into the national championship game. To think somehow if scUM were to beat us we would have won a Big Ten title and they would have won a National Title. I'm not sure, but I don't think a school that didn't win their conference won the national title. So to erase possibility of this I never thought I would say it, but I am going to have to root for USC.
 
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[SIZE=+2]Jim Donaldson: You shouldn't have one without the other

[/SIZE] [SIZE=-1]01:00 AM EST on Tuesday, November 21, 2006

[/SIZE] [SIZE=-1] [/SIZE] Do I think the Michigan Wolverines are the best college football team in the country?
Yes, I do.
They came within three points of beating the No. 1-ranked Ohio State Buckeyes in Columbus, and isn't home field supposed to be worth at least three points? They handed Notre Dame its only loss of the season -- a 47-21 thrashing in South Bend in mid-September. They also handed the Wisconsin Badgers their only loss of the season. As for the 12-0 Buckeyes, their best win -- other than Saturday's thrilling 42-39 mega-matchup with previously undefeated and second-ranked Michigan -- was at Texas, which also has lost to Kansas State.
So do I think Michigan deserves a rematch with OSU in the BCS championship game?
No, I most certainly do not.
The reason is simple: If a team does not win its conference championship, it should not get to play for the national championship.
Let me repeat, in larger, more emphatic letters: A TEAM THAT DOES NOT WIN ITS CONFERENCE CHAMPIONSHIP SHOULD NOT GET TO PLAY FOR THE NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP.
Sad to say, given the vagaries, idiosyncrasies and outright inaccuracies of the convoluted, confusing and contrived formulae used over the years for the BCS rankings, that has not always been the case.
In 2001, Nebraska was routed in its final regular-season game at Colorado, 62-36. That one-sided win gave the Buffaloes the Big 12 North division title, so the Cornhuskers didn't even qualify for their conference championship game. They did, however -- courtesy of the computers -- get to play in the BCS championship game, where they showed they didn't belong, getting trounced again, this time by Miami, 37-14.
Almost as bad was what happened three years ago, when No. 1-ranked Oklahoma was clobbered by Kansas State in the Big 12 championship game, 35-7. That elevated Pac-10 champion Southern Cal, which also had one loss, into the number-one spot in both the coaches' and the writers' polls. The natural assumption was that the Trojans would play SEC champion LSU, another one-loss team, for the national title.
Wrong.
The BCS rankings had USC third, so the Sooners, although they weren't even Big 12 champions, got to play in the national title game -- which they lost, 21-14, to the Tigers. The Trojans had to settle for a 28-14 victory over Big 10 champion Michigan in the Rose Bowl that earned them the No. 1 ranking in the writers' postseason poll and a share of a mythical national championship.
It's time to stop that sort of nonsense.
Two weeks ago I wrote that if Southern Cal won its final four games -- beating Oregon, California, Notre Dame, and UCLA -- the Trojans deserved to play the winner of the Ohio State-Michigan game for the national championship.
That's still the case. Because that was a national semifinal game that was played Saturday in Columbus, with everyone knowing going in that the winner would play for the title. And if those really were the two best teams in the country, well, consider it the football equivalent of the 1974 Final Four, when David Thompson's N.C. State Wolfpack played Bill Walton and UCLA in the semis. That's just the way it works out sometimes.
Besides, who's to say that if Ohio State and Michigan played in the SEC, against the likes of Florida, Arkansas, LSU, Auburn, Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee, rather than in the Big 10, against the likes of Minnesota, Northwestern, Michigan State, Purdue, Illinois, Iowa and Indiana, that they both would have come into their season finale with unblemished records?
Where a huge and highly emotional debate surely will develop is if Notre Dame upsets the Trojans this Saturday. Legions of Irish rooters will claim that an 11-1 record, capped by a win in L.A. over USC, should give them a shot at the championship. Michigan fans will counter that their one-sided win over ND should give the Wolverines the nod.
Nor should we overlook the Florida Gators, who can finish 12-1 by beating the worst Florida State team in years, then defeating Arkansas in the SEC championship game. In which case, they, too, would have a legitimate claim to a showdown with the Buckeyes.
Consider, also, this scenario: USC beats Notre Dame, but is upset by UCLA. Arkansas then knocks off Florida. Should the Razorbacks, rather than Michigan, get to play Ohio State, even though almost everyone believes the Wolverines are a better team?
Yes.
Definitely, emphatically, yes.
And the reason why is, c'mon you know the answer, so repeat after me, one more time: A team that does not win its conference championship should not get to play for the national championship.
 
