It was a great highlight to what’s been an otherwise largely forgettable bowl season for the SEC.
Some observations around the world of college football, served up in four quarter style.
Legal Disclaimer: these views are my own and may be really dumb.
1st Quarter: Mizzou – Brady rightfully goes out a winner
The Music City Bowl seemed to me to be a pretty fair microcosm of Mizzou’s 2024 season. Mizzou did just enough to pull out a tight 27-24 win over Iowa to end the season 10-3.
The game flow was pretty recognizable – Tigers get off to a slow start, find themselves down, manage to right the ship, make adjustments, play better in the second half and make all the key plays in the final moments to get the job done. I feel like we saw that game about a half-dozen times in 2024. Not great for the collective blood pressure of Tiger nation, but it sure showed the unflappable nature that the team demonstrated throughout the year.
Obviously all us Mizzou fans wanted to see the Tigers close with a win, but it was especially rewarding to see a kid like Brady Cook end his career with a dub. This dude wanted so badly to be a Tiger, and it meant so much for him to put on that uniform and go to battle each week with his brothers. The word ‘deserve’ is dangerous to use in the sporting world, but if there was anyone who truly ‘deserved’ to go out a winner, it was Cook.
You just had a feeling that that’s how his career was supposed to end – with an exciting bowl game win to send him off into the sunset. Much like how things ended for other Tiger QB greats of the past quarter century – Brad Smith, Chase Daniel and James Franklin – Cook joined them in walking off the field for the last time as a well-deserved champion.
Come to think of it, all four of these guys led comeback wins in their final bowl games – and also relied on their defensive teammates to get a stop that snuffed out a potential game-winning drive by their opponent in the final moments.
First in the 2005 Independence Bowl, Smith led the largest comeback in MU history (21 point deficit) and then after taking the lead late, the Tiger defense ended the game with a Darnell Terrell interception. In the 2008 Alamo Bowl, Mizzou trailed three different times in a bit of a sleepy performance, but Daniel got the Tigers to overtime against Northwestern, and delivered a TD pass to Jeremy Maclin in overtime on the final throw of his career. The score stood up as Mizzou’s defense got a stop by knocking down a desperation 4th down heave into the endzone.
For Franklin, he led the Tigers to a comeback in a thrilling back-and-forth game in the 2014 Cotton Bowl against Oklahoma State, with the last score coming on a Henry Josey 16-yard run (his third of the game) with just over three minutes to play. The Cowboys promptly drove deep into Tiger territory and appeared poised to win in the final seconds, until the prolific defensive end combo of Michael Sam and Shane Ray produced a sack-strip, with Ray running untouched 73 yards with under a minute to play to clinch a 41-31 win.
Football is the greatest game around, but it isn’t always fair. Sometimes the bad guys win. But not this time. Brady Cook (and company) saw to it. It was a fitting way for a largely unheralded Missouri native to wrap up an overachieving career.
2nd Quarter: SEC – A bowl season to forget for our favorite conference
I know there’s a big debate this time every year about the importance – or lack thereof – of bowl games. There’s probably no right or wrong answer, but I’ve always believed that the games do matter. But that mindset was developed back in the day of fewer bowl games when there were no opt-outs and no playoff. Yes, that means I’m old.
So how much does it matter to the reputation of the SEC – the league which aggressively touts itself as the biggest and baddest in the land – that it pretty much face-planted in the post-season this year? It’s certainly not catastrophic, but it’s also provided fodder for the critics and haters who love to see the mighty fall.
Going into the CFP semi-finals, the SEC stands 8-6 in bowl games, with Texas the only remaining team alive in the playoffs to defend the league’s sullied honor. It’s bittersweet to know a team that most of us didn’t want to see join the league is the only one left. Yuck.
To me, the biggest offenders this time around were Alabama and South Carolina. Two teams whose fan bases lobbied hard that their teams got hosed in being left out of the playoff had to eat some serious crow after both were dealt humbling defeats when they could have made a statement. A year ago, Georgia got left out of the old four-team playoff format, and then showed they probably deserved a spot when they embarrassed Florida State in their bowl game, winning by approximately 135 points.
The Crimson Tide fell behind a middling Michigan team 16-0 before you could blink an eye, and they never really threatened to get back in the game, on the way to a 19-13 defeat that dropped them to 9-4. The Gamecocks were starting to get pretty annoying as they became everyone’s darlings after closing the regular season with six straight wins. The cocky Cocks saw their hubris take some shots when they got manhandled on both lines of scrimmage by Illinois, and their coach (Bret Bielema) who wasn’t good enough to survive in the SEC.
Tennessee didn’t exactly do much to defend the SEC’s image when they got curb stomped at Ohio State in the opening round of the CFP. But after what we’ve seen from Ohio State, that seems mostly excusable. Georgia was outclassed by Notre Dame in the CFP quarterfinals, but that wasn’t really shocking after they lost their starting QB to an injury.
Major face palm emojis go out to Texas A&M and Oklahoma for their brilliant losses to a six-win USC and to Navy, respectively. I’m sure their fan bases will spend all off-season stewing in their self-loathing misery.
All that being said, at least we have the ACC (whose teams went a collective 2-11 in bowl season) to remind us that it could always be worse!
3rd Quarter: National – CFP seeding needs changed, but don’t hold your breath
We all saw it coming when it was announced that for the 2024/25 College Football Playoff, that the four highest-ranked conference champions would receive automatic first-round byes into the tournament quarterfinals.
Anybody with a pulse could see the controversy that would ensue, and the fates didn’t disappoint, as Boise State and Arizona State won their leagues, and were thrust into a bye they didn’t really deserve.
I say that with respect, because even though they both lost their first game, both teams acquitted themselves just fine – and ASU had one of the most soul-crushing losses that only Mizzou fans can properly relate to.
That doesn’t change the fact that neither team deserved the bye that should have gone to Ohio State and either Notre Dame, Texas or Penn State.
The good news is, this process can be changed, and it will undoubtedly be changed for the future. The bad news is, I think it’s not likely to happen in time for next season’s playoffs, because the current setup is a two-year system agreed upon by the conference commissioners in the FBS level. Making the change in time for 2025 would require a vote in the off-season, and why in the world would conferences like the Big 12, Mountain West, ACC and others choose to do away with something that benefits them so greatly?
The answer is, they won’t. So we’ll probably have to see one more run through of the current setup, hoping that things play out in a more equitable way next time around, but knowing full well that the flawed system will probably rear its ugly head once again in 2025.
Then, after this two-year cycle, we’ll collectively expect the powers that be to make the needed tweaks to continue to improve this fledgling experiment. I hope that’s not just wishful thinking.
4th Quarter: Dealer’s Choice – A cast of villains remains in the CFP
I guess I should only speak for myself, but in my estimation, the final four of the inaugural 12-team College Football Playoff couldn’t have worked out any worse. The remaining teams – Ohio State, Texas, Notre Dame and Penn State – are four of the most hated and unexciting teams in the country with fairly insufferable fan bases to boot.
That doesn’t mean the games won’t be exciting or well-played, and they’ll almost certainly provide a ratings bonanza for TV executives and advertisers. But for me, I’m so uninspired with these matchups. I’ve pretty much despised Ohio State, Texas and Notre Dame my whole life. And Penn State is very hard to root for after their unconscionable handling of the abuse crimes from the Paterno era. Plus their current coach James Franklin is someone I find very hard to like.
So, will I have the games on? Yes, I’m sure I will. But I’ll probably have my phone in hand playing my video golf games that will keep me way more intrigued.