Harbaugh Nails It

The Michigan coach says more teams in CFP–and he is right

by John Furgele (The Stuffed 228)

You have to admit that Jim Harbaugh is good for college football and I for one hope that he remains coaching the Wolverines over any NFL team. On the eve of the Ohio State-Michigan game, Harbaugh made news this week—and this month—by stating that the College Football Playoff should be expanded.

He is not alone there; in fact, ESPN’s Heather Dinich polled 62 Power 5 coaches and 30 of them are in favor of adding more teams. While everybody spits out eight or even sixteen, few coaches offer any concrete details—Harbaugh does.

His plan calls for 11 teams in the CFP. He thinks all schools should play 12 games and that conference championship games should be gone. I agree with him there because most of them time, they don’t pit the two best teams against each other.

The B1G is a prime example. The best teams in the conference—Penn State, Ohio State and Michigan—reside in the East, and while Minnesota and Wisconsin are good this season, they usually are a rung below the top teams in the East.

If Minnesota beats Wisconsin, they will finish at 8-1, 11-1 and on paper, that certainly is good enough for them to play in the B1G title tilt. If Wisconsin wins, they would end up 7-2, 10-2, but are they better than Penn State?  Then Michigan?

Harbaugh thinks that conferences should play 11 conference games; doing that would really eliminate the “need” for a championship game. That leaves one nonconference game to schedule, which undoubtedly, would upset those that love college football.

But, be honest—how many great nonconference games are there? Fans will point to Oregon-Auburn and in year’s past, Florida-Michigan, but these are neutral site games. Teams are scared to play these games because if they lose, they basically have to run the table to have any shot of making the CFP.

Alabama claims that they play tough teams, but they never play them away from home. This year they played Duke in Atlanta and in previous years, they played Florida State, USC and Wisconsin, but those games were in Atlanta or Arlington.

Once upon a time, Alabama played home and homes with Penn State and in 1987, they visited Notre Dame. I know because 19-year old Johnny Furgele was at that game.

Because that doesn’t happen anymore, Harbaugh thinks that schools should play 11 games inside their conference with the best team advancing to the CFP via automatic bid.

The SEC plays just eight conference games and because of the artificial divisions, Alabama only plays six division games and just two games against the SEC East (Tennessee and South Carolina) and with the Vols considered a permanent rivalry, that means that Bama and Georgia can only play once every six seasons.

If Alabama played 11 conference games, only two schools would not be played and it would eliminate (we hope) games against FCS schools. We know why teams schedule FCS games, but we really don’t need to see Alabama play Western Carolina, nor do we need to see Clemson play Furman.

11 conference games is a lot—maybe 10 would work better, but you understand Harbaugh’s point. If Baylor went 10-1 in Big 12 play and also beat South Dakota, they would still have the resume to be in the CFP because they were the best team in the Big 12 conference.

In lieu of conference championship weekend, Harbaugh would like to see that first Saturday in December used for the opening round of the playoffs. In an 11-team playoff, the top five seeds get byes while the 6 would face the 11; the 7 would play the 10 and the 8 play the 9.

I think a 12-team playoff would be better because it would give only four byes with four opening round games—5/12, 6/11, 7/10 and 8/9, but perhaps I’m splitting hairs here.

There would still be bowl games for those teams that go 7-5 and 8-4 and don’t make the CFP and Harbaugh thinks teams that lose in the opening round should be in a bowl, too.

The second round would be the second Saturday in December with the semifinals contested on New Year’s Day and the title game a week later.

Harbaugh’s plan will be refuted of course, which kills me. Those that run college football will tell you with a straight face that less is more, that adding teams will devalue the importance of the regular season. When I see them saying that on TV, I cringe, scowl and then break out laughing because deep down; they don’t even believe what they’re saying.

There once was a time when the NCAA basketball tournament had 16 teams, then 24, 32, 40, 48, 52, 64 and now 68. As silly as the First Four games are, people watch them and with more states allowing sports betting, they are getting more and more attention. There are people that do care about the Alcorn State-Robert Morris game in Dayton on that Tuesday evening.

The money that can be made with an expanded playoff would dwarf what they’re making now, and eventually, America will tire of seeing two SEC teams, Oklahoma, Ohio State and Clemson in the CFP year after year and when America tires of something, guess what they do?

They stop watching and the ratings plummet.

Having 11 teams gets everybody excited. In addition to Oklahoma, Ohio State, Clemson and Alabama, there would be the Michigans, the Utahs, maybe a Minnesota or a Cincinnati and that would give the CFP some spice.

The first round games should be competitive because in all likelihood, some 10-2 and maybe a 9-3 team will be featured. That could result in some quarterfinal mismatches, but it’s still a nice buildup to the semifinals. There are plenty of blowouts in the NCAA basketball tournament and even the NCAA soccer tournament, which also takes 64 teams has a mismatch or too.

It seems that college football uses that as the reason to not expand; they don’t want a flawed 10-2 team getting beat 34-3, but that happens now. They forget that Villanova won the ’85 hoops title as an 8 seed and Kansas won in ’88 as a 6 seed.

