Friday, October 4, 2024

I Tell Ya' Herbie

   Our weekly look at college football, I Tell Ya' Herbie starts (pause) now.

I Tell Ya' Herbie:

                             One tweak that I would make to the college football playoff would be that the fifth conference champion (Group of Five) receives the fifth seed.

Most likely, the committee will place that team as the twelfth and last seed, which means that the team will likely wind up on the road as the second-best SEC team.

Do I think that putting that same game at home would change the result?

Probably not but the best at-large team wouldn't be the final seed, it would give the G-5 team a better chance and either the G-5 or last seed would be guaranteed to advance, creating the possibility of a Cinderella to the Final Four.

If that's too much to ask, I'd be willing to compromise and require the G-5 participant to be given no lower than the eighth seed, which guarantees their representative a first-round home game.

I Tell Ya' Herbie:

                            I don't think he has a prayer of winning but it would be nice if Boise State running back Ashton Jeanty would be among the participants invited to New York City for the Heisman announcement.

Jeanty has destroyed opponents, rushing for 845 yards and thirteen touchdowns in four games, which includes 192 yards and three touchdowns against a top ten team in Oregon and Saturday's 259 yards and four scores against previously unbeaten Washington State.

Assuming Jeanty keeps this level of production and barring injury, that should happen, he deserves that recognition by the national media.

I Tell Ya' Herbie:

                             I didn't think the video review of the Hail Mary would have given Virginia Tech a walk-off win over Miami was conclusive enough to change the on-field call but you are extremely naive if you think that Miami playing at home had nothing to do with the change.

No one will ever admit that (as in the Pittsburgh-Oakland Immaculate Reception game in 1972) but it's true.

I didn't think there was evidence to overturn the call, mainly because there wasn't a good view of the ball, which I would have felt the same way if the review was to change from no-catch to catch.

I Tell Ya' Herbie:

                             The best race for an automatic bid might be the Big 12, where the three teams who were favored in the preseason all not only have September losses, they have in-conference losses!

Kansas State lost to BYU last week, Utah lost to K-State on Saturday, and Oklahoma State has lost to both of the aforementioned teams.

This opens up the longshot possibility that if say the Big 12 has three losses, could a Group of Five team such as a one-loss Boise State or UNLV or an unbeaten James Madison or Liberty have any chance of grabbing a fourth seed and therefore a first-round bye?

It would take some luck but not out of the question.

I Tell Ya' Herbie:

                             The Mountain West added their seventh school bringing their conference in a tie with the Pac 12 in the league's race to eight members that would play all sports with the announcement that UTEP will leave Conference USA to join their league.

The Miners are an excellent fit for the Mountain West, having competed against several schools in the league when UTEP was a member of the WAC, the forerunner of the Mountain West but was left out of the new league.

UTEP re-gains some rivals from years past such as Wyoming and New Mexico and will save money on travel by leaving the far-flung CUSA.

Earlier in the day, The Pac-12 added Gonzaga in all sports but football, in which the Zags do not field a team.

While that is quite a coup in basketball, Gonzaga will not count toward the Pac-12's needed number of eight schools because Gonzaga doesn't play football.

Texas State has been approached by both leagues, according to reports but is rumored to prefer the AAC to either league as that conference has three Texas schools in their league.

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