Merry Christmas (2004 Texas vs. Michigan)

The bowl season is in full swing, which means it's time for me to head to Shreveport to see Alabama vs. Colorado. Unfortunately, that also means no blog posts the rest of this week/year. So Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Here's hoping it's a good game.

The first-ever meeting between Michigan and Texas at the 2005 Rose Bowl lived up to expectations as the Longhorns pulled out a 38-37 victory on a 37-yard field goal by Dusty Mangum as time expired. Sophomore quarterback Vince Young accumulated 372 yards of total offense and five touchdowns. Courtesy of the Tournament of Roses archives.

1964 Princeton

Merry Christmas Eve everyone.

I've been trying for three months to get this photo to work and today was the day. Go figure.

Although the game returned to two-platoon football in 1964, Princeton’s Cosmo Iacavazzi continued to play both ways and led the Tigers to a rare ranking, No. 13. The All-American also placed ninth in Heisman Trophy voting. Courtesy of the National Football Foundation and College Football Hall of Fame.

1934 Alabama (and Stanford)

Well, we're now three days into bowl practices, and the Crimson Tide is beginning to install the game plan to play Colorado. It's hard to believe that Christmas is less than a week away, which has a different meaning for anyone associated with the team, including reporters, this year because we're all traveling to Shreveport that morning. So any gas stations between Tuscaloosa and there, please stay open. I promise, I'll stop at least twice, and so will everyone else.

Stanford All-American tackle Bob “Horse” Reynolds and coach C.E. Thornhill meet with Alabama coach Frank Thomas and All-American halfback Millar “Dixie” Howell prior to the 1935 Rose Bowl. Led by its passing game, Alabama won 29-13. Courtesy of the Paul W. Bryant Museum.

1951 Tennessee

General Robert Neyland twice left the Volunteers to serve in the military, but compiled an amazing 173-31-12 record during his three stints leading Tennessee.

The 1939 team shut out 10 consecutive opponents and the 1950 team finished 11-1 to earn national title consideration. He followed that up with a 10-0 regular season and consensus national title, though Tennessee lost to Maryland 28-13 in the Sugar Bowl. Courtesy of the University of Tennessee.

By the way, he's the one in the coat.

1955 Michigan State

Coach Duffy Daugherty won his Rose Bowl debut when Dave Kaiser made a 41-yard field goal with seven seconds left to play as Michigan State defeated UCLA, 17-14. However the Spartans finished No. 2 behind Oklahoma. Courtesy of the Tournament or Roses archives.

1951 Illinois

Wow, has it really been a week already? That's the thing about vacations, they never seen to last long enough. Such is life.

So now I have a week of football practice and then it's off to Shreveport on Christmas morning for the Independence Bowl. That's one of the problems with covering a team, where they go, you go, even on a big-time holiday.

Billy Tate had 150 rushing yards on 20 carries and scored two touchdowns as Illinois crushed Stanford in the 1952Rose Bowl, 40-7. John Karras, Don Stevens and John Ryan also scored in the second half when the game turned into a rout. Despite the 9-0-1 finish, most services had Maryland, Michigan State or Tennessee at No. 1. Courtesy of the Tournament of Roses archives.

1996 Florida

Congratulations to Tim Tebow and the Florida Gators on winning the Heisman Trophy. It's nice to see that the voters have caught up with the times, and actually selected a sophomore. It's about time.

Obviously, it's the school's third Heisman. The first was won by the guy on the right.

As for the photo, with Arizona State losing in the 1997 Rose Bowl, the national championship came down to No. 1 Florida State vs. No. 4 Florida, which had closed the regular season with a No. 1 vs. No. 2 meeting won by the Seminoles. This time Steve Spurrier’s Gators dominated, 52-20, to win Florida’s first national championship. Courtesy of the Southeastern Conference.

FYI, the blog is going to be a little hit-and-miss the rest of the month as I'm off this week (yeah!), but finishing a project, and then I'll essentially be on the road off-and-on for a couple of weeks. I promise to do the best I can.

1950 Cal

Busy days.

First off I want to thank the Red Elephant Club in Florence for having me as a guest speaker last night. I had a very enjoyable time, and was blown away by the number of questions (45 minutes, wow).

Second, I want to thank the very nice police officer for not giving me a speeding ticket on the way home. Merry Christmas.

Yesterday, I did a fun radio interview with a station in Louisville. Saturday morning it's West Palm Beach's turn.