An 11-team CFP can help or force Notre Dame’s hand. Think about the Irish kids. I’m not asking you to feel sorry for them, but if they go 10-2, they aren’t going to the CFP and because they’re an independent, they can’t play for a conference title. An 11-team playoff gives them something to play for should they lose two games.

It could also force them into a conference. With teams playing 11 (or at least 10) conference games, the Irish could struggle to find good opponents to play. We know they would play USC, but think about Navy—could the Middies play 10 conference games, Army, Air Force and Notre Dame? The answer of course, is no.

Harbaugh may be a little wacky. He says chickens are nervous birds; does that mean he doesn’t eat turkey on Thanksgiving? He may be odd, but he has given college football some good food for thought and at this time of the year it’s appropriate.

 

A Sweet and Surprising Easy Win For The Underdog Blue Bombers

When underdogs win, it’s usually close; not this year

by John Furgele (The Classic 228)

Championship games in football are unique (MLS Soccer, too) because unlike the other sports, they are one-offs. You get one chance to win the title—they are not best of three, five or seven—and if you don’t bring it, you don’t win.

For the underdog to win a one-off, things usually have to go right. Take last year’s Super Bowl for example. The Patriots were off their game, but because the Rams were also off, the better team—the Patriots—eventually pulled away for a 13-3 win.

Underdogs usually have to play almost perfect to win. Even if they are doing well, you wait for the better team to eventually put their foot down and take over. If you’re rooting for the underdog you get nervous. You lament settling for the field goal, you lament the missed field goal or the 2^nd and 7 pass that had it been caught would have put the team in scoring position. When they punt you wait for the favorite to get things going.

The Winnipeg Blue Bombers were the underdogs in the 2019 Grey Cup Game, played at McMahon Stadium in Calgary. In the regular season, Hamilton finished with a 15-3 record while Winnipeg compiled 11 wins in their 18 games.

In the 9-team CFL, you can throw the records away for a variety of reasons. Generally, the West is better than the East and with five teams there and only four in the East, the consensus is that the West teams beat each other up a bit more.

Still, Hamilton was favored, but Winnipeg jumped on the Ticats early and often. They seemed a step quicker, they hit harder and looked more prepared than their opponent. They jumped out to an early lead but because Hamilton was so good in ’19, you kept waiting for them to get up to speed and make a game of it.

It never happened.  The Bombers kept the pressure on and the Ticats kept making mistakes. They turned the ball over, they dropped passes, passes went off their hands and so on and so forth. And, had Winnipeg been more proficient in the red zone, the 33-12 score would have been worse.

The Bombers settled for six Justin Medlock field goals (and a single–he missed one). In Canada, with three downs, “settling” for field goals is more accepting than it might be in the NFL.

I can’t think of too many games where an underdog completely dominated the favorite in a football championship game. Does Seattle’s 43-8 romp in Super Bowl 48 over the 2-point favorite Denver Broncos count?

In most championship football games if the underdog wins, they do it in close fashion like the Philadelphia Eagles did when they beat the New England Patriots in Super Bowl 52. They certainly don’t win the way the Winnipeg Blue Bombers did last Sunday.

There have been many Grey Cups where the underdog has won, but there have been few where they have dominated. In 2017, Toronto was a big underdog against Calgary, a game they won by three points. In 2001, the 8-10 Calgary Stampeders were big underdogs when they beat the 14-4 Blue Bombers, but that was a 27-19 game, and though outplayed, the Bombers got the ball back down eight with a chance to draw even.

I’ve watched the Grey Cup since the mid-1970s and really haven’t missed once since 1980 and the only game I can think of where the underdog thoroughly outplayed the favorite was in 1986, when the Hamilton Tiger-Cats, a 9-8-1 team beat the 13-4-1 Edmonton Eskimos. The Cats led 29-0 at half, 36-7 after three, totally annihilating the “superior” Eskimos 39 to 15.

Hamilton was seeking its first Grey Cup title since 1999 when they beat the then defending champion Calgary Stampeders 32-21 in Vancouver. For Winnipeg, it was their first Grey Cup win since 1990.

In a 9-team league that seems hard to do. With so few teams, you would think that by dumb luck, you’d win a cup or two. The Toronto Argonauts are perhaps the CFL’s most unloved team. The other eight cities hate them and their fan support is lowest in the league; yet the Argos have won the title six times since 1990.

When the underdog wins, it’s usually a white-knuckle affair, but Winnipeg did not put their fans through the ringer much to their delight. In a way, it must have felt good for Blue Bomber faithful–you hadn’t won since ’90 and by the middle of the fourth quarter, it started to sink in that the drought was over. If you’re a sports fan, there’s nothing better than that–the ability to savor the final minutes of a championship game victory.

The Bombers did it the hard way, too. As the third seed in the West, they won at Calgary, at Saskatchewan and then beat Hamilton in the Grey Cup. They beat three teams with better records then they, so if you’re a fan, you will savor this one for many, many years.

