CFB51 College Football Fan Community
The Power Five => Big Ten => Topic started by: OrangeAfroMan on February 26, 2019, 12:11:57 AM
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It's December 9th, 1999. Thanks to Alabama, we won't have a semifinal rematch in the CFP.
Vote for who you think would win the national championship in 1999 had there been a playoff.
1 FSU vs 4 Alabama
2 VA Tech vs 3 Nebraska
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The Teams:
#1 FSU, 11-0, ACC Champions
3rd in scoring offense
11th in scoring defense
13th strength of schedule
First team to ever go wire-to-wire at #1. The Noles took on 4 ranked foes, beating #10 GA Tech and at #3 Florida by a TD each, a ten-point win vs #19 Miami, and a blowout win vs #20 NC State. FSU did escape Clemson with a 3-point win vs the .500 Tigers.
The offense scored 30 or more points in every game but one. A pass-heavy group, QB Weinke and company averaged over 300 yds passing and only 124 rushing per game. RB Minor was solid, but none of the ball-carriers had a good average per carry. The receivers were very talented, if not young. Led by Peter Warrick, Weinke also had Dugans, Minnis, Coles, and Boldin to throw to. Warrick was on track to win the Heisman, but was suspended 2 games for theft.
The defense was stout against the run, allowing under 100 ypg. However, against the pass, FSU gave up it's share but also picked off 22 passes. DT Simon was a monster, with 21 TFL and LBs Allen and Polley with 100+ tackles each.
The special teams were strong, with Warrick returning punts, Janikowski booming FGs, and Cottrell's punts going 43 yds per kick.
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#2 Virginia Tech, 11-0, Big East Champions
1st in scoring offense
5th in scoring defense
58th in strength of schedule
The Hokies find themselves in this position for the first time in their history. Beamer ball has them undefeated, having beaten 4 ranked teams, all of which were blowout wins. At #24 Virginia, a 62-0 shellacking of #16 Syracuse, #19 Miami, and #33 BC - all victims. The only close call VT had all year was @ WV by two points.
Like FSU, VT scored 30 or more in all but one game. A run-heavy offense, VT did pass for 200 yds per game, but ran for 256. RB Stith had nearly 1200 yards and 13 TDs, with backup Kendrick averaging 6.2 per carry. QB Vick helped out with nearly 700 yards himself and 9 TDs. Vick's favorite threat, WR Davis, caught a lot of deep balls, averaging 25.5 per catch to get over 1,000 yards for the season.
The defense held eight teams to 2 TD or less. Teams could not run on the Hokies (72 yards per game). While VT didn't pick off many passes, teams still couldn't complete half their passes, mainly due to the pass rush provided by DE Corey Moore (17 sacks). VT found some opportunistic scoring on defense as well, with 4 scoop-n-score TDs on the year.
The Hokies' special teams had good return games and FG kicking, with K Graham. If you're wondering about blocked kicks, they only got 2 this year, not like the 12 they had in 1998.
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#3 Nebraska, 11-1, Big XII Champions
12 in scoring offense
4th in scoring defense
16th in strength of schedule
In just his 2nd season at the helm, HC Solich has Nebraska in the playoff. The Big Red spent the whole season ranked in the top 10, and avenged their only loss (@ Texas) in the BXIICG. Aside from going 1-1 vs ranked Texas, Nebraska beat #21 A&M 37-0 and #5 Kansas State 41-15 in consecutive weeks.
The option offense hit 30+ points eight times this year. QB Crouch kept his passing % over 50, with 7 TD and 4 INT. He led the team in rushing with nearly 900 yards and 16 TD. RB Alexander and Buckhalter split time, but combined for 14 TD and both averaged 6+ yards per carry. Crouch had some good targets to throw to as well, WRs Davison and Newcombe, and big plays with TE Wistrom.
The Huskers had a stingy D, shutting down the run (77 ypg allowed) and pass (42.5% completion percentage). The Blackshirts picked off 18 passes on the year, and managed to score 4 TDs of their own on turnovers. Without any one player having over 7 sacks, the Husker D managed 54 as a team!
A good return game and punter were the special teams strengths. Once Newcombe was put at PR, he was a real dynamo. Kicker Brown was solid, but not a big leg.
