10 Most Hated College Teams

 So Uncoached.com released a list of the 10 most hated teams in sports. The list included three college teams; Ohio State football, Duke men's basketball, and Notre Dame football. It got me thinking about the college programs that people around the country really, really dislike and I ranked them. In addition to the three mentioned above, I added seven more.  

10) UConn women's basketball: The only women's team on this list!!! Nobody likes a team that has dominated for so long. 90 wins in a row? 90 FRIGGIN' wins in a row!!! Amazing, yes. But it just made you feel good to see them lose and cry, and pout, and be like 'We're UConn, what is this feeling of losing?'  And you know, there's just something about Geno Auriemma that rubs people the wrong way. I loved it when Pat Summit was winning titles, but Auriemma? The guy looks angry when his team wins by 30. 

Lane Kiffin. My blood boils. 

9)  Boise State football: I know there are many people who are fans of this perennial BCS crasher. But how many other people out there cry foul? Here's to all the people who ask "How would they do in a power conference? How many games would they lose in the SEC?" To each his own, but Boise State really started the conversation for the importance of strength of schedule in determining the top 2 teams in the BCS national championship game. For the record, I'm a fan of the Broncos. 

8) Southern Cal football: Two words: Lane Kiffin. Every time they lost last year just felt so good, didn't it?

7) Miami, Fla., football: The hatred thrown at the program stems from its renegade days in the 1980's. Some people suggest the program is still living in the past, but if that's the case, then so are all the haters who can't get enough of calling Miami "Thug U." So many people were calling for the Death Penalty liberally following the Shapiro scandal. The sanctions await. 

6) Kentucky men's basketball: John Calipari is the nation's best recruiter, but he hasn't won over many fans with his crop of one-and-done freshman sensations. His reliance on young talent paid off spectacularly with last year's national title, but some basketball purists can't stand the idea of "renting" players for one year, unless of course it's your team cutting down the nets at the end of the year. 

5) Tennessee football: You fire Phil Fulmer who was good at the beginning and bad at the end, kind of like an all-you-can-eat buffet. You gave Lane Kiffin a shot. Then he leaves you, your fans go all apocalyptic, but it's OK because you hired Derek Dooley. Plus, you gave Lane Kiffin a shot. 

Lord Voldemort, er, Saban

4) Alabama football: Roll Tide! Alabama was a broken program just six years ago. Enter Lord Saban and college football's craziest, most rabid fans have reason to get all smug again. They also claim a crazy amount of national titles, some of which are totally unjustified, most of which, begrudgingly, are completely legitimate.

3) Notre Dame football: All the history, nostalgia, and legacy from the Four Horsemen to Lou Holtz. No program has more lore than the Fighting Irish, and it's a bit annoying. Sure it's a historic program, but it's no different now than any other major college football program. Plus, there's the resentment of having their own contract with NBC and holding out of a conference. I predict the ACC is in your near future Notre Dame. 

2) Ohio State football: Only 15 years ago Ohio State was a respectable program cheered on by many people outside the state of Michigan. Then came Jim Tressel, who made the program a Big 10 powerhouse, but it came with his horrible sweater vest. Deep down you just knew Tressel was somehow...off. Then came the embarrassing losses to two SEC teams in BCS title games. The Suckeyes, I mean, Buckeyes have yet to live  those losses down. 

Cameron Indoor, home of the Dukies

1) Duke men's basketball: Blue bloods. Players on Duke teams have been called sell-outs, but all they do is keep winning ACC titles on a regular basis and reach Final Fours for Hall of Fame coach Mike Krzyzewski. After Duke won the 2010 championship people were literally outraged that they had beaten Butler. You ever seen an indignant Digger Phelps? I have. Their fans do tend to get annoying, but it's the only arena in all of sports where I catch myself paying more attention to the crowd than to the game. Is that a bad thing or a good thing?

Penn State Has Been Hit by the NCAA Atomic Bomb

There used to be statues dedicated to Joe Paterno.