Notes: Despite the notion that Canadians are moving away from the CFL, the TV ratings were strong with 3.6 million viewers, and the Grey Cup is Canada’s biggest one day sporting event. By comparison, Game 6 of the NBA finals, which saw the Toronto Raptors capture the NBA title, drew 7.7 million viewers. Game 7 of the Boston Bruins-St. Louis Blues Stanley Cup final drew 4.1 million and last year’s Super Bowl game (Patriots-Rams) drew 4.3 million.

 

 

 

 

 

 

When is Binghamton University Adding Football?

by John Furgele

There are four SUNY centers—Buffalo, Albany, Binghamton and Stony Brook—and only one of them doesn’t have a football program–the Binghamton University Bearcats.

The SUNY centers have come a long way in a relatively short period of time. They’ve always been excellent academic institutions, and over the last 20 years all of them have upgraded to NCAA Division I for athletics. That means they can give athletic scholarships and in theory, compete with the best of the best in the NCAA.

All four have sizable student populations—Buffalo checks with 29,000; Albany 17,250; Stony Brook, 17,300 and Binghamton, 16,500.  These are big schools and comparable to many state universities throughout the country.

Buffalo—the Bulls—compete in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), the highest of the two Division I football options. They play in the Mid American Conference against the directional Michigans—Eastern, Central, Western—the Ohioans—Bowling Green, Akron, Kent State, Miami (OH), Toledo—and the remaining schools, Ball State (IN) and Northern Illinois. If the Bulls enjoy football success, they can play in the MAC Championship Game and as of 2019, one of five bowl games that the conference has agreements with.

Schools like Buffalo play in the second tier of FBS, known informally as the Group 5 schools; G5 for short. They will often play Power 5 schools like Wisconsin and Penn State—these schools are known as P5 schools. Because the P5 schools don’t want to sign for home-and-home contests, they will often pay a G5 school a handsome sum of money for a one-off. An example of this occurred in the fall when Buffalo visited Penn State, got belted but picked up $900,000 or so to help ease the pain.

The NCAA says could G5 schools can win a national title, but let’s be real—if the Bulls finish 13-0, they would not get invited to participate in the four team College Football Playoff, which despite the banter is reserved for the big boys.

They’d end up in a big bowl game, but playoffs—–no. Still, it is Division I football and every Saturday (or in the MAC’s case, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays), you’re gaining what some would call a slip of attention, and trust me, those “SOAs” are important.

The Bulls play their home games at UB Stadium, a concrete giant that can accommodate 29,000 plus. It will never win any beauty pageants, but it is big and suitable enough to play MAC football in.  Buffalo is a pro sports town, so it is tough to gain a footprint for the Bulls, but one of these days, you would hope that enough Western New Yorkers will take their eyes off the Sabres and Bills for a few minutes and support the Bulls more than they do now.

Albany and Stony Brook play in the Football Championship Series (FCS), the lower level of Division I football. Football is the only sport that has these two distinct tiers. Buffalo could play Albany in the NCAA basketball tournament, but that can’t happen in postseason football because of this somewhat confusing two-tiered system.

The tier was created to prevent different sports in different divisions. There was a time where schools like Dayton, Butler, Canisius (they had football for years) and Iona would play Division I basketball, but Division III for football and perhaps Division II for a sport like swimming and diving.

The FCS (called 1-AA back then) was created to prevent that. Villanova wanted to remain in Division I for basketball and their other sports but they couldn’t afford to be a big-time Division I football program. The FCS was created for schools like Villanova; they could keep football but they didn’t have to compete with Penn State, Pitt, and Alabama.

The FCS offers pretty good football. There are 130 schools playing at this level. The Ivies, which include Yale and Harvard; public schools like Eastern Kentucky, North Dakota State, Montana and Montana State; private schools like Villanova and Colgate; Catholic schools like Georgetown and Holy Cross; historically black schools like Grambling, Southern, Howard and Florida A&M and small schools like Davidson and Presbyterian.

This is the level that Binghamton should participate in. With over 16,000 students and a goal to grow to 20,000, what a great way to attract more students/attention than to supply the school, the town and the region with a college football team. Adding football adds to enrollment as most college football rosters have about 100 players.

The biggest reason for not having football is cost. In 2014, some Binghamton students took a class that dealt with the topic of bringing football to the university.  They concluded that football would cost $3 million and bring in revenues of about $900,000, so yes, on paper that doesn’t look so good.

But there are other factors here, and sometimes you can be a loss leader and add revenues to your business model. For example, think about Cumberland Farms coffee; it costs 99 cents but it gets you into the store where the likelihood is that you will buy something else. The profits they lose on coffee come back when you buy a Jack Link’s beef jerky for $3.99, a slice of pizza or a hot dog.

When the University at Buffalo moved to Division I, donations to the school increased.  Why?  Because alumni liked seeing Buffalo sports results on TV and in the papers. They call it alumni pride. In fact, one alum cited seeing a blowout loss in basketball to North Carolina as the catalyst for making a donation and whether it’s $10, or $100, it all counts.

When Doug Flutie was winning the Heisman Trophy in 1984, applications to Boston College increased significantly. Thirty-five years have passed and while applications have dropped, they are still well above the pre-Flutie days. Think about that—the power of sports and the affect they have on the psyche of both alums and prospective students. Flutie–and football are still paying dividends nearly four decades later.