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osugrad21;667230; said:
Sporting News

SEC conspiracy theorists are in a frenzy already
November 20, 2006

The conspiracy theorists are in full force. I'm getting emails from fans in the SEC saying the deal already is done: Ohio State and Michigan will play in the national title game because that's the way ESPN and ABC want it, and since television runs everything, television wins out.
"Just like what they did to Peyton with the Heisman Trophy," says Ken from Nashville. "They gave it to Woodson because he played in the Big Ten and ESPN and ABC had the Big Ten (television) contract."
Right, and Chris Fowler secretly stuffed fake ballots.
Let me ease your fears, my faithful, frenetic SEC friends. ABC has nothing to do with the BCS. If you don't believe me, click here That's right, Fox Sports will televise the national title game, and as far as I know, Fox would never, ever ask the BCS honchos to manipulate the numbers so Ohio State and Michigan can play again.
Click to expand...
Sheesh. I knew there was a reason I couldn't stand Tennessee. I think those bastards have a Michigan-complex. They're mad they spent googillions of dollars expanding their pretty little stadium and promised all their boosters and fans they'd have the biggest in the country from here on out, and Michigan passed the hat at a game one day and used the proceeds to add 5,000 more seats to make Neyland forever #2. And the whining over Charles Woodson's Heisman was unbelievable - and they still haven't let it go.

Look, OSU fans, I can never turn on a TV, find Ohio State playing football, and openly root for the Buckeyes. Goes with the maize-and-blue territory. (Unless they're playing Florida State, in which case, 70 Buckeye points wouldn't be enough for me. That's a whole different case.) But if Florida's your opponent in Glendale, please knock the stuffing out of those SEC chumps. Do it for the Big Ten. I'm sick of hearing them whine about how the SEC is so superior that they'll never win a championship because the good teams always take each other out. That's not excellence, that's parity, and the SEC has enough bad teams this year to make a whole new conference.
 
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obviously, i am well aware of Tressel's successes at Youngstown State. i am thinking that his playoff experiences there undoubtedly included rematches...

if anyone can point me the way to a list of YSU's historical scores, a la James Howell's database, i would be glad to compile his win/loss record in rematches at YSU...
 
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osugrad21;667243; said:
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You want a good title game? Root for USC!

Trojans best-equipped to give Ohio State a tussle

nbcsports_michael_ventre.thumb.jpg
Michael Ventre
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In his Trash Talk column last week on MSNBC, Mr. Ventre claimed that The Game is (or was) "way overhyped" and likened it to college football's version of Snakes on a Plane. It's since been replaced by the current version, but here's an excerpt for those who didn't catch it (apologies if it's already been posted elsewhere):

Ohio State has what appears on the surface to be an explosive offense and a dominant defense. But after bagging a 24-7 victory at Texas on Sept. 9, the Buckeyes really haven?t played anybody. The Big Ten is a fine conference, but it?s down this season. Iowa stinks. Michigan State reeks. Penn State is achingly mediocre. And two weeks ago lowly Illinois threw a scare into Ohio State before losing, 17-10.

It?s really difficult to predict how the Buckeyes will do against a worthy opponent.

Then there?s the worthy opponent. Although Ohio State at least was willing to test itself with the Longhorns, the Wolverines chose Vanderbilt, Central Michigan and Ball State as its non-conference foes. And they struggled against Ball State just two weeks ago before finally holding on, 34-26.

