December 7th, 2011 at 1:45 PM ^
is that the Kraft Hunger Bowl should really not be a thing.
December 7th, 2011 at 1:48 PM ^
Exactly right. This only proves that bowl saturation is ridiculous. When Illinois, Purdue, and a sub-.500 UCLA team all go bowling, there is something wrong.
December 7th, 2011 at 2:47 PM ^
when Western Kentucky goes 7-5 and is left home. 0-12 two years ago to 7-5 should earn you a bowl if only for the determination to turn things around...
December 7th, 2011 at 3:29 PM ^
Because UCLA draws 60,000+ to its home games and Western draws 14,000? (If that--whenever I see these numbers at the low end I remember EMU handing out tickets to charities just to get their average attendance over the D1 threshold.)
December 7th, 2011 at 1:49 PM ^
Yes, but you'll watch it, won't you? Just to see if your eyes will fully bleed.
December 8th, 2011 at 1:59 PM ^
...but if there's a choice I'd rather watch Random-Sun-Belt-Team that I haven't seen before. I understand why it's this way, but I don't particularly like it.
December 7th, 2011 at 1:51 PM ^
........there are a lot of "bowls" that should not really be "things". We just got lucky that someone decided to have pity on Illinois this year.
What would really be something is if the teams in bowls that we played this year actually ended up winning 9 of them. Purdue plays Western Michigan so one of those teams will have a loss. To have played 9 bowl winning teams, and beaten 7 of them would be really telling for the season as a whole.
December 7th, 2011 at 2:03 PM ^
Nothing fights hunger like college football bowls. See you at Beef's!
December 7th, 2011 at 4:55 PM ^
The bowl might be beat but hell I'll take another whack just to check. It's college football, I love it and I really can't wait to watch this train wreck of a bowl. Think of the announcers and the storylines they will be just desperately reeeeeeaching for.
December 7th, 2011 at 1:48 PM ^
What does Sparty think of this?
December 7th, 2011 at 2:05 PM ^
Their whining about the BCS this year is exactly why they are the "little brother" and always will be. And actually, they aren't the "little brother". The "little brother" in most families gets quite a bit that the older brother never does, and vice versa. In reality, they are more like the "middle brother", always getting handmedowns from the older brother and then when they leave home, the "little brother" starts getting the same perks the oldest brother had.
Or, alternatively, they are the "step brother" in a family of favored elder siblings(UM, OhioSt.) in a remarriage where the new wife cannot stand the old wife, and projects that hate onto an available target(MSU), while still showing respect to those elder siblings and lots of love to the newest members of the family who happen to be both parent's kids(PSU and Nebraska). And unfortunately for them(MSU), even the degenerate new child(PSU) gets preferential treatment compared to them.
Poor Sparty. Always a doormat. The most likely of all the children to work at the post office, or start torturing animals, eventually attempting to kill off the rest of the family. Seriously, we saw hints of this during our game with them this year.
December 7th, 2011 at 2:27 PM ^
Let's leave it at "brother" for now and hold off with the "little" until we have "consecutive multiple" wins against MSU.
December 7th, 2011 at 4:07 PM ^
So, Michigan's never had "consecutive multiple" wins against little brother? Think again...
1916-1929 - Fourteen consecutive wins
1938-1949 - Ten consecutive wins
1970-1977 - Eight consecutive wins
2002-2007 - Six consecutive wins
1979-1983 - Five consecutive wins
1996-1998 - Three consecutive wins
1910-1912 - Three consecutive wins
1898-1907 - Three consecutive wins
December 7th, 2011 at 10:14 PM ^
Lil' brother is not just a football term. The term is used to describe them in all aspects of the college experience and life in general.
Lil' brother is always jealous of Big Brother. Big Bro has a better job, hotter wife, overall a much happier disposition. Big Bro embraces adversity and faces it head on. Lil bro just sits back and cries, "why me?" or "why not me?"
Big Bro is the leader in every aspect of life, from medicine, engineering, space exploration, world leadership, world economics, philanthropy, law, the arts, entertainment, and much more. Big Bro isnt arrogant, he is just confident. He leaves the world a better place than when he arrived.
Lil brother can only sit back and watch. No matter how hard he tries, he can never be Big Brother. Big Bro is so busy with his life that he really does not care about lil bro. He knows that lil bro exists, he hears him bitching every now and then. But humanity is so much more important than lil bro.
The only way lil bro can "get back" is once per year, lil bro challenges Big Bro to a gridiron chess match. Big Bro accepts this match and typically embarrases lil bro. The current record is 67-34-5. Big Bro wishes he didnt have to do this. He wishes lil bro would just move away to a different family so he does not have to humiliate him anymore.
