Curses! The Buckeyes Foiled Me Again!

You know, if I wasn't already genetically and geographically disposed to dislike Ohio State, I might begin to hate those guys. They're really starting to bug me. Virtually every team I've rooted for over the past six months has been defeated/eliminated/etc. by the Buckeyes.

In football, they knocked Michigan out of the national championship race in November. In basketball, they ruined any chance Michigan had for an NCAA Tournament bid - twice in one week! And now, the Ohio State University has taken my bracket, crumpled it up, and thrown it into the garbage, by eliminating my homeboy Bruce Pearl and his Tennessee Volunteers in last night's regional semi-final.

Now that I think about it, did the St. Louis Cardinals beat the Detroit Tigers in the World Series, or did Ohio State? That happened back in October, so my memory's a bit hazy. I do remember the color red being involved, however, so I wouldn't be surprised...

Why do they enjoy hurting me? What did I ever do to piss those guys off -- oops, never mind, I know the answer to that.

I'm still not sure how the Buckeyes came back to win that game. (Yes, even though Rocky Top Talk has outlined a thorough explanation.) Weren't the Vols up by 20 at one point? I have a text message from Dr. Lil' Sis' fiancee that essentially confirms that scenario. And... and that Oden dude barely played in the game because he kept fouling people (though his fourth foul was a weak call). Yet there he was at the very end, blocking the Vols' last shot.

I suppose it's easy to say that Tennessee lost because all those three-pointers they made in the first half turned into bricks during the second half. (Those guards obviously have the green light from Coach Pearl to jack up all those threes. Otherwise, I don't know how the hell he could stand it. Maybe that's the way they always play, but I kept screaming "No! No! No!" at the TV every time JuJuan Smith or Chris Lofton hoisted it from near-NBA three-point range, only to say "Oh! Okay - well, keep doing that!" every time the shot went in.)

Anyway, so that happened. Thanks, Ohio State, for screwing me again. Dammit.

So let's bring this back home. Now that Tennessee's season is done, will their head coach be getting a call from the Michigan athletic department? Chalk this up to frivolous rumor (and a lot of those things have been swirling around over the past week), and that category could certainly apply here, but I've heard rumblings from the Volunteer State that Bill Martin plans to go after Bruce Pearl and go after him hard. Maybe even harder, now that Minnesota nabbed Tubby Smith (and if you haven't read Maize n Brew's account of that, get over there and go into your weekend with a smile). Of course, that could just be anxiety from Tennessee. Take it or leave it.

By the way, now that the shock has worn off, did Tubby Smith really leave Kentucky for Minnesota? I mean, that really happened? I just wanted to be sure. I don't have anything against Minnesota. I love Minneapolis; I almost moved there a few years ago. I'm just wondering when exactly the world I knew so well changed so drastically.

Who Wears the Pants in the Amaker Household?

Okay, I missed the Michigan-Ohio State basketball game yesterday, opting to see Zodiac instead. Some might argue that my sports fan card should be suspended for that. I'd point to the Big Ten men's basketball standings in my defense, which would've supported a case for a blowout that I had no obligation to watch.

(Sitting through almost three hours of Zodiac wasn't necessarily more fun. It's not that I didn't like the movie, yet I'm not saying I liked it either, so there's your less-than-enthusiastic endorsement. Drink some coffee beforehand, or get a Pepsi from concessions; there's a lot of sitting and talking. But I digress...)

So I didn't get to see Michigan get their hopes crushed by the Buckeyes yet again. (To even make such a comparison between football and basketball is silly, of course.) But it looked like a close one, at least according to the score I saw on my cell phone after the movie. The mantra from the home locker room at Crisler Arena, however, was "Coming close doesn't mean anything."

Tommy Amaker argued that his team deserved more, but I don't think he knows what he's really saying. As the Ann Arbor News' Jim Carty points out, if those seniors deserved anything, it was to have a better team built around them, and a coach who could teach them how to develop into better players. And Amaker never managed to do that in their four years at Michigan.

Yet probably the worst kept secret in Ann Arbor is that there will be no coaching change in the men's basketball department. Maybe Amaker did enough to save his job this week by beating Michigan State and fighting the #1 team in the country to a four-point margin. Some have said that the decision has already been made to keep Amaker, regardless of how his team finished the season. How is that possible? Well, such a decision might not have anything to do with basketball. Check out this nugget from Drew Sharp's column in today's Detroit Free Press:

"... fueling the coach's job security most is that he's the second-most-popular Amaker on campus. His wife, Dr. Stephanie Pinder-Amaker, is an associate dean of students who co-chaired a large university fund-raising initiative. She's a rising star in the academic community, something that's not lost on university president Mary Sue Coleman, who remains an advocate of diversity despite recent legal challenges.