This may be sacrilegious to say in this current environment of nonstop gushing, but maybe these teams are overrated.

If so, look for Ohio State-Michigan to be close. Look for it to be exciting, because any college football game with such high stakes and great traditions usually is.

But will this be the pinnacle of what college football is capable of offering in 2006? It?s doubtful. It?s more likely that people will walk away from their televisions shaking their heads in much the same way that they did walking out of "Snakes on a Plane," wondering what all the fuss was about.
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:roll2: Quite the contrast between the two pieces. Ah well, he's a USC alum and thankfully the decision isn't his to make.

I'll look forward to the talk of a rematch dying out. Right now it seems a large number of Michigan faithful are vehemently arguing for another shot, still fresh on the heels of Saturday's stinging loss. Frankly, I wish they would put aside the emotional reaction and move on. We had our shot at the conference title, Ohio State played a superior game and seized the day -- in my mind, that's as cut and dried as it gets. It's time for another contender to receive their opportunity at the NC.

In the latest bowl projections posted on ESPN, Ivan Maisel has penciled in a Notre Dame vs. Michigan Rose Bowl. My first reaction: "Argh! Not again!" I can oh-so-easily imagine the pro-rematch cries from certain UM camps going over like a pregnant pole vaulter with Buckeye fans. IMO, those who're now sitting around hoping for a cascade of relevant losses solely to bring their dream to fruition have misguided priorities.

In seeing these same discussions across the Web, I can't help but wonder how many people stomping their feet for a rematch cried foul when Nebraska and Oklahoma (respectively) were awarded NC berths without having won the Big XII (let alone the division, in the Huskers' case). It'd be interesting to know just for grins. :wink2:
 
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ABJ

Posted on Tue, Nov. 21, 2006



Let's avoid a rematch

Michigan may be second-best, but title-game revenge would settle nothing

By Terry Pluto

No rematch.
It's that simple.
No more Judgment Day, no more Game of the Century, no more Ohio State-Michigan this season.
It's over.
Great game, no doubt.
But the final score is more than 42-39, it's the FINAL score. The Buckeyes won, over and done.
Maybe these two teams will meet again, especially given how the BCS figures out these things.
Wait a minute, I have no idea how the BCS figures out anything. Compared with the BCS, the IRS tax code is a SpongeBob SquarePants cartoon.
I do know Ohio State should play someone else for the national title. Maybe Southern California. Maybe Florida. Maybe Arkansas.
I have no clue except that it's not time for another game with the maize and blue.
Buckeyes coach Jim Tressel and quarterback Troy Smith have won the last three games with Michigan.
That's three strikes and you're out.
I'm also a little worried about Wolverines coach Lloyd Carr. Suppose the two teams play again. Suppose the Buckeyes win again.
I'm afraid someone will have to talk Carr down off a ledge. Being 1-6 vs. Tressel? Losing twice in a season to OSU?
That's almost -- remember, I said ALMOST -- enough to make Buckeye fans feel a little pity for the scowling coach from The State Up North.
Give Carr credit for how he handled the game.
`We lost to a better team today,'' he said.
Carr also talked about how the death of his friend and mentor Bo Schembechler wasn't a motivating force for his team. It was more important than that. It was the death of a human being, far bigger than any game -- even Ohio State-Michigan.
Let's suppose a little more.
Suppose they play again, and Michigan wins.
Then what?
Ohio State is the Big Ten regular season champion because it beat Michigan? And Michigan is the national champ because it beat Ohio State?
Even the best BCS computer can't sort that out.
So play a third time -- in Ann Arbor?
A strong case can be made that Michigan is the second-best team in the country, which is how the BCS has it rated. But a few other schools may make a claim for that spot, too.
No one doubts Ohio State is No. 1.
Undefeated.
The only other team in the Top 25 with that distinction is Boise State. The Broncos deserve a BCS bowl game, but not a shot at the national championship. Probably the toughest team on their schedule was Hawaii (9-2), their only opponent in the Top 25.
It's hard to make a case for Notre Dame, which is 10-1; that defeat was a decisive 47-21 Michigan win. Although it was last season, I also remember whom the Buckeyes dominated 34-20 in the Fiesta Bowl.
For those who vote, the question is: What team, besides Michigan, is worthy of facing Ohio State?
Assuming the Trojans finish their season with victories over Notre Dame and UCLA, then USC would perhaps be the best matchup. Ohio State and USC have had no common opponents. Beating Notre Dame would give USC four victories against highly ranked teams.
The Trojans' only loss?
To Oregon State.
Guess who beat Oregon State?
You got it, Boise State.
So that means Boise State should play Ohio State?
Nah.
Maybe Michigan. Then again, maybe not.
Let's make sure Ohio State and Michigan play someone, just not each other.
 
