Yesterday was quite a day for College Football. The new approach made New Years Eve (day) pretty interesting. In the past it has been the Weed Eater Bowl followed by the Peach Bowl, which made for great noise while getting ready to ring in the new year. This year was different.
The Peach Bowl kicked off at noon, and for the first time in forever, they didn’t sell out. In fact, they didn’t come close. The game ended up being very entertaining, but I have a feeling the brass will insist that they stick to the ACC vs. SEC matchup (when it isn’t part of the playoffs). The Orange Bowl turned out a little different than most of the pundits predicted, and the Cotton Bowl was exactly as expected. Here are my first thoughts with less than 24 hours to digest:
Peach Bowl:
- Florida State didn’t want to be there. At all.
Break dance-off
- When UGA and Richt parted ways, I was high on Tom Herman coming to Athens. This game proved it. He won’t be at Houston much longer.
- Houston has some serious athletes.
Orange Bowl:
- Watson may be the best player in college football. If the Heisman voting happened after these games, I’d bet $5 that DeShaun would bring home the hardware.
- Ben Boulware is my favorite player in college football. He plays at full throttle 110% of the time. It’s refreshing to watch. He hits like a truck and has incredibly good instincts. Not to mention his mustache and his tattoo should have their own Instagram pages and Twitter accounts.
Singing Van Halen’s “Panama”. It’s a full body experience.
- What is it with Oklahoma QBs and the Pure Barre headbands?
- It seems like Sterling Shepard has been catching passes for Oklahoma for 9 years. He’s Stephen Garcia-esque.
- I don’t know what Dabo said or did at halftime, but Clemson came out and absolutely dominated the second half.
- I would send my kid to play for Dabo in a New York minute.
Cotton Bowl:
“Blow the whistle!! Blow the effing whistle!”
- Yawn. Everyone saw this coming from a mile away. Apologies if this sounds like an SEC-homer statement, but it shows how good Alabama really is. Their second and third string would be starting for every other college football program in the country.
- FYI – Kirby is doing double duty as UGA head coach and Bama DC. His defense just shut out the #3 team in the country.
National Championship Game:
- My first thought it that it will be lower-scoring than either of the playoff games.
- The networks would have rather had an Alabama vs. Oklahoma match up. Regardless, ticket prices will be high. Both Clemson and Bama travel well.
- There will be 20 legitimate NFL players on the field in this game.
- If I had to guess the score right now, I’d say 31-30 Clemson, but I need to chew on it.
What do you think?
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Photos: Google Image Search
Two thoughts on the early games- FSU had some bad luck at the QB position, which changed their game considerably. Don’t understand why they didn’t just hand off to Cook but whatever. Two- I’m with you on the Tom Herman to Athens thing. Hopefully Kirby will pan out but I’d feel better to have an offensive mind running the show.
Championship Game- Seems to be the best matchup. Clemson has the type of game that gives Bama’s D the fits. Watson is a great team leader and has the tools, both running and throwing, to counter Bama’s strength of burying the run. In my mind, you couldn’t ask for a better QB to give you an edge. That being said, there’s something about this Bama team that’s special. Don’t know what it is, but they seemed to really turn it on the last half of the season. Maybe it was the decision to go with Coker exclusively or maybe they’ve just gotten better every game, but whatever it was this team is going to be tough. Assuming Coker plays a good game and the defense can counter Watson and game plan over the next 10 days, I’ll take Bama 42-17.
If Sumlin gets fired at A&M I think Herman will go there. He will know the territory well and will already have talent on offense.
I think the national championship will be something like 31-17 Alabama.
Why would Herman go to A&M to play LSU and Bama every year when he could wait one more year and take over for the Longhorns?
On the Playoffs, the times were terrible. Takes a special talent to make football ratings go down. Never going to make the casual fan tune in on NYE.
The Champ Game- Pulling for Clemson hard. Love the contrast in play calling, coaches and just the overall style of the two programs. College is fun, and Dabo embraces that.
Clemson 38, Alabama 27