Do you think she'll risk losing a highly qualified African-American female educator because her basketball-coaching husband hasn't fulfilled expectations?"

Of course, you could write that off as speculation (and many would dismiss it because of the byline "By Drew Sharp"). However, it might also explain a few things. Bill Martin is getting a lot of negative feedback for the state of the men's basketball program, and maybe he's to the point where he might want to make a change, too. But what if it's not ultimately his call? If you're a Michigan fan (I'm not going to say "Michigan basketball fan" because that applies to a smaller readership), how infuriating is that?

And if you're Tommy Amaker, how big should your budget be for Valentine's Day, birthdays, and Sweetest Day? Maybe throw in something for Mother's Day too, just for the hell of it.

The Gator Chomp of Affirmation

Oh, right - so that's why they play the game. Wow.

As if I didn't already feel foolish enough for protesting Florida's bid for the national championship game after Michigan's performance in the Rose Bowl, the Gators' upset annihilation of Ohio State has me reassessing whether or not I actually know anything about college football.

41-14. And it wasn't even that close. I know you can't take away Ted Ginn's touchdown to begin the game. It obviously counts. But when you consider that the Buckeyes offense only managed seven points on the Gator defense, the result seems that much more shocking.

The idea that I or anyone else briefly considered that the game might be an Ohio State rout, with Ginn scoring so quickly, seemed utterly laughable just minutes later when Florida scorched right down the field to tie the game.

And that's really as close as this ever was. Didn't Jim Tressel seem to concede the game by opting to go for it on 4th-and-1 from his own 29-yard-line? You expect that kind of play-calling from a Detroit Lions coach. It was only a 10-point game at that point, but Tressel's decision acknowledged how desperate the situation had become.

Was Tressel thinking he had to get some more points before halftime? Was he trying to keep his defense off the field? If so, he ended up applying more pressure by giving Florida the ball 29 yards away from the end zone. Who the hell knows? I'm not even sure Tressel does right now. Fortunately, Ohio State only yielded a field goal, which prevented the decision from completely exploding in his face. But that was really besides the point. This thing was over.

Unless you were a Gators fan or some kind of Buckeyes masochist, I'm not sure why you tuned in for the second half. Well, I kept watching. But I wanted to see if Florida might post 60 on the scoreboard. It certainly looked possible.

Florida's game plan was simply masterful. It was like Urban Meyer and his staff had spent the past five weeks locked away in a situation room with transparent dry-erase boards, radar screens, sophisticated super jumbo computers, and three-dimensional digital schematics turning back and forth on high-definition monitors. Meanwhile, back in Columbus, Tressel and crew were in smoky offices, watching grainy film from rickety projectors and mapping out plays on chalkboards.

The Gators had an answer for everything. On offense, a receiver was open on seemingly every play, and Chris Leak calmly found him for a big gain. Over on defense, linebackers and defensive ends rocketed past blockers - if they were blocked at all - and were in Troy Smith's face before he could even complete his dropback.

Could you have blamed Smith if he'd left his Heisman Trophy on the field, shrieked "Here! Take it!" and just run back to Columbus to hide? Was this really the same guy that looked oh-so-unbeatable this season - especially against Michigan? Not when he was battered around like a pinball. Even when he had time in the pocket (which was rare), Smith rushed his throws in anticipation of the pressure.

Had we really been poking fun at Meyer over the past month-and-a-half for his campaigning and politicking? "Urban Cryer"? "Urban Whiner"? Holy $#!+, are you kidding? Sure, I was hoping that Ohio State would wipe that pompous smirk right off his face. Too bad he smacked us right in the mouth, essentially giving the finger to anyone and everyone who dared question his team's bona fides. This was the sweetest affirmation for Meyer, who showed that he belongs among those master tacticians who can come up with anything, given a month to prepare.

Also drinking the wine of affirmation was Leak, who'd spent much of the past two years as the proverbial square peg trying to fit into a round hole. It never seemed like he was the right guy for Meyer's rootin'-tootin'-spread-option scheme. There has been plenty written about how the coach had to shake his quarterback out of his comfort zone to make him a better leader and teammate. And this year, Leak had the added pressure of staving off the chosen one, Tim Tebow. But he held his ground and asserted himself, living up to the promise he showed throughout his career in Gainesville. It was the kind of ending you love to see for a guy like this, who just clamped down on his mouthpiece and kept fighting.

So I'm done. My hands are held up in surrender. The white flag is waving. I feel like a jackass for ever expressing outrage that voters put Florida in the national title game by finding reasons not to support Michigan, rather than touting the Gators' virtues. Such arguments seem incredibly foolish today. I'd better start studying for next season. These BCS match-ups have shown me I still have a lot of learning to do about college football. And that's what makes this thing so fun. If we knew how it was all going to turn out, why would we bother watching?