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Give the Trojans a shot against the Buckeyes

Notes written while exchanging my cleats for sneakers:
Ohio State vs. Michigan was wonderful drama, but if you give me a vote for the national championship game, give me Ohio State-Southern California, not a rematch of Saturday's game in Columbus.
If Southern Cal closes the regular season by defeating Notre Dame and UCLA, that would give the Trojans three victories against top-12 teams in the Sagarin computer rankings and 10 victories against top-40 Sagarin teams.
I'll excuse the Trojans for their slip at Oregon State if they win the Pacific-10 in addition to non-conference victories against Arkansas, Nebraska and Notre Dame.
If USC stumbles?
Then the call goes to Michigan. The Wolverines lose fewer points for losing at Ohio State than Arkansas loses for getting blown out by USC or Florida loses for stumbling at Auburn.
Don't even suggest giving Notre Dame the call over Michigan.
[FONT=arial,geneva]Out of conference, out of mind[/FONT]When I compare USC's non-conference schedule with the cream puffery practiced by the Southeastern Conference, I smile at the folks who scream that SEC football is the greatest thing since Derby Pie.
According to Sagarin, Florida's highest-ranked nonconference opponent will be Florida State, which the Gators play Saturday. Sagarin ranks the Seminoles 50th.
Arkansas played USC at home -- and lost 50-14. The average Sagarin rating of the Hogs' three other non-league opponents (Utah State, Southeast Missouri State and dangerous Louisiana-Monroe) is 171.3. There are 119 NCAA Division I-A teams.
Nobody does home-cookin' like the SEC. A third of its 12 teams didn't play a non-conference road game.
SEC teams played 39 of their 48 non-conference games at home. That's 81.3 percent. Big East teams played 60 percent of their non-conference games at home, and Big Ten teams 70 percent.
The average Sagarin rating for the SEC's 48 non-league opponents -- a robust 106.4. The average Sagarin rating for the Big East's 40 non-league opponents is 94. The Big Ten number is 87.9.
SEC teams scheduled three road games against top-40 teams. So far the league is 0-2.
The SEC's most impressive non-conference road win?
Mississippi State's 16-10 overtime win over Alabama Birmingham, which is ranked 124th.
Read the SEC bylaws. It says schedule at least three embarrassingly easy non-league games -- unless you can get away with four. Win at least half your league games. Keep chanting, "The SEC is the greatest."
Some people will believe you.
 