Football is unique because the games are played once a week; usually on Saturdays and for alums who are busy with families, it’s nice. You can check the scores later that day, or Sunday morning. If your team wins, a smile, if it loses, get’em next week. While other sports can get lost, football does not which is the major reason why its America’s number one sport.

Many schools see football as a way to generate more awareness for its university, and despite the dangers of playing football not one school is dropping it–in fact, many are adding football and some are even moving up to a higher division.

Long Island University, Merrimack College and the University of North Alabama are prime examples. All three played at the Division II level, but in 2018, North Alabama moved up to FCS and this year Long Island and Merrimack did the same.

Long Island took things a step further by doing a total rebranding. For years, there were two campuses–LIU-Brooklyn and LIU-Post (CT), each with their own sports teams. Now, the school is Long Island University, the teams’ nickname is Sharks, the football team has a stadium in Connecticut while the basketball teams plays games in Brooklyn.

Why would a university go through all this?  To brand itself and sports is one way to do just that. When kids are looking for a school to attend, sports sometimes come into play. There’s a reason why Ohio State has over 50,000 students. Sports allow a university to advertise itself without spending advertising monies.

Binghamton wants to grow. A few years ago, they introduced their 20 by 2020 initiative with the goal of having 20,000 students enrolled by that year. It’s an excellent school, one of the toughest SUNY institutions to get accepted to.  Does football help its academic profile?  Perhaps not, but it can help them draw a few more applications, which in turn, should increase their student body.

FCS football is fun and exciting. An 8,000 seat stadium with some nice features (chairback seats, for example) is all you need. The stadium could also serve the soccer and lacrosse teams and of course, intramural sports.

New York State is not a great breeding ground for FBS players, but the state produces plenty of FCS talent with Albany and Stony Brook holding their own as FCS members in the Colonial Athletic Association (CAA).

That leads to the next question–which FCS conference should Binghamton join?  Luckily, there are some attractive options that we can examine. The choices appear to be the CAA, Northeast, Patriot or Pioneer. Let’s see which one is the best fit.

The CAA is one of the top conferences in FCS football. It includes perennial power James Madison. The Dukes won the FCS championship in 2016 and are the last team to beat juggernaut North Dakota State in the 24-team FCS playoffs.

Albany and Stony Brook are CAA members which gives Binghamton some natural rivals. The SUNY Cup would surely be introduced which could hype up the competition between three of the four SUNY centers. And, just because they can, Binghamton could schedule a paycheck game at Buffalo should they desire.

The CAA features a good mix of eastern schools–Rhode Island, Maine, New Hampshire and Villanova as well as some attractive southern schools like James Madison, William and Mary, Towson, Delaware, Richmond and Elon. Week in and week out, the CAA is very good, very tough and that makes it very attractive.

The drawback is that money will need to be spent; you can’t really be half-baked in the CAA. There are 63 scholarships to dole out and in order to be competitive, you have to recruit nationally. Schools like Rhode Island have tried to be frugal and the result is losing football. It’s a good conference to be in, but not if you’re 2-9 every year. Fans have to have hope and if they don’t, they won’t go to your games.

The NEC is an attractive option. Currently, the NEC has eight football members and soon, the aforementioned Merrimack will join the fray. Most of the schools–Bryant, Duquesne, Robert Morris, Sacred Heart, Long Island, Wagner, Saint Francis of PA, are private, but public school Central Connecticut is not only a member, but a power.

The NEC allows 40 scholarships, 23 short of the maximum, so financially, this may work well for Binghamton. That does make it tougher to compete nationally, but it certainly doesn’t prevent a NEC school from making a run in the NCAA playoffs.

Geographically, the NEC is a great fit for Binghamton. There are two schools in Pittsburgh (Duquesne and Robert Morris), two in New York (Wagner, Long Island), two in Connecticut (Sacred Heart and CCSU) another in Pennsylvania (Saint Francis) one just a few hours east in Massachusetts (Merrimack) and one in Rhode Island (Bryant). Every schoool is a bus ride away.

If Binghamton came into the NEC with its guns a blazing, it shouldn’t take “forever” for them to be a competitive program. It might be tough to create a rivalry, but since Binghamton and CCSU are the only public schools, that to me looks like the Saturday before Thanksgiving encounter with the hope of a conference title on the line.

Another option is the Patriot League, which began in the 1980s and was modeled after the Ivy League in the fact that it didn’t offer athletic scholarships. That worked for over 20 years until Fordham, tired of finishing 2-9 every year started offering them. In 2013, the rest of the league followed and now scholarships can be offered for all sports.

The league features some of the oldest schools in the nation, schools I refer to as the old colonials. Lehigh, Lafayette, Holy Cross, Georgetown, Fordham, Bucknell and Colgate are the seven football playing members. With only seven teams, there are just six conference games which makes nonconference scheduling a bit of a challenge.

