The Back Corner Fade

How many of you just shook your head at the end of the game asking yourself, “We just won by 29?” For two quarters and change this team was going through the motions. There’s really no other way to describe it. Poor tacking, suspect line play, horrible passing game (that never changed,) and more head scratching play calling. But, to this team’s credit, it put the game on the backs of the veteran offensive line, and flat out took care of business. Yes, the passing game is, for lack of better words, awful and certainly needs a lot of work. That being said, when you can run for 500+, that’s going to certainly mask that….for now. Another great thing to take out of this one, last year in a 14-13 game in the 2nd half, this game probably would have gone south. This team didn’t buckle, they turned it up. That’s very encouraging to see.

So what did we learn about last week, sports fans. Let’s take a look:

• Two weeks ago, I mentioned what a pathetic opening opener Texas had vs Maryland. It’s only fair to talk about the Herculean effort they put forth in South Central against Southern Cal. Consider the fact that they gave up 51 to a Big 10 bottom feeder, they completely shut down SC’s running game and if it wasn’t for Sam Darnold bailing them out, Texas wins that one. The offense is a huge work in progress, but being Tom Herman’s calling card, I got to believe that will come sooner rather than later.
• Kansas has lost 42 consecutive games away from home. 42. The last time the Jayhawks won a road game was 2009 when they went to El Paso and took care of UTEP. This past weekend, they went to Athens……Ohio to take on Ohio U and Frank Solich. It’s so bad, they can’t even go on the road in front of maybe 10,000 people and beat a middle of road MAC team. They didn’t just lose, they got flat out smoked. 
• Slowly and very quietly, Derek Mason is building something down at Vanderbilt. They’ve improved every year record wise, and this past Saturday took down a ranked Kansas St team. While they’ll never compete for SEC titles, it says a great deal that their competitive in the conference with some of the academic restrictions they have. That being said, Alabama comes to town this week.
• Vandy is a far cry from the worst team in the SEC. No, that honor clearly belongs to the Missouri Tigers. This week they were hammered at home, 35-3 by Purdue. Yeah, I get the fact Jeff Brohm is doing a nice job, but you’re an SEC school. You’re supposed to knock the hell out of bottom half, Big 10 teams. Bottom line, Missouri doesn’t fit in the SEC, in anything. Gary Pinkell had a few nice years, but this program has been in a complete tailspin since he retired. 

Conference games being in earnest this week and there and some really good ball games to be watched. Nothing to change any weekend plans, but good enough to make for a lazy Saturday afternoon on the couch.

• A much improved TCU teams heads north to take on Mike Gundy (who currently is still a man, 50 years old, and has a head of lettuce that a right winger on the 1991 Minnesota North Stars could have envied) and the Oklahoma St Cowboys. For those of you that haven’t watched OSU this year, they can score, a lot. Granted Tulsa and S. Alabama weren’t going to stop them, but I never figured they’d drop 49 pts and over 400 yards passing on Pitt……in the first half. 
• Michigan is on the road to take on the suddenly rejuvenated Purdue Boilers in a game at the beginning of the year looked like it’d be another laugher. Michigan’s offense, in a word, is awful. Got to hand it to Harbaugh, that sleep over he had at kicker Quinn Nordin’s house last year is paying off in spades. If the Mighty Quinn doesn’t bang 5 field goals, they lose to Air Force. I’m really interested to see how Purdue does in this game. The played Louisville tough (who now doesn’t look anything but average,) blew out Ohio, and knocked aforementioned Missouri around. I honestly think this thing is well in doubt deep into the second half. 
• LSU limps, and I mean limps back home to take on Syracuse after getting run out of Starkville last weekend. It’s only week number 4 and it’s already time to have some fun at Coach O’s expense. Different year, same old LSU. Undisciplined is an understatement, the offensive has the creativity of a Jim Colleto run unit, and could be well on their way to another 9-3 season or worse with Top 2 round talent all over the board. They brought Matt Canada in from Pitt as their new offensive guru and he looks a helluva lot like Cam Cameron 2.0 so far. This team needs some serious Coach O shirt ripping to turn the tide. That or have him fight Mike the Tiger. Either way, his boys need something to get them jump started. 
• Probably what could be the game of the day that will fall under the radar is Mississippi St heading over to Athens to play Georgia. Nick Fitzgerald is a tough, tough kid at QB for MSU, and their defense is better than expected. I can assure you, they’re not going to throw the ball 35+ times to try to beat them either, ahem. This will be the toughest test for Jacob Eason, Jacob Frohm, Jacob Marley, whatever Jake UGA rolls out there and obviously Chubb and Michele will once again be counted heavily. I think this one is going to be a lot of fun for the first hour then all our TV sets flip on over to Fox……

Spartan Stadium. Strange, strange things happen in this place when ND and Michigan State get together. Obviously, I need not mention the 1966 game, but just look at the last 25 years: Smoker to Haygood on the 3rd and 9 slant to the house to beat us, Dilligham to Arnaz Battle to beat them, the 4th quarter comeback in 2006, “Little Giants,” and of course Willingham running off the field in 2004 to take a Willingham. Why should this one be much different? You can never predict a wild ending, but I do think this game will be settled in the last 7 minutes of the game…..if we can’t pass. If Wimbush can look like he did against Temple throwing the ball, and there again, it wasn’t great, I think we’ll win this game by 10-14 points and do it fairly comfortably. If he looks like he did the last two weeks, get the Rolaids and rosary beads (you know you read these article, Coach Faust) because it’s heading to the wire. This isn’t a good MSU team on paper by any stretch of the imagination and the jury is still out with wins over Bowling Green and WMU (BGSU is the worst team in the MAC and WMU doesn’t play defense) to how good they really are.  They’ll be a typical MSU team: tough, play good defense, and try to wear you down with a massive line and huge backs. Basically similar to Georgia but nowhere near as talented in any position. Just throw that all out the window, because in the end, they’re a royal pain in the glutes. They’ve been that way for years, and I can’t see it being any different in the near future. 

Play defense like we have the first three weeks, block like we did for the last 25 minutes last week, and hit a receiver here and there and this one will be a breeze…….is that too much to ask?

Beat Sparty.