2013-01-07 07:04

I decided to review the Championship game in a separate entry, so here are the reviews of the Bowl games from last week, except the BCS-Final.

The BLOCK OF GRANITE BOWLS FROM LAST WEEK

ALLSTATE SUGAR BOWL: #21 Louisville vs #3 Florida
Wow, that was an upset I think nobody did see coming.
Louisville did play very good and that QB is worth a watch next year.
On the other hand we have a very bad playing Gator-QB and a very undisciplined Gator-team.
Almost 100 yards in penalties including several personal foul are just too much against a team playing almost perfect.
With that comes a questionable coaching decision starting of the second half, where Florida was behind and did kick an Onside Kick.
In the recovery events it came to a brawl and a Gator did throw a punch, got ejected and Louisville got the ball deep in Gator territory, scored and Florida did trail even more.
What could have been, was visible in the last quarter when Florida did made first downs and scored, but it was much too late to tie a game they destroyed by themselves in the first 3 quarters.
Well, that Gator coaching staff is not stupid, so they will get that team on track next year.
33-23 -> Jacks Bowl Score: 15-14

TOSTITOS FIESTA BOWL: #4 Oregon vs #5 Kansas State
This went a bit as expected.
And it started not well for Kansas State already.
The Ducks did return a coffin corner kick off starting the game the whole distance for a score.
Ugh!
Until the half it was an open game and Kansas State did had chances to get in lead, but a very nice Ducks defense did do their best to prevent that.
A deep pass by the Wildcats almost end of the half was knocked out of the hands of the catching WR a few yards before the endzone.
A catch would have probably meant a score for the Wildcats.
The Ducks did prevent that and then scored a TD by themselves within under a minute to get into halftime with a nice lead.
In the second half it was more or less Ducks dominated, even there was not that much scoring.
One interesting event did happen, when the Ducks did score again a TD.
They trie do kick the extra point and the kick was blocked.
So free ball for a defense return, if you get it, right?
Right. A KSU-Player did catch the blocked ball in the air and did run into his own endzone to get away from the Oregon players and to return the Ball.
You all know, this can happen very easily on a try, since the LOS is right in front of the endzone (3 yard line).
That Wildcats player was almost brought down by Ducks players in the endzone, so he did try a lateral (but it was a forward pass) and the play ended with the unhappy Wildcat player catching that false lateral been tackled in the endzone.
Mean?
A 1-POINT-SAFETY!
You don't see that very often.
So now all eyes are on Chip Kelly and his eventually NFL career start somewhere.
35-17 -> Jacks Bowl Score: 16-14

AT&T COTTON BOWL: #9 Texas A&M vs #11 Oklahoma
I'm stunned over that A&M team.
This will be fun to watch in the next season.
Their QB will be back as he is only a redshirt freshman, so no worries here.
What happened?
They crushed Oklahoma in the second half, after it were an open game until halftime. (score 14-13)
They kept Oklahoma scoreless in the whole second half and won big against their former conference rival.
Johnny Manziel, the Heisman winner, did everything; he did throw for 287 yards and 2 scores and ran for 229 yards and 2 scores.
Bob Stoops, the Oklahoma HC, is a fine coach, but his Bowl fate is not that good (7-6).
We will see, if Oklahoma can rebound from that loss, next year.
For A&M, the expectations will be next year sky high.
41-13 -> Jacks Bowl Score: 16-15

BBVA COMPASS BOWL: Pittsburgh vs Ole Miss
When two 6-6 teams are meeting, this is normally not so good.
Except you have a new are and that one 6-6 team was very bad last year and did play 6-6 despite the fact it has to play a tough SEC schedule.
Ole Miss did great against Pitt and won.
I'm curious to see them next season.
17-38 -> Jacks Bowl Score: 17-15

GODADDY.com BOWL: #25 Kent State vs Arkansas State
I said it could go either way and at the end the SBC team did win, not the MAC team.
It's always a bad thing if you have to play with an interims coach, but this time both teams did lose their HC after the season because of new jobs and you never know how the teams will play in that situation.
I don't want to take away anything from Arkansas State here, but for me it looked like Kent State did suffer more from the HC loss than Arkansas State.
That Interception thrown in Arkansas States Endzone was probably a game changer.
Not only did Kent State not score, no, they also lost the ball and moved the chains to touchback point.
Well. We will see, how they will play next season under new management.
17-38 -> Jacks Bowl Score: 17-16

National Championship game will come tomorrow.

At the moment it is time for the so called underclassmen to declare for the draft and as every year some do (in average this is increasing year by year).
Some unique situation here, Björn Werner did declare for the draft.
He is a German football player who won a national championship with Berlin, when he played in Berlin Adlers (means eagles) youth team in Germany.
He did play the last 3 years for Florida State and is on some draft boards very high, some have him in TOP 5 of DE, some have him in TOP 5 overall.

Personally I don't know what I would do in that situation.
This is a very big lottery ticket you carry there.
The price? Money and fame.

Here are the rules:
Declare for draft, and eventually get drafted very high, get a very nice contract and millions up front before playing a game. Then you might be very good on the field, good, fine, or you suck. You don't know.
After 5 years you will have to get a new contract and you might get it or not.

Do not declare for the draft, play another year in college, finish college (maybe), win a championship (maybe), suffer a career ending injury (maybe) or just a bad injury (maybe). Get drafted (maybe) and then the same as getting drafted a year earlier, just with two difference. More experienced and one year of hitting more on the clock.
You might end up (because of the experience) making a better start and a better impact in the NFL and getting easier the contract extension.

So bottom line is, you might get the earlier dollar now, but more money if you went pro later, or you might end up with no money at all.

Tough from my point of view.

Think about it.

‘Til next time
Jack6 on BLOCK OF GRANITE

Tags: Block of Granite