Would Binghamton fit here? Maybe or maybe not. They would be the only public school in the league, they would be the biggest, and that might not jive with the Patriot League model. Geographically they would be fine with easy trips to Lafayette, Lehigh and Bucknell and frankly, all the teams in the league. Personally, I don’t see the Patriot League adding a public school, but ideally, FCS conferences would have at least seven if not eight conference games, so perhaps, the Bearcats might have a case for this conference.

Patriot League schools cap football scholarships at 60, just below the 63 maximum and scholarships have helped. In recent years, the Patriot champ has made some noise in the FCS playoffs, which is why they added them to begin with.

Because Binghamton is in the East, I love seeing the eastern schools playing each other. A Binghamton-Holy Cross game looks good and sounds good and even though BU is public, academically it’s a great fit with the seven Patriot League schools and with Colgate just 68 miles north, a natural rivalry would be born.

The next option is the wildcard—the Pioneer Football League. To say this league is unique is an understatement. Back in the day, you had schools playing sports “all over the place.” Some schools were Division I in basketball and Division III in football. That still exists today in hockey and lacrosse. Minnesota-Duluth plays Division I hockey, but plays Division II in their other sports. RPI and Union play Division I in hockey and Division III in every other sport and in lacrosse, Johns Hopkins, a perennial power, plays D-1 but D-3 in their other sports.

Schools like Dayton, Drake, Butler, Iona, Canisius, Siena, Niagara, Marist, and LaSalle were Division I institutions that played Division III football. In January, 1991, the NCAA mandated that if you want to be Division I in a sport, all your sports had to be Division I with some exceptions that have been detailed above. In essence, it forbade schools like Dayton to be Division I in basketball and Division III in football.

These schools had to make a choice.  They could spend millions to upgrade their football programs, or they could drop it to comply with the new mandate. For some schools, it didn’t make sense to upgrade and many of them–Iona, LaSalle–gave up football.

What about the others?  What about a school like Dayton, a two-time Division III National Champion that wanted to keep playing football, but knew that competing with Ohio State, Cincinnati and Bowling Green was unsustainable?

Enter the Pioneer Football League. Faced with Division I or die, several schools got together and came up with a solution.  We will play Division I football, but we won’t give scholarships. The original schools–Evansville, Dayton, Drake, Valparaiso and Butler called the NCAA’s bluff. They would upgrade to Division I, but they would do so on their terms which meant no athletic scholarships.

They were not doing this alone as both the Ivy and Patriot leagues were playing without athletic scholarships at what was then called Division 1-AA. But those schools were established; they had played Division I football for decades and when the 1-A/1-AA split was made they were able to adjust and fortify themselves. Schools like Dayton and Butler didn’t have that history. They went from playing North Central and Case Western Reserve to scheduling Indiana State and Eastern Illinois.

Eventually, the PFL grew to 12 teams and in 2019 has 10 members. The non-scholarship model seems to be working, but sometimes, teams want to upgrade. Mercer and Campbell were Pioneer members, but a few years ago, both decided that they wanted to go all-in with Division I football by offering scholarships.

On the contrary, Presbyterian College has found that playing scholarship football is proving too costly and in 2021 will join the Pioneer League; so if you want to play Division I football and keep costs down, the PFL is a viable option.

The University of San Diego has dominated the PFL for the last decade. The Toreros have not lost a league game since 2016 and once again are making another trip to the FCS playoffs. They are not to be confused with San Diego State and this private university was where Jim Harbaugh got his head coaching debut as he coached the Toreros from 2004-2006, going 7-4, 11-1, and 11-1.

Because of the non-scholarship model, the Pioneer League has a wide national footprint.  In addition to San Diego there are teams all over the country; Jacksonville and Stetson in Florida; Dayton (Ohio), Drake (Iowa), Marist (New York), Butler (Indiana), Valparaiso (Indiana), Morehead State (Kentucky) and Davidson (North Carolina).

Since you can’t offer recruits a scholarship, you can sell them on being able to see much of the country via airplane. Unlike most FCS conferences, there is more time flying than busing. When you play for Marist, the only way to get to San Diego, Stetson and Jacksonville is by air.

For Binghamton, the Pioneer would be a good fit because of cost. You can dip your toe in the waters and see how it goes. If success comes, you could pull a Mercer or a Campbell and move to scholarship football. For Presbyterian, the PFL likely saved the college from dropping football.

With no scholarships, money is saved. If you take 63 scholarships and multiply it by $30,000, that’s $1.9 million that isn’t given away. Students would be eligible for merit aid and need-based aid, but that’s aid that is available to all students, not just ones who would play football at Binghamton.

Pioneer schools play eight conference and three nonconference contests. For years, the Ivy League thumbed their noses at the lesser Pioneer League, but times are changing and more games are taking place between the two leagues.  This year Marist hosted both Cornell and Dartmouth (losing both) at Tenney Stadium in Poughkeepsie.

There are some drawbacks. One is nonconference scheduling. Often, PFL teams will face off against schools that give athletic scholarships and sometimes, the games can get ugly. On the other hand , San Diego has won two playoff games in recent years, beating scholarship-giving schools.

Travel is another concern. Yes, you’re saving money on scholarships, but you’re booking flights and hotels rather than busing to and from each week.

