As soon as Penn State won the Big Ten Championship Game, I pumped my fist and screamed into a pillow. I would have screamed into the night, but it was 5am and I didn’t want to wake my housemate up.
The next thing I did was call my friends, who were all Penn State alums or die-hard Penn State fans.
The premise was simple: Make a joke at the expense of Ohio State and Michigan (Did you hear the one about Urban Meyer or Jim Harbaugh winning the B1G Championship? Not this year!), talk about how we ‘couldn’t ****ing believe that we won that game’, talk about how we were certain that the offense was going to **** it all up at the end with the discrepancy between game clock and how many downs the team had left (and our surprise when it didn’t happen), and last but not least: Should Penn State be in the College Football Play-Off.
Here were the answers, said pretty much verbatim:
‘Are you kidding me? We play Alabama, and it’ll be as bad as the USC Rose Bowl Game in 2008. We’ll be down by 40 at half-time. I’d much rather Washington played them and be happy about going to Pasadena.’
‘Listen, people talk about us being a fourth seed and having to go into the Play-Off? We’re not better than Ohio State. Ohio State was better than us for three quarters. And we’re not even better than Michigan’.
‘The four best teams out there were Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson and USC, but they’ll put up Bama, Ohio State, Clemson and Washington’.
‘I’m drunk. But we won the Big Ten. Ohio State didn’t. I’m happy with being Big Ten Champions, baby! And no, I don’t want to play Alabama in the play-off, thanks’.
‘Alabama would kill us. Why would we want to see our team get killed?’
It’s weird, because every sports and college football podcast I’ve heard on this seems to be saying that the whole of Penn State Nation is going crazy that the Nittany Lions didn’t make
the College Football Play-Off, and like my buddies, they don't agree that Penn State was amongst the four biggest team in the country.
For the record, I agreed with them.
So here are my top four, and here are the reasons why:
- Alabama is the best side in the country, and would slaughter Penn State in the same way as they did when we had the home-and-home against them in 2010 and 2011, when both games were only close because Nick Saban took his foot off the gas out of reverence for Joe Paterno and the Penn State program (and both games weren’t close). Actually, ‘slaughter’ would be a polite word for what would happen to Penn State. It would be ‘Saw 7: Return to College Football’.
- Clemson: The defense is a lot of fun to watch, and when the offense gets things going, it can be scary good. The problem that they have is not so much the team’s talent as some of the offensive play-calling. Dabo Swinney gets a little too conservative, and other teams smell the blood, and go after it. It’s been hurting them all season (apart from against South Carolina). They need to keep their foot on the gas.
- Ohio State: J.T. Barrett, the Buckeyes’ QB, has had a poor season, but the Buckeyes seem to find ways and wills to win. They are young and very talented, and extremely well-coached under Urban Meyer. As I mentioned – a better team than Penn State (even though the Lions beat them (snigger)).
- USC: There is no team playing better than Southern Cal at the moment….and I really don’t like Southern Cal. Adoree Jackson is one of THE best defensive players in college football at the moment, and their offense isn’t whirring so much as firing on 200 cylinders. They beat Washington, and I didn’t understand how the Committee went for the stupid “Well, they won their conference rule”, instead of going for the best teams at the time. If they did, SC would be there.
Instead, Washington - the Pac-12 Champions - went in as a No.4 and will Alabama.
Good luck, Washington.
Oh, and after all, this I can go to sleep with this in my head: "Did you hear the one about Urban Meyer and Jim Harbaugh winning the Big Ten Championship? Not this year!"
Oh, and after all, this I can go to sleep with this in my head: "Did you hear the one about Urban Meyer and Jim Harbaugh winning the Big Ten Championship? Not this year!"
