Archive for December, 2009
You probably figured there was no way we could work a Bay Area angle into the Holiday Bowl, right? Not with the winning team being Nebraska in a 33-0 blowout of Pac-10 team Arizona. Fear not, we can sneak the local angle into any situation, although, in this case, it was not really that difficult. ...
Dec 31st, 2009
One day after Stanford offensive coordinator David Shaw said it was “very, very doubtful” that Cardinal redshirt freshman quarterback Andrew Luck would play in Thursday’s Sun Bowl, Cardinal head coach Jim Harbaugh said on Wednesday that there is a chance Luck could play. Lucks’ status becomes the No. 1 issue of the of the game between ...
With Pac-10 play beginning this week, the question is not whether Stanford will win its 10th straight Pac-10 regular-season title but whether it will go undefeated in the process. While winning or tying for 18 of the past 21 Pac-10 championships, the Cardinal has gone 18-0 only four times and not at all since 2001-2002. But it’s hard ...
Four surprises, each with an accompanying question, headline our Pac-10 men’s basketball preview with conference play beginning this week. Surprise No. 1: Washington State – How can a team transform itself from a slow-down team to a fast-paced team in the offseason and exceed expectations? Surprise No. 2: USC – Can one player most people ...
The one thing Stanford’s men’s basketball team seems ill-equipped to handle is a dominating big man, and that is exactly what the Cardinal will face when it hosts James Madison at 7 p.m. on Tuesday in its final game before the start of Pac-10 play. James Madison is 6-4, but a more accurate record for ...
Let me get this straight: A fellow named Dabo just won a bowl game as Clemson’s head coach. Someone called Jimbo will become a head coach at Florida State in a week. And a guy named Joker probably will be Kentucky’s head coach. Dabo, Jimbo and Joker – the rhythm of college football in the ...
Bowl games are sort of like politcal spin doctors: They have a lot more influence on public perception than they should. Not only does a performance in a bowl game define a team or a player for that entire season, but it shapes the sporting public’s opinions for the next season. A favorable matchup or one lucky ...
For those who are curious, USC’s opponent in the Emerald Bowl is Boston College, which technically will be a participant at San Francisco’s AT&T Park on Saturday evening. But the Eagles are sort of like the out-of-town opponent brought in to face the rising local boxing star. Sure, the opponent has a chance to win, but the story and ...
Cal’s puzzling season appropriately concluded with a perplexing performance in the Poinsettia Bowl that paralleled its strange season. The 37-27 loss to Utah on Wednesday leaves the Bears’ future and the Pac-10 in an unsettled situation. The Pac-10 is 0-2 in bowl games, losing decisively to Mountain West teams in games in which the Pac-10 ...
You don’t have to have be coach Norman Dale from “Hoosiers” (“I think you’ll find these exact same mesaurements at our gym back in Hickory”) or even an expertise-spewing analyst at ESPN to know what happened to Stanford’s No. 2 women’s basketball team against No. 1 Connecticut on Wednesday. Connecticut was too quick and too ...