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Commentary

Greed without bounds

College officials see Division I-A football as gold

By Bob Smizik

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

spt_FR_Ohio_State2_11-21-2006_AB8ET85.jpg

Associated Press
Ohio State receiver Ted Ginn Jr. is hoisted by teammate Rory Nicol. They will have to wait 51 days before they get another chance to celebrate a touchdown.
Imagine this: After the Steelers and Seahawks won conference championship games Jan. 22 of this year, the NFL announced the Super Bowl would be played not in two weeks but March 13.
Crazy, right?
What about this? After the National League Championship Series ended Oct. 19, it was announced the St. Louis Cardinals would begin play in the World Series against the Detroit Tigers Dec. 9.
Idiotic, right?
Why would any sport on any level wait more than seven weeks after determining the participants to play its championship event?
That?s a good question for the NCAA, which abdicates the responsibility it accepts in every other sport by allowing the championship of Division I-A football to be run by people who don?t have the courage to buck an archaic and anti-educational system and whose primary interest is financial.
Would the NCAA allow its basketball tournament to have regional finals the last Saturday in March and begin the Final Four in mid-May?
Of course, it wouldn?t. But it is allowing Ohio State and Michigan, one of which will play for the national football championship, to play its final game Saturday and then take off 51 days before playing for the title Jan. 8.
There is no logical explanation for this other than it always has been done that way before.
Apparently bent on getting every possible dollar out of football ? the better to finance other sports ? and every possible mention in the news ? the better to attract more student applicants ? the presidents of the Division I-A football universities have no intention of changing this irrational system.
The underlings of these presidents ? coaches, athletic directors, conference commissioners ? never miss an opportunity to gush about what fine fellows these men are and how much their support means to college athletics. In reality, they?re every bit as unscrupulous as the dozen or so coaches who face NCAA sanctions every year for cheating.
This year, there will be 32 bowl games, beginning Dec. 19 with the San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia, and ending Jan. 8 with the title game. The minor bowls used to get out of the road before Jan. 1, but that?s no longer the case. The International Bowl will be played Jan. 6 in Toronto and the GMAC Bowl Jan. 7 in Mobile, Ala.
There will be 64 teams participating in these games, which is more than half of the 119 colleges that are members of Division I-A. Whereas it once took an 8-3, maybe a 7-4, record to earn a bowl invitation, now six losses can get you in.
These bowl games exist for one primary reason: To provide programming for ESPN.
Twenty-one of the 32 games will be carried by ESPN, which has an audience that never tires of college games, regardless of how meaningless. It is not too far-fetched to suggest that if ESPN can find the sites and the advertisers, in the not-too-distant future teams with losing records will be extending their seasons with a bowl game.
The upshot of this ridiculously overextended bowl mania is an extension of the season that takes away even more classroom time than the normal activities of a Division I-A athlete.
There are more practices, more mental preparation, more toll on the body and less time for studies, less time to be a college student.
If the NCAA had the guts to take control of the football season, it could do away with much of this abuse. A 16-team playoff, beginning the first week in December, would have every team, or all but two, finished by the end of the month. Such a plan would end the season for 103 of the I-A teams in November, allowing those players to get back to their studies and have a chance to be a student.
 
