Loser of the Week

POSTED BY Robert Reid, 20 September 2007

Not all glories in the wonderfully irrational world of COLLEGE FOOTBALL come with wins

The world's greatest piece of art isn’t in the Louvre, Uffizi or Metropolitan. It’s in Hamilton, Ontario, standing quietly outside the wonderfully absurd Canadian Football Hall of Fame. At first glance, the shimmering sculpture looks like two metal men engaged in rather improper public contact. One stands and reaches upward, the other moving in to the other’s mid section. Look closer and you’ll see it’s just football in progress. A receiver clutches a (metal) football, and a wide-eyed defender leaps in a last-gasp attempt to make a play. The receiver may have the ball, but the defender — the central action of the piece; the only figure facing the viewer — inescapably has your attention. That the artist named it Touchdown means that the sculpture, ultimately, memorializes glorious failure. I like that.

The 2007 college-football season is already more exciting than last year’s ho-hummer, with lots of juicy losses to take in, including Michigan to Appalachian State, Louisville to Kentucky, Oklahoma State to Troy, Auburn to South Florida and Mississippi State, Notre Dame to anyone it plays. But other than Mike Hart’s day versus App State, these losses haven’t really been that dignified, have they?

Those who lose well — particularly well — deserve a home too. Like Tom Osbourne going for two in the 1984 Orange Bowl. Tom could've tied with a PAT and gotten his first national championship. But he wanted to win. And he lost. This weekly Loser of the Week (LoW) is their Xanadu.

2nd-String: Norfolk State
I believe all losing teams should have to take the bus home. Norfolk State takes the bus both ways. Wearing gold instead of the usual visitors’ white jerseys, Norfolk State made its debut against Division-I opponents at Rutgers Saturday, a game they agreed to so they could afford to fly to Florida A&M next month and skip the usual 14-hour bus ride each way (Rutgers offered $275,000 to play).

NSU isn’t exactly Appalachian State. The Spartans haven’t had a winning season since they joined Division II league a decade ago. And Rutgers — losers for so long, and whose fans shamefully chanted ‘F--- Navy!’ last week to the visiting Midshipmen — welcomed the Spartans with a breathless six-touchdown second quarter, capped with the (controversial) calling of three time-outs already up 48-0 to get the ball back right before halftime. Norfolk State’s quarterback was ‘irritated’ by it and the punter (who was fouled and hurt on the punt the time-outs set up) said it was ‘unnecessary.’ But NSU coach Pete Adrian rallied the team to play harder in the second half. And team started the third quarter with their best drive of the day, which reached the Rutgers 18 (before holding calls pushed them out of field-goal range). Enjoy that flight to Tallahassee guys; you’ve earned it.

Norfolk State lost 0-59.

Starter: Central Florida
For UCF’s first game in its new, $55-million Bright House Networks Stadium in Orlando, they scheduled the highest-ranking opponent in Knight history, and even and held a brief come-back lead to an overrated Texas in the 4th quarter. After a Knight fumble set up Jamal Charles’ 46-yard TD run with 3:37 remaining (and an enigmatic two-point try by Texas that failed), the hometown team found themselves down by 11, on their own 10 yard line, with a 4th and 22 and 1:17 remaining. And UCF punted. The FSN sports announcers clumsily theorized, ‘Well, looks like UCF wants to preserve a 11-point loss, so it looks close.’ Huh? Two plays later, UCF wrestled the ball loose from Charles, scored a TD and two-point conversion, before failing to convert an onside kick and a chance at a game-tying field goal.

Unlike the FSN announcers, UCF never quit. Their turnovers led to two Texas TDs, and they were down 10-20 at half, 10-23 in the 3rd quarter, than 24-35 with 75 seconds to go (and their defense on the field) — and bounced back each time. Coach George O’Leary afterward shrugged off any idea that it’s a ‘moral win’ to play close to a team only a season removed from a national championship. He told the Orland Sentinel afterwards, ‘That’s the one thing I was happy about with the kids. They were real upset about the game in the locker room.’

UCF lost 32-35.

LoW Penalty Box
When winning or losing is done wrong, the guilty get a trip to the LoW Penalty Box:

--> TCU coach Gary Patterson. A week after losing to Texas, TCU let a late 17-3 lead slip to Air Force and lost in OT. Regarding TCU’s end-of-regulation interception while in potentially game-winning field-goal territory, coach Patterson put all blame on his offensive coordinator: ‘We should have run the ball. Why we threw the ball, I don’t know. I don’t call that side of the ball. We made a mistake.’ You stay classy Ft Worth.
--> California Fans. Cal’s rising in the ranks and BCS-hope soars, but on the beautiful blue-sky gold-sun Saturday in Berkeley, 20,000-some seats glared like bare stripes on a flag of indifference. It’s Louisiana Tech not Tennessee, and Cal cruised to a 42-12 win, but c’mon Bear Fans! You won't see an empty seat in Auburn or Tennessee or Michigan despite their early-season slips.