December 7th, 2011 at 2:27 PM ^
I think the need that some Michigan fans have to constantly make fun of and put down Sparty makes us look like "insecure older brother". Bringing up "little brother" over and over gets a little annoying after a while. I'm all for ripping them when they do something wrong and shutting them up when the bicker and whine, but most of the time it's better to just look at them with a smile on your face. The fact is, past three they've beaten us, but never soundly. (Okay, well maybe one time soundly) They'll make it seem like their team is now worlds better than ours because of four years of close wins. They are only marginally better than us. Their coaches' have done a great job evaluating, recruiting and developing talent. They take lower ranked guys, get most of them to play at an average Big Ten level and get a couple to play like 5 star future first round picks. It's a gamble, and they will miss sooner rather than later. Let them bask in their glory, it will be short lived and great to watch them lose to us next year. We'll show them how one team can dominate another without playing dirty.
December 7th, 2011 at 9:20 PM ^
........miss my point and the point of others who routinely refer to them as "little brother". It doesn't have a damn thing to do with whether or not they beat us, are in some kind of winning streak, or anything about their game(s) with us. It's about their whiny mentality that projects all ill that befalls them and their school as somehow being our fault, or anybody else's fault, other than their own.
This season is the perfect example of that. Yes, they beat us head to head. So what? In the grand scheme of cfb, their record and ours is very comparable, and pretty equal all things considered. Going into the last week, conference championship week, we were closely ranked with them, particularly on the computers. They had their own destiny in their hands. No one else, other than Wisconsin, had anything to do with their falling out of BCS berth contention. It was their own fault that they lost. Not ours. We had absolutely nothing to do with it at all. Yet, when they've spoken since then, all the blame for their predicament(not being in a BCS bowl) is placed on Michigan. THAT is why they are referred to as "little brother".
So, again, Efff Sparty. They get what they deserve in life. Karma. It's a bitch sometimes.
December 7th, 2011 at 2:50 PM ^
It was great to see the game stolen from them by one of their own players. Just as Ohio features the cheaters of the B1G, MSU contains the thugs of the B1G. Whiny thugs at that.
(#CaptainKirk & #General Dantonio)
December 7th, 2011 at 1:49 PM ^
I think Eastern was just a win away from a bowl too.
December 7th, 2011 at 1:51 PM ^
They almost made the Pez dispenser/KY jelly Bowl in Bolivia.
December 7th, 2011 at 1:58 PM ^
Oh, I thought I heard they were going to the Trojan Condom Bowl, in South Penisula, FL.
December 7th, 2011 at 2:19 PM ^
"Florida, America's wang"
<br>"we prefer the sunshine state"
<br>
December 7th, 2011 at 2:43 PM ^
The Sun Also Rises.
December 7th, 2011 at 9:23 PM ^
December 7th, 2011 at 2:00 PM ^
Where do I send the invoice for the new monitor and keyboard I now need???
<should know better than to drink coffee while on this board>
December 7th, 2011 at 1:59 PM ^
Scheduled a 1-A cupcake! Haha
December 7th, 2011 at 2:04 PM ^
the last few years they were 1A cupcakes. The best talent on that field was mormally the random high school games they hold. That speaks wonders on how well English turned that program around.
December 7th, 2011 at 3:07 PM ^
December 7th, 2011 at 3:24 PM ^
Western counted. And know so do the stats. Assuming that's what you meant.
EDIT: Reading comprehension fail. This was about Eastern. Apologies.
December 7th, 2011 at 2:09 PM ^
I would think this would also mean this team played against a schedule featuring one of the highest (if not the highest) overall winning percentages in recent memory. Given the era of reduced scholarships, that might be an interesting stat. Anyone have that handy?
December 7th, 2011 at 2:34 PM ^
Michigan didn't play a single team that ended the season with fewer than 3 losses.
December 7th, 2011 at 3:12 PM ^
Youir sparty green is showing through again. It's ok to be a sparty fan, but you have to be man enough to admit it.
December 7th, 2011 at 3:39 PM ^
I responded to a post saying Michigan's opponents likely had the highest winning percentage of all time by saying "I would be surprised if that were true, no team Michigan played had fewer than 3 losses." Which, by the way, fucking includes Michigan State. I would expect that there are other Michigan teams that have played a number of winning teams that have also played teams that did not lose many games. For example, I would guess the 1997 team had opponents with a higher winning percentage since almost every team they played that year was ranked.