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Carr keeps BCS whine corked

November 21, 2006
If I had a vote for coach of the year, Michigan's Lloyd Carr would get it because of what he didn't do.
After wading into the Buckeyes' den and losing the best game of the college football season by three points Saturday night, he didn't beg for a rematch or lobby the people who actually do cast ballots in the Bowl Championship Series polls to bail him out.
"The BCS is a system that governs and will take care of all that," Carr said. "I think it will be very interesting to see what transpires in the polls as we go forward. But I don't care to speculate. I know it will probably be very controversial either way. So that's what we like."
At the end of what had been a very tough couple of days, Carr cracked a smile.
A day earlier, he had to tell his team about the death of Bo Schembechler, who not only hired and mentored Carr, but continued to shape the program in ways both real and symbolic. A few minutes earlier, the 42-39 loss at Ohio State had likely cost Carr a shot at the national title and perhaps even the consolation prize of the Rose Bowl.
With the Wolverines' season over at 11-1, somebody asked how tough it would be to find out where his team would land.
"I have no idea," Carr replied. "I guess we'll find out."
Contrast that with what Florida coach Urban Meyer said Sunday, when both The Associated Press poll and BCS rankings kept Michigan in the No. 2 slot, ahead of Southern California, by margins no wider than a few blades of grass.
"If that does happen," Meyer said about a possible rematch between Ohio State and Michigan in the national title game, "all the (university) presidents need to get together immediately and put together a playoff system.
"I mean like now," he added, "January or whenever to get that done."
By my reckoning, that might be the earliest a coach has ever uncorked any BCS whine. The Gators, ranked fourth by the BCS with two games left against Florida State and Arkansas, haven't even been hosed yet.
But apparently Meyer figures it's never too early to launch a pre-emptive strike. And if he and his colleagues weren't so quick to take the hush money - many have contracts triggering handsome bonuses for appearances in the major bowls - and fall into line when the BCS hijacked college football's postseason back in 1998, maybe we'd have that playoff system that sounds so good all of a sudden.
Instead, members of the coaching fraternity don't develop a conscience until it's their ox that's being gored - or in Meyer's case, looks like it might be.
In his defense, this isn't the first time Meyer has mentioned a playoff - that came when he was trying to wedge his former team, Utah, into a BCS bowl. And even so, that little rant isn't on par with some of the most memorable whines - Oregon coach Mike Bellotti likened the BCS to "a bad disease."
Nor is it as self-serving as Texas coach Mack Brown's shameless plea two years ago: "If you've got a vote, vote for us."
But that's what makes Carr's refusal to pander even more admirable.
He buttoned his lip, even though Michigan has the best argument, by far, among the one-loss teams clamoring for a shot at Ohio State. USC lost to unranked Oregon State, Florida lost to an Auburn team that's been beaten twice, Arkansas was humbled by USC at the start of the season at home, and Michigan beat Notre Dame in South Bend by 26 points.
But those four teams all have games left, and if the results don't swing enough votes, well, you know what's coming next. Given the BCS's uncontrollable desire to "tweak" the format - a half-dozen at last count - next year's innovation will be a "kiss-and-cry" area for coaches who get jobbed.
If somebody can explain what's so precious about the current format, beyond the nonsense about arguments being good for the game, let's hear it. The BCS has turned coaches into whiners and the college presidents who supposedly call the shots in the system into hypocrites. They want to protect the major conferences, the bowls and their TV partner and decide nothing tougher than how to divvy up the take.
Those presidents claim a playoff would harm their student-athletes' chances at academic success, but Penn State coach Joe Paterno, a Big Ten colleague of Carr's with impeccable old-school credentials shot holes in that alibi a while back.
"Whenever the talk turns to having some kind of a playoff, they say you can't miss classes and yet we've already got NCAA playoffs (in every other college sport) and everything else. I mean, who's kidding who?" Paterno added. "They've got to try to figure out a way to get rid of it and the hypocrisy of money, money, money."
 
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Novak: Michigan deserves #2 rank

November 21, 2006
By RICK ARMSTRONG STAFF WRITER
DEKALB -- Who's Number 2?
That's the question that will dominate college football the next two weeks as one-loss teams jockey for a spot in the BCS title game opposite No. 1-ranked Ohio State.
Southern Cal? Florida? Notre Dame? Or will Michigan get another shot at the Buckeyes after falling 42-39 last Saturday in Columbus?
If the game were this week, Northern Illinois coach Joe Novak would give Michigan the nod. Novak has a vote in the ESPN/USA Today Coaches poll and voted that way this week.
"I voted Ohio State No. 1, obviously, and I voted Michigan No. 2 because at this point, I think they're the second-best team in the country," Novak said Monday at his weekly press conference.
"We can argue if (Michigan) should be in the championship game or not but I look at it like this, I want to see the best two teams. Now, let's see what happens with Southern Cal the next two weeks. Maybe I might change my mind.
"But as of today, considering Michigan lost to Ohio State in Columbus in a great football game and Southern Cal lost to Oregon State, which is not a bad team, I'd pick Michigan, as the second-best team in the country.
"Now, if Southern Cal beats Notre Dame and UCLA I'll have to reconsider. I don't know if I'll change my mind or not. In my heart, today, I believe (Michigan is) the second-best team in the country."
 
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the Wolverines chose Vanderbilt, Central Michigan and Ball State as its non-conference foes
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WolverineTx - did I read that correctly? To bolster his argument that Michigan only played weak OOC opponents he leaves of ND?

(Wouldn't his argument have ben equally convincing with them in the rotation, or at least factually correct in its references? :))
 
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