The ESPN crew has become a disgusting band of self-promoting carnies? When was it exactly that “all-time� became the ubiquitous companion to the word great?
As many of you who have read this website over the course of the 2005 football season know, I don’t have much patience for USC dogma. But before anyone questions my motives, I don’t hate USC, and I do acknowledge that they are an outstanding team. However, the irrational exuberance that accompanies USC is tiresome.
USC continues to be rated on recruiting rankings, media hyperbole, and last year’s Orange Bowl. Otherwise, how does one explain their lofty “all-time� stature? Has any national championship squad had a total defense ranked 39th (just below Rutgers)? Whatever happened to defense wins championships?
This is a great offensive USC team, but for ESPN to look for the team’s overall all-time place in history before this season is even over is no less ridiculous than looking for OU’s all-time place in history in 2003. Have our memories become so short that everyone has forgotten the media’s proclamation of the 2003 OU team as the greatest of all time during the 2003 season before the Sooners lost their final two games. The regular season accomplishments of that OU offense were at least on par with what USC has done this year, and their defense was dominating – unlike USC’s. However, the thing the two teams have most in common is inferior competition.
ESPN is comparing this year’s Trojan squad to 11 “other� national champions (Other is in quotes because this Trojan team hasn’t won anything yet.) How ESPN came up with these 11 teams is anyone’s guess, but even a cursory look at the list points out some notable omissions such as the 1995 (or 1994 or 1997) Nebraska team and the 2004 Trojans and some questionable inclusions such as Penn St. ’94.
While the ’05 Trojan’s are at the top of the list of “championsâ€? according to most offensive statistics, they are also at the bottom of the list in nearly all defensive statistics. On the offensive side, some other teams are very close to the 50 ppg median output of this USC offense – likely against better defenses – UT ’69 (47 ppg) with a running attack and PSU ’94 (48 ppg) were very close, and four other teams put up over 40 ppg. OU ’03 actually produced 52 ppg during the regular season. On the defensive side, the mediocrity of this Trojan defense is in a league of its own relative to this small sampling of national champs. USC gives up 20 ppg. Only Penn State ’94 (21) gave up more than 2 scores.
While USC did not hold a single opponent under 10 points, the OU ’55 and Miami ’01 each held 8 teams under 10 points. Every team but PSU ’94 and FSU ’99 held at least 4 opponents to single digits. In terms of margin of victory, the Trojans fall right in the middle of the group. The omitted ’95 Nebraska team would have dominated the margin of victory stat.
Perhaps the most telling stat is that no team other than USC and OSU ’02 (Cinci) had a close call to a non-BCS team. As everyone knows, USC barely beat a Fresno St. team, which had losses to La Tech and Nevada. In a note on how poor the Pac 10 is this year, USC’s closest games were to non-conference Fresno State and Notre Dame. As for the Pac 10 in bowls this year, Cal topped 6-6 BYU by 7, Arizona St. topped 7-5 Rutgers by 5, Oregon lost to unranked OU, and UCLA was trailing NW 22-7 at the end of the first quarter. These are far and away the top Pac 10 teams, and none even faced a ranked opponent.
If USC does win the Rose Bowl, their place in history should be as an outstanding offensive team in a really bad conference who won a national title in a down year in college football. I suppose nothing is newsworthy anymore unless it’s described with the superlative – greatest, and while it’s frustrating, you can’t really fault Walt Disney (parent of both ESPN and BCS game media outlet ABC) for hyping an otherwise slow college football year. At least one reporter is not trying to rewrite history.
Anyway, a question for you ACC fans, what the heck happened to Georgia Tech?
I do like the Utah players quote “I don’t think the ACC has seen a passing attack like the ones in the Mountain West.” In fact, they have, BC beat Mountain West runner-up BYU 20-3, and oh, there was also that UNC win over Utah 31-17. I guess he forgot about that one on the way to his 6-5 regular season in the Mountain West.