Do I have to fucking fax you a copy of my Michigan diploma? This is absurd.
December 7th, 2011 at 4:34 PM ^
In 1997, Michigan's 11 regular season opponents went a combined 63-69 (.477). 6 of them would have been bowl elgible by today's standards.
Colorado 5-6
Baylor 2-9
Notre Dame 7-6
Indiana 0-11
Northwestern 5-7
Iowa 7-5
Michigan State 7-5
Minnesota 3-9
Penn State 9-3
Wisconsin 8-5
Ohio State 10-3
Michigan played (and beat) two teams that would finish the season ranked in 1997: Ohio State and Penn State. We have also played two teams that finished ranked this year, Nebraska and Michigan State, although we went 1-1 against them.
December 7th, 2011 at 4:39 PM ^
Not that it'll make a huge difference in the numbers, but OSU and PSU each had 2 losses in the regular season and then lost their bowl games. Not sure about the other teams.
December 7th, 2011 at 4:54 PM ^
Keep in mind the pre-season fear that schedule spawned. Notre Dame hadn't been dead for 20 years and Colorado was pretty good in that era. Also Penn State was a great team that year until we ripped their souls out at the end. Lastly we did horribly in the bowl season that year with a ton of 1 score losses. The following year the B1G did great in the bowls with a ton of 1 score wins. Lots of randomness to that and all of it was negative to the scoreboard above.
December 7th, 2011 at 3:34 PM ^
You're seriously crying about the schedule? MSU is in the B10 too, silly. Also you played INDIANA fergodsakes.
December 7th, 2011 at 3:40 PM ^
I would just be surprised if this was Michigan's toughest schedule of all time because the Big 10 was mediocre, including Michigan State.
I don't know how else to say this: I AM NOT A MICHIGAN STATE FAN. I AM A 2006 GRADUATE OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN WHO WENT TO UOFM FOR COLLEGE BECAUSE I GREW UP ROOTING FOR THEIR FOOTBALL TEAM.
December 7th, 2011 at 9:31 PM ^
.......think the B1G was "mediocre" this year. Because Ohio was down? Because we didn't have a team finish with less than two losses? It would be more correct to state that the B1G, at the top, was down compared to other years. But even then, it's hard to qualify that statement since it's impossible to truly compare, say, Wisconsin 2011 to Ohio State 2007, or PSU 2008, or Ohio/MSU/Wisconsin 2010. It could be, for example, that the B1G overall this year is a much more competitive conference than it has been in the past, making the likelihood of a team finishing unbeaten, or with only one loss, highly improbable.
Think about this; When is the last time the B1G had 10 teams bowl eligible? Or even, considering we haven't been at 12 total teams but for one year, 9 bowl eligible teams?
I'd say, if we are talking about the strength of the conference top to bottom, that the B1G was in the top three conferences this year. Easily.
December 7th, 2011 at 4:22 PM ^
Michigan's opponents were a combined 82-63 this season, for a 56.6% winning percentage. If anything, this season is probably unique in the number of teams we played that finished 6-6: Eastern, Northwestern, Purdue, Illinoise, and Ohio State. 5 teams, nearly half the schedule.
December 7th, 2011 at 2:21 PM ^
Not sure what the highest total attendance any one team has played in front of but team 132 has played in front of 1,153,531 this season. Playing all those home games certainly helps. With the Sugar Bowl this number will be higher in the end. Very impressive.
Western Michigan Attendance: 110,506
Notre Dame Attendance: 114,804
Eastern Michigan Attendance: 110,343
SDSU Attendance: 110,707
Minnesota Attendance: 111,106
@ Northwestern Attendance: 47,330
@ Michigan State Attendance: 77,515
Purdue Attendance: 112,115
@ Iowa Attendance: 70,585
@ Illinois Attendance: 60,670
Nebraska Attendance: 113,718
Ohio Attendance: 114,132
Total 1,153,531
December 7th, 2011 at 2:53 PM ^
the biggest crowd watching a game today"
December 7th, 2011 at 2:59 PM ^
There are too many Bowls nowadays. Please eliminate three.
P.S. I am not a crackpot.
December 7th, 2011 at 9:38 PM ^
That record is probably broken each and every season now. I looked at the bowl list the other day and got sick to my stomach at how LITTLE the accomplishment of bowl bid means now. They are multiple 7-5 teams in it from the MAC and the Sun Belt.
December 7th, 2011 at 9:17 PM ^
I like the bowl with the largest name anywhere in America today, the San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl.
December 7th, 2011 at 9:18 PM ^
December 7th, 2011 at 9:25 PM ^