This weekend, Zach Mettenberger is visiting quarterback-challenged LSU as he looks to rejoin the D-1 ranks. He’s been offered scholarships by at least eight schools, including heavyweights like Arkansas and Alabama. But the Tigers are thought to lead for his signature. Their secret for success might surprise you:
“If I had to guess, at the top of his list would be LSU,” Mettenberger’s father, Bernie Mettenberger, said Thursday. “That’s from my conversations with Zach. He’s never been down there to LSU, but his favorite show is ‘Swamp People.’ And he’s got a real close relationship with Les Miles.”
“Swamp People” is a documentary series on the History Channel that chronicles the lives of a Cajun family on the Atchafalaya River basin.
If today were April 1st, I’d assume this to be a joke, but since it’s mid-November, I’ll take it at face value.
Earlier this week we posted a couple of photos that showed how snug a fit the football field inside Wrigley Field for this week’s game between Northwestern and Illinois was. I had mentioned that there was no amount of padding that could be placed on the brick walls in the east end zone that would save a player should he run full-speed into them.
Seems that both schools have figured this out as well. Now, it’s too late to move the game back to Northwestern’s campus, so they’ve decided on the next best thing.
Only one end zone will be used during the game on Saturday.
Can’t wait to see who loses his/her job over this.
Auburn quarterback Cam Newton is 197 yards away from breaking the NCAA single season record for most rushing yards by a quarterback. Air Force’s Beau Morgan ran for 1,494 yards in 1996. Newton, with three games remaining, has 1,297 yards. However, Morgan probably won’t have the record for much longer. Michigan’s Denard Robinson has 1,417 yards with three games remaining.
Newton and Robinson are tied for the FBS lead this season with 43 carries of 10 yards or longer.
Two players in one season breaking a fourteen-year old record? Watson, the game is afoot.
… And given the passion with which the locals embrace the sport, Lundquist, whose resume is as diverse as any announcers, is a household name in SEC country.
That’s OK with him.
“I got hooked right away,” Lundquist said. “I’ve told people since it’s been the best thing that’s ever happened to me, professionally. … You couldn’t drag me back to the NFL now, and they know that in New York.”
Color me surprised. I thought this piece of red meat that Gentry Estes tossed out last night would have the Intertubes ablaze. There was some message board chatter in response, but not much, and what I saw of it was dismissive for the most part. No Mark Bradley post, either (there’s still time, I know).
… Speaking of smart, the Big Ten obviously was wise to add Nebraska and create a title game. It promises to pay for a lot of shoulder pads and lacrosse sticks.
A source said the league’s six-year agreement with Fox Sports will be worth between $20-$25 million per season. At $22 million, divided equally among 12 campuses and the conference office, each school will get $1.7 million richer each year.
The $22 million figure is more than analysts had estimated, given that the SEC title game is believed to be worth $14-$15 million a year…
Fox Sports, hunh. They… wouldn’t, would they? They couldn’t. It’s not something they’d even think about.
Oh yes, they would.
… Fox Sports President Eric Shanks, an Indiana alum who joked he hoped the length of the deal would give the Hoosiers enough time to reach the title game, hailed it as “the biggest new property to come onto the market.”
Shanks said Fox is “a few months away” from deciding on announcers. Charles Davis and Thom Brennaman teamed for Fox’s coverage of its BCS title games.
Brennaman is a top candidate to call the Big Ten title game, although Shanks joked of the native Ohioan: “If Ohio State’s not in it, he might be weeping during the entire broadcast.”
If there’s ever a time to pull a high-profile neutral site game onto Georgia’s schedule, it’s next year. The Dawgs now have seven home games and a bye week before the Cocktail Party. The non-conference schedule is, to put it mildly, mediocre.
I presume that adding Boise State means subtracting Louisville. That’s a good move. This may have looked like an exciting matchup when it was arranged, but Louisville is a shell of its former self right now. It’s not an attractive home-and-home arrangement. There’s little upside for Georgia, and plenty of downside. And that’s before you even get into who coaches the Cardinals now.
Groo does the math here. Bottom line: even paying the buyout fee to Louisville for cancelling the series still leaves Georgia with a net profit over the two-year period. Sweet.
It may be a case of our bug (cupcake, anyone?) being McGarity’s feature, but ditching the road game in Louisville means he gets the opportunity to add a seventh home game in 2012.
It’s big time national exposure for Georgia over the summer leading up to the game, at a time when the program could definitely use it. There will be endless bloviation, to the point where we’ll almost be sick and tired of hearing about it. (I said almost.) As a bonus, one of Georgia’s rivals will be deprived of that attention.
It’s one helluva recruiting sales weapon to add to Mark Richt’s arsenal as Georgia tries to close the deal on the class of 2011.
The University of Hawaii is being extended an offer to join the Mountain West Conference, the Star-Advetiser [sic] has learned.
A 7 p.m. [HST] press conference has been called for Bachman Hall to make the announcement.
The MWC presidents met today to approve conditions under which the conference would accept UH, which is expected to join the Big West in all sports except football.
If true, this puts the WAC on the brink of going defunct; NCAA rules state that for a conference to receive an automatic postseason bid — or really be recognized by the NCAA in any way — it must have a group of five member schools that have been in the same conference for at least five years. With Boise State, Nevada, and Fresno State all headed to the Mountain West and now Hawaii joining them, the WAC would be down to the bare minimum of five tenured schools in 2012: Louisiana Tech, Idaho, New Mexico State, Utah State, and San Jose State. If even one of those schools leaves before 2017 (when brand new members Seattle, Texas State, and UT-San Antonio hit the five-year mark), the WAC will effectively cease to exist. That would be its own special brand of history, wouldn’t it?
I’ve seen speculation that this move is motivated by a belief on the MWC’s part that it makes it more relevant in the BCS AQ discussion, but methinks there’s a more primal motive in play here. Craig Thompson is finishing the job he started. At the time, I referred to the move as “like watching Mary’s Lemonade Stand attempt a hostile takeover of Jimmy’s Newspaper Route”, but this is more like watching something out of The Untouchables [some NSFW language, folks].
Makes you wonder what he’s got in mind for the Big East if TCU leaves.
“And Georgia fans, don’t be turds. Enjoy this. Soak it up. It’s awesome. If you don’t win this year, it’s still not a failure. It’s a heck of a run. Back-to-back in the Playoff era hasn’t been done. So, to ask for a third I feel like it’s gluttonous. I feel like it’s not OK. But we’ll be in the mix.”-- David Pollack, On3.com, 5/9/23
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