Between the brawling and bad sportsmanship, the flag planting and pepper spraying that made the much-hyped rivals week one to remember, it was easy to forget the College Football Playoff picture appears to have cleared up quite a bit.
The Big Ten will likely send four representatives to the 12-team field, along with four SEC teams, Notre Dame, and three to-be-determined teams from outside the Power Two conferences, including the conference champions from the ACC and Big 12.
The Big Ten and SEC title games at Indianapolis and Atlanta will be fun to watch, but only seeding and a first-round bye are probably on the line. No. 1 Oregon will likely retain the top seed and a bye if the 12-0 Ducks beat No. 4 Penn State, but if Penn State pulls an upset the chaos begins.
No. 10 Indiana and No. 4 Ohio State are expected to get wild-card berths and play in the quarterfinals, along with the loser of the Oregon-Penn State game. Ohio State alumni’s “Fire Ryan Day” movement gained stream with Saturday’s brutal 13-10 loss to unranked Michigan, but Day can still become the first coach to win a national title and still have fans calling for his head afterward.
The last piece of the Big Ten puzzle Saturday was Indiana’s 66-0 thrashing of Purdue, an expected result by the team smarting from national reaction to the previous week’s shellacking by Ohio State. Indiana finished 11-1, but the one loss defines them to skeptical observers.
“We certainly made a statement … again,” coach Curt Cignetti said Saturday, raising his eyebrows as though he was very tired of making statements.
Cignetti pointed out the Hoosiers had the largest margin of victory of any team in the nation, and admitted he was looking for “style points” to impress the CFP committee, whose rankings come out Tuesday.
“Obviously style points are important this time of year, and style points are earned, right?” Cignetti said.
And sometimes they’re given, like Penn State’s 44-7 win over Maryland. Nittany Lions quarterback Beau Pribula tossed a 15-yard touchdown pass on a 4th-and-12 as time expired to make a blowout even more “blowoutier” than it was.
Nittany Lions coach James Franklin was also trying to send a message to the committee, and running up the score was his form of communication. Terrapins coach Mike Locksley took umbrage over the blatant piling on at the end, and let Franklin hear his opinion.
“Bulls−−− is what it was,” Locksley told the media. “I respect the game, I’ve got a lot of respect for James, his program. I think it was bulls−−−.”
Surprisingly, Franklin was not asked about the unsportsmanlike call until the very end of his 15-minute news conference, shortly after the coach thanked the local media for “all the positive articles you guys write” about his program.
Before Franklin could shop for thank-you gifts for the Penn State writers, someone bravely asked about the postgame altercation with Locksley.
“I get it, right?” Franklin said of Locksley’s umbrage. “But a couple of things I will say. My job is to put the (third and fourth stringers) in the games, but when the 3s and 4s go in, they get to play football.”
Franklin then blamed Locksley for not playing Cover Two defense at the end of the blowout, as if Maryland was asking for Penn State to pile on.
“If you don’t want (a touchdown), play Cover 2,” he said. “So I’m good with it. And on top of that, there’s also a change in college football. We are trying to play as long as we can, make the playoffs and be seeded as high as possible. And scoring as many points and a point differential matters.
“All that matters, and if you don’t get that, it’s really not my problem.”
That level of arrogance is not unexpected from Franklin, who also told the media Saturday he’d love to answer a question about what people say about the program with: “I could give a …”
“God, I’d love to do that one day,” Franklin said.
That’s the stuff dreams are made of at Penn State.
Meanwhile, the on-field brawl at the Horseshoe sparked by Michigan players trying to plant their flag at midfield was still the talk of football Sunday. While TV networks enjoy displaying the word “hate” during rivalry week, like the “Clean, old-fashioned hate” nickname of the George-Georgia Tech rivalry, the real thing is ugly to watch when it gets out of control, as it did in several rivalry games Saturday.
“I don’t know all the details, but I know these guys were looking to put a flag on our field, and we’re not going to let that happen,” Day said defiantly.
The irony is that Day’s inability to beat Michigan is what led to the flag-planting episode. He told a TV station last week that losing three straight to Michigan was “one of the worst things that’s happened to me in my life, quite honestly.”
“Other than losing my father and a few other things, like it’s quite honestly, for my family, the worst thing that’s happened,” he said. “So we can never have that happen again, ever.”
Not only did it happen again, but the fourth straight loss in “The Game” was one that Buckeyes fans will never forgive, much less forget. Even redemption in the playoffs might not save Day, but at least he’ll get that chance.
A memorable college football season is about to get even better.