Coach Lynn “Pappy” Waldorf led the Bears to three straight appearances in the 1951 Rose Bowl after undefeated regular seasons, but wasn’t able to get a victory. The last came against Michigan, a 14-6 loss. His Cal record through 1956 was 67-32-4; his career record 170-94-22. Courtesy the Tournament of Roses archives.

1946 Illinois

It's a busy couple of days for me, so I'll need to keep this one short. It's kind of fitting, though, with Illinois returning to the Rose Bowl.

No. 4 UCLA was on pace for an undefeated season when it faced No. 5 Illinois at the 1947 Rose Bowl in the first meeting with a Big Ten/Pac-10 agreement. Led by “Orange” Julius Rykovich (107 yards) and Mr. Five by Five, Buddy Young (103 yards), Illinois won, 45-14. Courtesy of the Tournament of Roses archives.

2003 Southern California

A quick update on the book front, things seem to be really picking up. It's in stores, interview requests are up (Louisville on Thursday and West Palm Beach on Saturday morning), and now there's this huge controversy about the BCS that's not going to go away.

Just to throw some more wood on the fire, people have been picking through the final coaches' poll and are finding some surprising ballots. For example, Dennis Franchione ranked Hawaii 22nd, while Hal Mumme had the Rainbows at No. 1. Tommy Bowden had Oklahoma behind Missouri, a team it beat twice this season. And Frank Beamer had his team, Virginia Tech at No. 2, which would have put it in the title game. Sorry, Frank.

Quarterback Matt Leinart celebrates after catching a touchdown pass from wide receiver Mike Williams in the 28-14 victory in the Rose Bowl against No. 4 Michigan. Although Southern California was No. 1 in both major polls, it was excluded from the BCS national championship, resulting in a split title. Courtesy of the Tournament of Roses archives.

Everyone has a claim this year

Guess which team the computers had No. 1 in the BCS rankings? Not Ohio State, or LSU. Try Virginia Tech, ahead of No. 2 LSU and followed by Ohio State, Missouri (which is not playing in a BCS game) and Kansas. By the way, LSU only crushed Virginia Tech this season, 48-7.

Ok, earlier in the season I wrote a column speculating on what if the BCS didn't exist and we had a playoff format in Division I-A (or whatever they're calling it these days) football.
It was a simple concept, and pretty much the same one they use in every other division. A committee puts together the field, and off we go.

Here's how it would work. The top team from each of the six major BCS conferences (ACC, Big East, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-10 and SEC) gets an automatic bid, with the field filled out by the BCS rankings. If conferences want to have a championship game for the automatic bid, that's fine, and the world can still have a slew of bowl games for the non-playoff teams. The first round would be at home sites of the higher-ranked seeds, with advancing teams playing at neutral sites of the biggest bowls (Sugar, Orange, etc) along with other high bidders. The committee's primary job would be to switch teams out of playing conference opponents, and things like that.

So here's how a playoff would look:

16 at 1: Tennessee at Ohio State

9 at 8: West Virginia at Kansas

12 at 5: Boston College at Georgia

13 at 4: Florida at Oklahoma

14 at 3: Illinois at Virginia Tech

11 at 6: Arizona State at Missouri

10 at 7: Hawaii at Southern California

15 at 2: Clemson at LSU

The only change would be to swap Florida, Boston College and Illinois to avoid SEC and ACC first-round matchups, and minimize chances of two teams playing for a third time (after meeting in a conference title game).

1934 Alabama: After defeating Stanford in the Rose Bowl, the Crimson Tide (10-0) was able to make a claim on the national title, although Minnesota was the consensus choice. Courtesy of the Paul W. Bryant Museum.

1968 Ohio State

Wow.

The season's over and the only thing we pretty know for sure is that Ohio State is in the title game. I was joking with friends about "When did the Buckeyes become the lock?"

This year, though. It seems fitting.

Oh, and there's a new poll. I would have listed 10 possible answers, but for some reason the site wouldn't let me.

After an early 13-0 upset of No. 1 Purdue, Woody Hayes’ Buckeyes rolled all the way to a 9-0 record, the national championship, and a 27-16 victory against Southern California in the Rose Bowl. Although O.J. Simpson had 171 yards on 28 carries, including an 80-yard touchdown, he also contributed to five Trojan turnovers. Courtesy of the Tournament of Roses archives.