Post by cviller on Oct 19, 2007 11:21:45 GMT -5
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From the New York Times
October 19, 2007
Sports of The Times
By HARVEY ARATON
Piscataway, N.J.
It would be decidedly unfair today to call South Florida a Bowl Championship Series fraud. Better to take the high road, make the claim that Rutgers, with a season-saving 30-27 victory here last night, proved that 2006 wasn’t a tease.
Two Big East programs on the rise — Rutgers from the ashes, South Florida from the ground up — had a heck of go of it at Rutgers Stadium and the lone casualty from the big-picture Big East perspective was the Bulls’ unbeaten season and their mind-blowing dream of a national title.
But if you are a fan of change, of spreading the wealth, of black eyes for bullies, what could be more gratifying than South Florida’s coming-out party this season, after Rutgers’s of a year ago, while the most famous name in college football — and that would still be Notre Dame — prepares for its seventh defeat of the season tomorrow (against one victory) against Southern California?
Appalachian State over Michigan was wonderful theater but ultimately a one-time usurpation of the laws governing big-time college sports. The contrasting fortunes of Rutgers/South Florida and Notre Dame — Big East Conference mates except for football — are more reflective of permanent change, even as the old-guard establishment continues to paint the Big East as the Big Easy.
“A tremendous conference,” Jim Leavitt, the South Florida coach, said after his team’s run, which took it to the No. 2 position in the first B.C.S. standings this week, was ended. “Big East football, you’d better be locked in every game.”
The measure of a conference is always related to its depth. The lesson learned by the Bulls last night was that six straight victories didn’t make them champions of college football, the Big East or even the State of Florida. It’s a long, long season when your conference schedule has a roll call of hungry, newly endowed programs.
To that end, Rutgers perhaps had more to lose — any real chance at the Big East title and much of the momentum established last season — than South Florida. But Ray Rice had 181 yards in his legs last night, Rutgers Coach Greg Schiano threw caution to the wind and was rewarded with 10 points off punt and field goal fakes, and the Knights survived two muffed punts and a late fourth-quarter fumble that set Bulls quarterback Matt Grothe on the Rutgers 40-yard line.
Grothe is the elusive sophomore who beat nationally ranked Auburn of the big, bad Southeastern Conference on the road in September and later defended home turf against West Virginia. Suddenly, the Big East had another Florida power, which was believed possible only in the Mike Tranghese household after Miami defected to the Atlantic Coast Conference with Virginia Tech and Boston College in 2003.
“When we lost the three schools and had to find replacements, I really had to convince our people about South Florida,” Tranghese, the Big East commissioner, said. “But I told them that if you put this school in a league with some other good programs, with B.C.S. entry and with the geographic advantages they have, they will be good.”
Tranghese did his homework and now has an eight-team football conference, written off for dead four years ago, that is proving itself B.C.S. worthy but could certainly use another member or two, preferably one that would bring what is largely missing: a brand name with a long history and a national following.
Doesn’t that sound like Notre Dame? Tranghese said people shouldn’t hold their breath.
One of the first calls he received after the A.C.C. migration, in fact, was from Notre Dame, wanting to help. So Rutgers will show up on the Irish schedule by 2010, as will other Big East opponents. How unreasonable is it to ask that by then, who will be helping whom? What if Notre Dame’s drastic slide under Charlie Weis is the punctuation on the widespread belief that it is no longer prudent — or possible — for the Irish to be the crusading, independent Goliath?
Notre Dame’s much-celebrated network contract bolsters revenue, but does it attract premier recruits? Everyone is on television these days while playing in fierce conference showdowns, like last night’s.
“Our goal has never had anything to do with rankings,” Leavitt said after a sea of red-shirted Rutgers fans rushed the field, pulled down the goal posts and re-enacted the Louisville coming-out party victory of 2006. “Our goal is to win the Big East.”
When Michigan loses to Appalachian State and Oregon, it can still fight for a Big Ten title. When Notre Dame stumbles early and is out of the B.C.S. bowl picture, what then?
“I just think they really believe independent is the way for them to go, and I’ve never seen an iota of wavering on their part,” Tranghese said. “But if they want to come, all they have to do is pick up the phone.”
As last night again demonstrated, his league keeps getting better. Wouldn’t it be poetic justice if Notre Dame some day had to beg Rutgers and South Florida to let it come in and play?