About three years ago I was having dinner in New Orleans with a group of sports administrators who were in town for a volunteer trip. One of them was a retired athletic director for academic advising at Penn State. She asked me, "Do you know what they call Penn State?" I had an idea where she was headed but I replied, "I'm not sure, what?" She said, "They call it Happy Valley. Do you know why?" I said, "No, why?" She said, "The name says it all. It truly is a very happy place." She went on to talk about the university and how wonderful people were there. She talked about how Penn State was one of the first schools to have a Life Skills department for its student-athletes. She even gushed about the football team winning the 1986 national title against Miami. The conversation was a pleasant one, but it left me feeling uneasy. I mean certainly, not everything in Happy Valley could truly be happy, right? Last November we found out that it wasn't, and today we found out that Penn State football as we know it is forever altered.
The sanctions destroyed Penn State's legacy and its future. Penn State football will be irrelevant for what may be up to a decade, if not longer. Joe Paterno is no longer the winningest coach in Division I-A / FBS history. The 60 million dollars that will go to external funds for victims of sexual abuse, which is a great sanction that benefits the victims of this tragedy, will not only take away from the football program, but also from all the other sports programs that football helps fund. The reduction of scholarships means that fewer young adults will have the opportunity to attend college and represent Penn State.
In many ways this was worse than the death penalty, because Penn State football will continue to exist as a shadow of its former self, and we will all be spectators to its fall from grace. We will all see the Michigans and Ohio States of the world demolish Penn State and we won't be left wondering if it was because of poor recruiting or coaching, we'll all know it was because of a child molester who lurked in the shadows of Beaver Stadium. Penn State's humiliation will be a years-long public spectacle.
I hope these sanctions serve as a warning to other schools that football cannot take precedence over an institution's academic purpose. That these sanctions will provide some kind of relief for the victims of Jerry Sandusky, and that administrators will think twice about covering up any crime, especially those as heinous as Sandusky's.
Yet I cannot help but look at the NCAA people as a bunch of hypocrites. It relied solely on the Freeh Report to dole out its sanctions, without conducting any kind of real investigation on its own. The organization harps on the importance of keeping football from becoming an institution's priority, yet year-after-year the NCAA stands to gain billions of dollars from multi-year football contracts leveraged by programs like Penn State. It also continues to punish innocent student-athletes that had nothing to do with crimes committed by men of higher authority who failed them. The NCAA is losing sight of itself. The money in college sports has become too great for the NCAA to keep pretending that there isn't an incentive for programs to cheat and sink to the lowest depths of humanity. The sad truth is that ethics, morality, and virtues don't stand a chance when there is money to be made. Penn State deserved a stiff punishment, but the NCAA needs to take a look at itself and wonder if it has become that monster it aims to punish.
I'm sure that there are people in Penn State who are hurting at their core. Like the athletic director told me a few years ago, Penn State was a happy place for a lot of great people, but now comes the self-reflection and finding out truly, what makes a place "happy?"

Days Off to the National Title Game

50 off-days until the big stage is a bit much. i.e. 41-14

Building off of my previous post, I looked at the "true" national title games since 1980 to see what impact the number of days off had on the title game participants. What I mean by "true" is the one bowl game that would determine the national title winner, essentially a #1 vs. #2 matchup.

There were instances when if one team lost in a bowl game, then another team had the opportunity to win the title as in 1997 when Nebraska went undefeated and won the national title, and when Penn State also went undefeated but finished 2nd in both polls. Unfortunately, Penn State and Nebraska did not face each other in a "true" title game.

There are also instances as in 1983 when 5th ranked Miami defeated #1 Nebraska in the Orange Bowl and won the national title because of losses suffered by the teams ranked above them. Though the winner of the 1983 matchup resulted in the national title winner, it was not a "true" title game because outcomes outside of the game factored into the national title.

Here's what I found:

1983 Sugar Bowl - Penn State (36 days off) vs. Georgia (35 days off)

1987 Fiesta Bowl - Penn State (41 days off) vs. Miami (36 days off)

1988 Orange Bowl - Oklahoma (41 days off) vs. Miami (26 days off)

1993 Sugar Bowl - Miami (34 days off) vs. Alabama (26 days off)

1994 Orange Bowl - Nebraska (36 days off) vs. Florida State (35 days off) 

1995 Fiesta Bowl - Nebraska (39 days off) vs. Florida (30 days off)

The research was disappointing because dating back to 1980 from the first BCS game in 1998, there were only six instances in which the numbers 1 and 2 teams met for the national title. The data showed that in the six instances when #1 went up against #2, there was an even split between teams with more or less off-days. I would consider the 1983 Sugar Bowl insignificant in that Penn State had just one more day off than Georgia, but I must stick to my requirements.
However, to add on to a previous stat, since 1980 when teams have a difference of seven or more off-days in "true" national title games, the team with fewer days off has an 8-3 record. The sample size is too small for us to consider this significant, but perhaps there is something to having too many off days.
Going back to my first post regarding Ohio State, I still believe Florida was the superior team (I think that was clear considering the outcome). However, the 50 off-days that the Buckeyes had were the most of any team competing in the national title game in the last 31 years, at least. And when we consider our previous stat, it could be that they started the game at a disadvantage. I have to admit while I believe Florida was without a doubt the better team, I don't think Florida was 41-14 better, know what I mean?
I believe that the advent of conference title games for the Big 10 and the Pac 12 will make their elite teams better prepared for bowl games with national title implications.