This week in college football as explained by Michael Jackson
Here we are.
The final week of the college football regular season has come and gone, and we're now staring down a holiday season full of conference championships, bowl games, and setting price alerts on Kayak for flights to wherever your team happens to be playing in December or January. But don't get lost in your dreams of warm postseason trips to Florida or California just yet! Take some time to review what was an amazing week of football, with some help from the King of Pop. Then you can start packing.
Okay, I know this is beating a dead horse at this point, but it really bears repeating. This year, the Notre Dame Fighting Irish were Very Very Bad At Football.
In their rivalry week game against the USC Trojans, they were beaten by three scores, and the game shouldn't even have been that close. As if that weren't enough, defensive lineman Jerry Tillery literally kicked a USC player in the head, and then proceeded to stomp on another USC player's ankle.
And after this, after a season that saw wins vacated due to an academic scandal, a terrible record, and the team's head coach throwing everybody involved with Notre Dame football under the bus before taking any accountability for himself, apparently Brian Kelly thinks he's in a situation where he can shop around for other coaching jobs. It'd be unbelievable, but at the same time, it is Brian Kelly, and it is Notre Dame. Who's bad? It's you, Brian Kelly. It's always been you.
It was a sad story for a while, but for Orgeron and his players, there's a happy ending (at least for now). Orgeron gave the Tigers passion, his very soul, he gave them promises, and secrets so untold.
And now, thanks in no small part to the love the players have for Coach O, LSU has promised Ed Orgeron forever (or at least five years). It's a decision that makes sense, especially when you consider the fact that Tom Herman was really shopping himself around.
For now, things are peaceful at LSU, but if history is any indication, we'll be having this year's coaching discussion again next year at LSU, and Orgeron will be wondering who the team is flirting with behind his back.
"Beat It": The Longhorns finally fire Charlie Strong and hire Tom Herman
Jeez, finally. We all knew Charlie Strong was on his way out at Texas, and the way the team mishandled his departure was so flagrantly disrespectful that it almost seems like a relief that it's finally over. At this point, it doesn't matter whether the Longhorns were wrong or right to fire him, it's honestly best for Strong that Texas made him beat it.
And it seems, at least on the face of it, that things have worked out for Texas as well. Despite the love that the team obviously had for Charlie Strong and the work he had done building the team, Texas had landed Tom Herman, the consensus top head coaching candidate in the nation. So everything's gravy, right? Well...
"Gone Too Soon": ... Right after Herman was humiliated by Memphis
Okay, okay. Sure, it's an overreaction to point to this late-season loss as a bad omen for Herman's tenure in Texas, but Longhorns players and fans might be rightly concerned that Tom Herman seemed to check completely out of his game against Memphis as soon as it became clear that it was the final game he'd coach at Houston.
Yes, Herman was shiny and sparkly and splendidly bright, here in Houston one day, and gone to the Longhorns one night. It's just a shame that night turned out to be the night before a Houston game.
Let's get this out of the way early: it was a first down – and even if it wasn't, there wasn't nearly enough evidence to overturn the call on the field. Sorry, Michigan fans. I know you don't want to believe it, and trust me, given my experience with Ohio State at College Gameday when they beat Northwestern on a close first down call, I can empathize. I know it hurts.
Okay, Michigan fans. You can go away now.
Are they gone?
Good.
Oh my god, that was an absolute hell of a game. In a season full of amazing upsets and improbable finishes, Ohio State's win in double overtime, a win that has all but ensured their spot in the college football playoff, will go down as the thriller of the season. Harbaugh's Wolverines gave the Buckeyes as much as they could handle, but when Michigan was forced to kick a field goal on their opening drive of the second overtime period, the writing was on the wall. Watching this game was an unique experience. Speaking personally, when overtime started, my body started to shiver. No mere mortal can resist the evil of a thriller.
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