A Little Ludwig Goes A Long Way

While this weekend’s victory over Michigan was not one for the ages, it does cap another great Buckeye season. Undisputed Big10 champs, 5 straight Big10 titles, Rose Bowl trip, 5th straight BCS bowl, 6th straight victory over Michigan, undefeated November including wins over other title contenders. It is a good era to be a Buckeye fan. Tresselball is alive and well despite opinions to the contrary — I am very happy winning games with a tough defense, special teams play (tho this has not been as strong this year), and mistake-free offense. Some writers want to see a lot of “style” points, but that is not football. If you value style points, go watch ice dancing or diving — fine sports, nothing wrong with them. I don’t watch football for style points.

The throwback unis looked good and it is super to commemorate the ’54 team — congrats Dad.

For Michigan, wow, another terrible season. The fan base is failing as well — the amount of scarlet in the Big House was astounding. Real Michigan fans are pissed about.  For the sake of the rivalry, I hope that Michigan starts to be relevant and credible again. I admit to having the thought that, if there was any year in which the pain of losing to Michigan would be small, this might have been it, and it would have been good for the rivalry. The wolverines weren’t up to it.

Also watched a lot of PAC 10 action. With USC caught up in its own undershorts, the Pac-10 is a mess. Stanford opted out this weekend. Arizona opted out. Oregon-Oregon State for all the marbles? When has that ever been the case in the past? The collapse of USC is like the death of Tito, with the Pac-10 fracturing like Yugoslavia into a bunch of warring factions, none dominant.

Nice collection of pictures summarizing the day at Buckeye Battle Cry. And USC wins tonight so that is good as well. Nice to see the Buckeyes play well in an important game, good to start getting that monkey off their back.

Here’s a typical blog posting from the USC community. Whacking on Corp for Saturday’s loss. All the blogs repeat this theme as do the press like the OC Register. And I saw quotes from Pete basically throwing Corp under the bus.

Seems to me tho that Corp was no better or worse than Barkley before him. When you change QBs and results are the same, perhaps it is the other variables — receivers or coaching. And as I watched the game, the poor ball handling by Havili and McKnight, who both gave up unforced fumbles to kill scoring drives, seemed like the greater issue.

Of course as a Buckeye fan, this all just reaggravates the wound.

After USC, What is the Best Home Game? | Eleven Warriors — nice data on scalping prices and also note the cool fact that either USC or OSU (or both) have been involved in the top-10 scalped games ever per stubhub data.

Sigh. USC is a great team, there was probably no way OSU was winning this game. The turning point was in the 2nd quarter when OSU penalized themselves out of a score. Things just got worse.

You have to pin the poor performance on coaching. USC offense and defense both have commented that they didn’t see anything surprising. OSU put no pressure on USC offensively or defensively. No interesting halftime adjustments — in fact halftime misadjustments as the staff decided to let Boechman carry the load — an impossible position for him with no running threat to keep the defense honest. There were a lot of stupid penalties and some really poor qb decisions to put the icing on the cake.

Here’s hoping that the staff learns something from this debacle.

On the plus side, the USC fans around us couldn’t have been nicer. Families, alums, a very pleasant crowd.

• Fan note: ESPN Gameday is coming – USC - OCRegister.com.  7am, not sure I am going to make it there
• Your guide to discussing the game with friends
• Oops — Small fires up the Trojans
• Beanie expected to play tho it seems a little iffy