College Football – The News About Losing

Classic Quotes from the Losing Coach – Choice Comments from Week Two

College coaches are hired as much for their on-field abilities as for their off-field diplomacy skills.  Diplomacy is a necessary skill made valuable by the competing pressures of being honest and trying to keep one’s job.   

Colorado Coach Dan Hawkins – who in a fit of delusion predicted that the Buffaloes would produce a 10-win season – suffered a humiliating 54-38 loss to the mighty football power Toledo Rockets which sent his record for 2009 to 0-2.  Following the game, he said he “had confidence in his team.”  He just didn’t say confidence to do exactly what.

Following his teams come from ahead loss to Michigan, Notre Dame Coach Charlie Weis said that “this is a very disappointing, disheartening loss.” He will be all the more disheartened when he has to start sending out resumes.  Weis called two pass plays  – both of which fell incomplete – which allowed Michigan to take over possession with 2:13 left and two time outs.  Weis’ horrible clock management in this game will be made more difficult to bear should he fail to win out the remainder of his schedule.

And there were other coaching comments worthy of note.  Virginia coach Al Groh – lamenting on his 0-2 start with losses to William and Mary and last weekend to TCU – “we expect more out of ourselves.”  Anyone who paid for a ticket to a Cavalier football game expects a whole lot more as well.  
New New Mexico Coach  Mike Locksley  came up with this gem – “I’m proud of the way our defense played,” he said after a 44-10 loss to the mighty Tulsa Golden Hurricanes.  “The defense corrected quite a few things. We had a few instances where we need to get off the field on third down.”  After letting the opposition run up over 40 points in each of its first two games, the Lobo defense seems to have quite a few things that remain to be corrected.  Locksley has problems on the other side of the ball as well.   “We have some guys in our offense who have the ability to make plays. Somebody has to step up and do it. “  After two games producing a total of one offensive touchdown, it is going to be a very, very long season in Albuquerque.

Washington State Coach Paul Wulff should be commended for his honesty following an embarrassing 38-20 loss at home to Hawaii.  “When you turn the ball over five times, you aren’t going to beat anybody.”   His Cougars are now 0-2 and have to confront the real possibility of a completely winless 2009.  Following on the heels of cross-state rival Washington’s winless 2008 season, state football fans are taking up curling.

College Football Lowlights from Week One – College Football Losers

The inaugural week of the 2009 College Football season is nearly complete.  As of this writing there have been a couple unusual upsets as well as the usual number of predicable humiliations.  Western Kentucky was hired to be blown out by the Tennessee Volunteers in Knoxville, and in this week’s Ben Dover Memorial Game, someone called Charleston Southern was defeated 62-3 by #1 Florida.  The real mystery was why fans actually showed up to watch.  

As always, there were some huge gridiron disasters to report on as well as a couple close calls.  Navy nearly handed Ohio State an application to a tier two bowl game by not quitting in Columbus, but most games went according to prediction.    

Dung Heap Disaster
In other Bottom Ten news, the thriller of the week was played last evening in Las Cruces, New Mexico (for those of you without a map that is just across the state line from El Paso, TX where the stock yards and a big prison are).  First year NMS coach DeWayne Walker has already requested help from fans to provide snacks for his players (not making this up!).  He should probably start requesting help from fans in calling plays.  His Aggies went down to defeat 21-6 to one of the other worst teams in the country from the University of Idaho.  Making matters worse, this was a home loss for Walker who is now seriously staring up the nose of a big and ugly winless season.  Walker has a call into the recruiter who got him this job.

Tiger Food
Mike the Tiger came out of his slumber last evening to watch a surprisingly close game on national TV.  Last year’s Futility Rankings Champion Washington took on a sleepy LSU team that appeared to be seriously jet-lagged.  The Huskies kept it close for the first half before pulling away for a 23-31 defeat to the Tigers, extending their un-won streak to 15 games.  UDub hasn’t won a game since November of 2007, but at least has a shot next week at home against the aforementioned Idaho Vandals.   

Div I-AA Duke
Although there were some very competitive games yesterday – such as Alabama vs. Virginia Tech – the early schedule is dominated by teams attempting to get a win at the expense of a school that has no real expectation of success on the field.  Duke University penciled in Richmond this year to get its season started on the right foot.  Unfortunately, the Richmond Spiders showed up and stomped the unbelievably hapless Bleu Devils 24-16.  Richmond will go on to play the likes of the Delaware Fightin Blue Hens, Hofstra and VMI.  Richmond should have a decent year in Division I-AA.  Duke would have a respectable year in Division I AA.  Unfortunately for Duke, they play in the ACC.  Duke is also staring down the long abyss of a winless season.

Cougar Cough
Losing to an egghead school is bad enough.  Losing at home in the season opener to a conference school is a disaster.  The Washington State Cougars dropped their opener to Stanford by a lopsided score of 39-13.  The Cougars were never in this thing from the start.  Washington State now looks forward to games against Hawaii and SMU.  Adding to their bad luck, the Hawaii game is at home.

Sucker Punch-Out
If taking the field with the moniker ‘Fighting Ducks’ isn’t hard enough, LeGarrette Blount ended his season after game one by sucker punching a Boise State defensive lineman.  Blount then quickly backpedaled after the punch trying to look tough when the Bronco players began to ‘object.’  The University of Oregon at least suspended Blount for the rest of the season, but the Ducks have a lot to overcome.  Two of their next three games are against nationally ranked opponents, so the humiliation of getting beaten in Boise may have some shelf life. Sort of like hitting a skunk with the family mini-van, the stink from this thing will hang around to remind the Ducks of what losing the game as well as one’s composure smells like.

Check back Wednesday for the Week Two, Bottom Ten,  FirstWorst Futility Rankings – the Worst of College Football.