E-mail: hjaraton@nytimes.com
From the New York Times
October 19, 2007
Sports of The Times
By HARVEY ARATON
Piscataway, N.J.
It would be decidedly unfair today to call South Florida a Bowl Championship Series fraud. Better to take the high road, make the claim that Rutgers, with a season-saving 30-27 victory here last night, proved that 2006 wasn’t a tease.
Two Big East programs on the rise — Rutgers from the ashes, South Florida from the ground up — had a heck of go of it at Rutgers Stadium and the lone casualty from the big-picture Big East perspective was the Bulls’ unbeaten season and their mind-blowing dream of a national title.
But if you are a fan of change, of spreading the wealth, of black eyes for bullies, what could be more gratifying than South Florida’s coming-out party this season, after Rutgers’s of a year ago, while the most famous name in college football — and that would still be Notre Dame — prepares for its seventh defeat of the season tomorrow (against one victory) against Southern California?
Appalachian State over Michigan was wonderful theater but ultimately a one-time usurpation of the laws governing big-time college sports. The contrasting fortunes of Rutgers/South Florida and Notre Dame — Big East Conference mates except for football — are more reflective of permanent change, even as the old-guard establishment continues to paint the Big East as the Big Easy.
“A tremendous conference,” Jim Leavitt, the South Florida coach, said after his team’s run, which took it to the No. 2 position in the first B.C.S. standings this week, was ended. “Big East football, you’d better be locked in every game.”
The measure of a conference is always related to its depth. The lesson learned by the Bulls last night was that six straight victories didn’t make them champions of college football, the Big East or even the State of Florida. It’s a long, long season when your conference schedule has a roll call of hungry, newly endowed programs.
To that end, Rutgers perhaps had more to lose — any real chance at the Big East title and much of the momentum established last season — than South Florida. But Ray Rice had 181 yards in his legs last night, Rutgers Coach Greg Schiano threw caution to the wind and was rewarded with 10 points off punt and field goal fakes, and the Knights survived two muffed punts and a late fourth-quarter fumble that set Bulls quarterback Matt Grothe on the Rutgers 40-yard line.
Grothe is the elusive sophomore who beat nationally ranked Auburn of the big, bad Southeastern Conference on the road in September and later defended home turf against West Virginia. Suddenly, the Big East had another Florida power, which was believed possible only in the Mike Tranghese household after Miami defected to the Atlantic Coast Conference with Virginia Tech and Boston College in 2003.
“When we lost the three schools and had to find replacements, I really had to convince our people about South Florida,” Tranghese, the Big East commissioner, said. “But I told them that if you put this school in a league with some other good programs, with B.C.S. entry and with the geographic advantages they have, they will be good.”
Tranghese did his homework and now has an eight-team football conference, written off for dead four years ago, that is proving itself B.C.S. worthy but could certainly use another member or two, preferably one that would bring what is largely missing: a brand name with a long history and a national following.
Doesn’t that sound like Notre Dame? Tranghese said people shouldn’t hold their breath.
One of the first calls he received after the A.C.C. migration, in fact, was from Notre Dame, wanting to help. So Rutgers will show up on the Irish schedule by 2010, as will other Big East opponents. How unreasonable is it to ask that by then, who will be helping whom? What if Notre Dame’s drastic slide under Charlie Weis is the punctuation on the widespread belief that it is no longer prudent — or possible — for the Irish to be the crusading, independent Goliath?
Notre Dame’s much-celebrated network contract bolsters revenue, but does it attract premier recruits? Everyone is on television these days while playing in fierce conference showdowns, like last night’s.
“Our goal has never had anything to do with rankings,” Leavitt said after a sea of red-shirted Rutgers fans rushed the field, pulled down the goal posts and re-enacted the Louisville coming-out party victory of 2006. “Our goal is to win the Big East.”
When Michigan loses to Appalachian State and Oregon, it can still fight for a Big Ten title. When Notre Dame stumbles early and is out of the B.C.S. bowl picture, what then?
“I just think they really believe independent is the way for them to go, and I’ve never seen an iota of wavering on their part,” Tranghese said. “But if they want to come, all they have to do is pick up the phone.”
As last night again demonstrated, his league keeps getting better. Wouldn’t it be poetic justice if Notre Dame some day had to beg Rutgers and South Florida to let it come in and play?
E-mail: hjaraton@nytimes.com