FCS football might not appeal to the masses, but the quality is good and the level produces more than its fair share of NFLers.  Super Bowl winning quarterback Joe Flacco played at Delaware; Tony Romo, Eastern Illinois, and running back Brian Westbrook starred at Villanova.

FCS football doesn’t require a 30,000 seat stadium either. Albany plays in a nice 8,500 seat stadium, Tenney Field at Marist holds 5,000 and Stony Brook’s Kenneth LaValle Stadium holds 12,300. For Bearcat football, an 8,000 seater would more than suffice.

Assuming Binghamton elects to join its fellow SUNY brethren by adding football,which conference should they apply to?  The CAA? The Patriot? The NEC?  The Pioneer?

To me, the NEC makes the most sense. The schools are close geographically and for a fledgling program like Binghamton, the NEC offers tough but not overwhelming competition.  Long Island and Merrimack are newbies to Division I and both would be eager to have a new team like Binghamton to square off against. Moreover, the league seems eager to expand and adding Binghamton would give the conference nine schools. That means everybody plays each other in true round-robin fashion for eight games.

Binghamton would have no problems scheduling nonconference games. Colgate, the Ivies, Marist, the CAA and the remaining Patriot schools would be more than willing to do some home and homes with the Bearcats.

A case can certainly be made for the Patriot League. The schools are closer in miles and with only seven current members, one would assume that the league would be open to expanding. Games against Colgate, Bucknell, Lafayette and Lehigh are easy trips, and eight just looks and sounds better than seven.

I’m just not sure the Patriot League would want a public university in its conference. I’m not sure Binghamton fits their profile. The Ivies will never expand, and in some ways, the Patriot thinks like the Ivy and if they ever considered adding a school, wouldn’t a Sacred Heart or Duquesne make more sense?

The Pioneer League remains the wild card. John Hartrick is the Associate Athletic Director at Binghamton and cites cost as a major concern.

“Money,” he said. “I’m just not sure football is viable. I don’t think we can afford the 60 plus scholarships at the Division I level.”

If that’s the case, then the starting point is easy—the Pioneer Football League.

It’s time for Binghamton University to get the proverbial wheels in motion and outline a plan for the addition of college football. At one time, the school was called SUNY Binghamton; they played at the Division III level and they were known as the Colonials.

They made a big leap once; the time to do it again has come.

 

 

 

 

 

It’s Grey Cup Time: CFL Title Game This Sunday

by John Furgele (The Beau 228)

Finally, the drought will end. When the 107^th Grey Cup kicks off this Sunday at 6:30 pm ET, the team that wins the game will end a championship drought that dates back to the 1990s.

The East champions are the Hamilton Tiger-Cats and record-wise are the CFL’s best team. Despite losing their starting quarterback in week seven, the Tabbies haven’t missed a beat with Dane Evans taking over at the pivot and finishing with a 15-3 record. In the East final, they beat Edmonton 36-16 to advance to the big game in Calgary.

The Ti-Cats have played in several Grey Cups, most recently in 2014, but have not sipped bubbly from the chalice since 1999 when the Danny McManus-Darren Flutie Cats defeated Calgary to win the title.

The opponent is the Winnipeg Blue Bombers who made the Grey Cup the hard way. The Blue Bombers were the three seed in the West with an 11-7 record. That meant that they would have to win two road games to claim the West and a berth in the game.

Mission accomplished. After routing defending champion Calgary in the West semifinal, the Bombers won a white knuckler by holding off the Saskatchewan Roughriders 20-13 in Regina.

The Riders were held to four field goals and a rouge, but late in the game, had a 3^rd and goal from the one yard line. Everybody knew what was coming—a QB sneak by Cody Fajardo—and the Winnipeg defense was up to the challenge as they stuffed the Nevada product and took over on downs.

But the last three minutes of a CFL game are long and the Riders forced a punt, got the ball back and had one more play with four seconds left and the ball on the Winnipeg five. Fajardo’s pass hit the crossbar (dead ball) and that was that; Winnipeg had done it.

If you think Hamilton’s drought is bad, think again. The Blue Bombers have not won the Grey Cup since 1990 when Colgate product Tom Burgess led them to a 50-11 pasting of the Edmonton Eskimos. The Bombers made the Grey Cup in 2007, but had to play it  with backup quarterback Ryan Dinwiddie, losing to Saskatchewan and lost to Saskatchewan, 23-19.

Since winning in 1990, the Blue Ones have lost in the final five times, the aforementioned 2007 and 2011 as well as 1992, 1993 and 2001. And, unlike the rest of the CFL teams, the Bombers have represented both the East and West divisions in the Grey Cup.

When the CFL has nine teams, the Bombers reside in the West, but in those instances where the league has dropped to eight teams, the Bombers were moved to the East. There have been times when both Ottawa and Montreal have taken breaks, thus forcing Winnipeg east to balance the league out.

In fact, all of their Grey Cup appearances since 1990 have been as champions of the East Division. This year marks the first time since 1984 that Winnipeg has come into the Grey Cup as the West champion. In that 1984 game, they defeated Hamilton 47-17.

As the say something’s gotta give and fans of both franchises are feeling that this year is the year to break that drought. The last time Hamilton played in the Grey Cup in 2014, Zach Collaros was its starting QB; on Sunday, he’ll start for Winnipeg.

The CFL is unique and unlike the NFL has an understated quality to it. The highest paid player in the makes $750,000 per year with many players hovering in the $100,000 salary range, but despite that, the league has played 106 Grey Cups and puts out a very good product.

The best thing about the Grey Cup is that there is no two week break between the Division Championship Games and the cup, meaning it is a normal week for players and fans. Teams will have meetings Monday, fly to Calgary Tuesday and then practice Wednesday-Saturday and play on Sunday.  With the normal schedule, there is no need to overhype this league’s biggest game of the season.

The game will air on ESPN 2 and in a tremendous get; Keith Urban will perform at halftime.  Don’t be confused when teams punt on 3^rd down and don’t shake your head when teams elect to take the ball at their own 35 after a made field goal. Oh, and when it is 1^st and 10 at the 53, don’t worry about it.

Dear UConn and UMass Football: Please Come Home, The Yankee Conference Wants You Back

Nothing but tales of woe for both football programs

by John Furgele (The Optimistic 228)

We all know how big college football is, so big that the NCAA is allowing athletes to make money off their likeness as well as holding a job if they wish.  Because it drives the money bus, all the schools want in. But when is enough enough? When do some programs look themselves in the mirror and admit they’ve been had?

The football programs at the University of Connecticut and the University of Massachusetts are in sad, sad shape. They have so many things going against them that it makes you feel sorry for both schools.

Let’s start with UConn. We all know what’s going on in Storrs. For years, their athletic program was defined by its basketball—men and women. They decided to get into football because everybody told them there were riches to be had. For years, they enjoyed decent success at the 1-AA (now FCS) level, but they took that leap to the FBS hoping to strike gold.

When they did so, it forced the basketball program to go with them and off to the newly formed American Conference they went. They were joined by similar programs—Memphis, Temple, East Carolina, SMU—decent football programs, but far from juggernauts. In short, since being there—they have stunk up the joint.

To their credit, they know who they are—a basketball school—and when the Big East decided to let them back in, they dropped the American and will play football as an FBS independent starting in 2020.

How bad is the football program?  They’re 0-6 in the American and 2-8 overall. In those six conference games, they have given up 281 points and scored just 80.  On Friday November 1, they hosted a very good Navy team. The Middies have 100 players on its roster; these kids go to Navy because they love their country and want to serve after they graduate. Of the 100 players, there are no blue-chippers, no 5-star recruits and if they weren’t playing for Navy, 93 of them would be playing FCS, Division II or even Division III football.

Despite those notes, the Middies hung 56 on the Huskies in a 56-10 rout before an announced crowd of 16,683 in East Hartford. Simply, that shouldn’t happen. Yes, Navy is good enough to win games, but when their grinders beat you by 46 points at home, it shows just how low Connecticut football is.

As bad as UConn is, it’s worse at UMass, where the Minutemen are already playing as a FBS independent. The Bay Staters play in a lousy stadium and have to search high and low to find 12 opponents each year. Of course, when you never win, teams will be calling to get you on their schedules. One of UMass’ losses was to UConn by a 56-35 score, so that tells you right there how bad the Sixty-Second Men are.

They sit at 1-9 and in those ten games have yielded 531 points, an average of 53 per game. Last Saturday (Nov. 2) they lost to Liberty, a team that just joined the FBS this season and all the Flames did was come to Amherst and beat them 63-21 before an announced crowd of 10,284.

This week, they faced an Army team that still hasn’t recovered from its devastating loss at Michigan. The Black Knights were 3-6, but they were still potent enough to hang 63 in a 63-7 win at West Point.

It’s tough to win in the Northeast. Look at Syracuse. Look at Rutgers. Look at Pitt (technically they’re not in the Northeast, but you get the point). Look at Boston College. They all can’t be 9-3 each season and going to good bowl games.

It’s even tougher in New England. As we know, the population has shifted. There are still lots of people living in Northeast, but gone are the days of Sully and Wife having six kids with four of them playing football at Suffolk Catholic and then Boston College. High school football isn’t as big as it once was. Teams that used to have 60 kids, now have 22 to 30, with some having so few that 8-man football is starting to appear.

The region still produces plenty of FCS talent. Maine, New Hampshire, Holy Cross, Colgate and others hold their own at that level. The Ivies do too, but Ivies recruit nationally because they’re………Ivies.  Still, there are plenty of New England kids on Ivy League rosters. But there are reasons why Northeastern and Boston University dropped football and why Rhode Island has struggled in recent years; there just isn’t enough talent to go around.

If both UConn and UMass could, they would admit the truth and realize that FCS football is the best level for them. We know that won’t happen; UConn has a 45,000 seat stadium, which was not built for games against New Hampshire, Lehigh, Holy Cross, Fordham as well as FCS newbies Merrimack and Long Island.

UMass used to win at the FCS level.  In fact, they won the title in 1998 and lost in the championship game in 2006, but they thought that moving up was the right thing to do and since, have experienced not even moderate success.

The thing that is most concerning is what to tell, sell and market to your fans. Why would anybody want to go to a UMass or UConn game? What fun is it to sit in the stands and watch your team get blasted each week? And, even if you lose a close game, it’s more by luck than anything else.

At least at the FCS level, games would be competitive. UMass could play Maine, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Albany, Delaware, Holy Cross, Colgate, William and Mary and if you had tickets to their home games, you’d drive to the stadium thinking they had a chance to win. But, when newbie Liberty hangs 63 on you, what can you do?  What would make you want to come back for more?

There are many who don’t watch or accept FCS football, so dropping down will automatically lower gameday attendance. For them, it’s FBS or nothing; in fact, it’s Power 5 FBS or nothing.

The other thing that hurts these New England schools is that there are pro teams everywhere. Even when Boston College is good in football, they struggle to get attention in an area that has a plethora of professional teams in Boston and New York.

I am pleading my case here for UMass and UConn to go back to their FCS roots. I know it won’t happen, but that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t.

 

 

 

Almost Home at Santa Anita–Then It Happened

The first 13 races were clean, the last one wasn’t

by John Furgele (The Concerned 228)

They almost made it through. Thirteen Breeder’s Cup races, 176 horses with no on-track incidents. And then it happened. In the biggest race of them all, the one broadcast on NBC a horse suffered an injury. The Breeder’s Cup Classic was quite a race with the hard-charging Vino Rosso overcoming some earlier 2019 misfortune to win the $6 million race at Santa Anita before over 67,000 spectators.

Mongolian Groom was the horse that was pulled up with less than a quarter mile to go. The gelding was competing hard, running third at the top of the stretch when he suffered what ultimately would be a fatal injury.

Some saw it on TV, while others heard about it later. Kudos must be given to NBC; they didn’t skirt the issue and didn’t just mention it once. They were fair; they talked about it as well as conducting an interview with the on-track vet.

Our country is in the midst of self-examination, which, despite some pains, is probably a good thing. Horse racing is no different; the last year has been one of intense introspection.

Horses get injured. They are enormous athletes that train and race on very skinny legs, and sometimes, they break bones and have to be euthanized. Since December 26, 2018, 37 horses have died by way of training/racing/other at Santa Anita Park. That is a high number; by comparison, Churchill Downs’ had 43 fatalities over the last three years (2016-2018).

Unfortunately for the sport, the breakdowns started happening at the wrong time and they kept happening enough to garner attention. And once people caught wind of it, the scrutiny intensified.

Society has changed. Some say it has changed for the worse; that we have gotten too soft and sensitive, while others say that it has changed for the better as we, as a nation, are more aware and more in tune to what is right and just.

The governor of California is Gavin Newsom; he doesn’t appear to be a fan of horse racing and if he was given truth serum, he might choose to get rid of it.  He knows that the tracks contribute to the state’s economy, but he views horse racing as an industry that takes short cuts and in his words, if the “sport doesn’t make reforms, its time is up.”

He couldn’t run and win on that platform in Kentucky, but in a state like California, it sells and sells well. He has supporters and every time a horse goes down at Santa Anita, the number grows.

The sport is trying.  There were almost as many vets as there were horses at this weekend’s Breeder’s Cup, but still a horse was put down. The sport knows it has to keep trying, but it seems like they can’t get on the same page and those that defend the sport always have an answer.

Horse racing is regulated by the individual states and that is likely to remain, so what goes in New York doesn’t necessarily go in California. That said why couldn’t the states get together and hammer out some consistent legislation that would benefit all that make their living in the Sport of Kings?

Tapeta is a synthetic surface that statistically has proven to be safer than traditional dirt. There was a time when all California tracks were required to have it, but the tracks, for many reasons, put the dirt back in.

The anti-Tapeta faction has always rebutted those that support it. Fatalities were down, but soft-tissue injuries were up. Handle stayed the same, but the good trainers and horses didn’t come to the synthetic tracks for their big races. The rubber was good for morning training but too hot for afternoon racing.

Horse racing has been run on natural surfaces—dirt and grass—since its beginnings.  Traditions are important to all sports, horse racing included. But the sport “feels” like it is in trouble. It just doesn’t look confident and when you have trainers like Todd Pletcher saying he was anxiety-ridden about potential fatalities at the Breeder’s Cup, that’s not what you want to hear.

The conversations will continue and the sport must keep coming up with positive reforms to ensure its long-term viability. Look, you never want to see a horse breakdown, but they had just one over the weekend.  Yes, you could say that it’s one too many, but you can say that about a lot of things.

The sport still has more people that like it than don’t. There were 67,000 plus in attendance for the Breeder’s Cup Classic and each summer Saratoga Race Course draws over 1 million fans to its 40-day meet.

Governor Newsom is watching and California is a referendum state. I have to believe that Newsom wants to work with those in the horse racing industry to make it as safe as it can be; safe enough for trainers like Pletcher to come to Santa Anita relaxed and ready to race rather than be filled with angst.

All in all, it was a safe weekend for horse racing at Santa Anita. The goal is for that to be the norm.