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#4 Alabama, 10-2, SEC Champions
31st in scoring offense
24th in scoring defense
1st in strength of schedule
Perhaps the most unlikely playoff team ever, after a September loss to Louisiana Tech, the Tide made it all the way here by facing SEVEN ranked opponents, beating six. Close wins over #14 Arkansas, at #3 Florida and at #22 Ole Miss, then a loss to #5 Tennessee, then wins over #20 Southern Miss, #8 Miss State, and #5 Florida in the SECCG. The Tide earned their way from unranked to #4 in the country.
The offense wasn't spectacular, but effective. QB Zow was a game-manager and had more TD than INT (12-9). The offense centered on RB Alexander and his 1300+ yards rushing with 19 TD. WR Milons was the biggest receiving threat, but only had 2 TD receptions.
The Tide defense stuffed the run, as usual, holding teams to under 75 yards rushing per game. However, the pass D was uncharacteristically porous, allowing 222 yards per game through the air. Teams could count on big plays over the top, trying to get a lead on Alabama.
WR Milons was a good return man, but the kicking game was just average overall.
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Notables Involved:
DE Corey Moore, VA Tech - Nagurski, Lombardi, All-American
OT Chris Samuels, Alabama - Outland, AA
K Sebastian Janikowski, FSU - Groza, AA
HC Frank Beamer, VA Tech - Coach of the Year (AFCA, AP, Robinson, Bryant, Camp)
HC Frank Solich, Nebraska - Coach of the Year (Home Depot)
WR Peter Warrick, FSU - AA
OL Jason Whitaker, FSU - AA
DT Corey Simon, FSU - AA
DB Ralph Brown, Nebraska - AA
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I believe that Nebraska team fumbled 50 times that season. Lost about half. Two big ones inside the UT ten.
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Wow, FSU's run defense is the worst among the four teams.
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That was probably the worst FSU defense of the peak Bowden years right?
But that offense was terrifying. I do think Nebraska eliminates Vick in the semis, but that would be a hell of a game. Noles over Huskers in the final.
Florida State was the #1 offense by Connolly's metrics, but who was #2? 8-4 Georgia Tech, led by Joe Hamilton. That was a super fun team. They scored 35 or more in 2 of their 4 losses, but allowed 31 or more in 4 of their wins, including 51-48 over Georgia, and 45-42 over Clemson.
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I believe that Nebraska team fumbled 50 times that season. Lost about half. Two big ones inside the UT ten.
49 fumbles, 25 lost
Nebraska out yarded Texas by 429-275 but lost three fumbles while the Longhorns played turnover-free football. Perhaps the most costly fumble came early in the fourth quarter when Correll Buckhalter lost the ball on the Texas 2-yard line on 3rd-and-goal run.
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I voted FSU, but had a hard time picking against the Huskers
Damn the Longhorn curse
I did get to San Antonio with my brother to see the Big 12 champ game and the only win for the Huskers vs the Horns since 1974 in an old fashioned beat down
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It wouldn't have been the Wolverines.
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It wouldn't have been the Wolverines.
Might have been, if they had gotten in the field.
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That Orange Bowl was crazy.
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That Orange Bowl was crazy.
Was a fun day of bowls. MSU beat Florida in the Citrus on a walk off FG. Purdue blew a 25 point lead and lost to Georgia in OT in the Outback. Wisconsin completely shut Ty Willingham and Stanford down in the second half to win the Rose.
I miss NYD being so good, and even that was after the Fiesta and Sugar were played off NYD.
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Might have been, if they had gotten in the field.
Now THAT I will conceed.
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Now THAT I will conceed.
Their QB isn't too bad in the postseason. Assuming Carr didn't play Henson.
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Might have been, if they had gotten in the field.
If the B1G had a championship game in '99, I think Michigan (assuming they would have won it) would have made the cut into the final four.
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Now THAT I will conceed.
stay strong
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I drank a lot of gin that day. Not my finest hour
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I drank a lot of gin that day. Not my finest hour
So, hours then?
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Twas back when one could go back to back w/o consequence. Of course I was out all night the night before on NYE. We really hit it hard in the 2nd half of the Citrus. Tanguearay martinis. I still love gin but never again tanguearay. Out of it by end of Rose but made a triumphant return for 2nd half of Orange.
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I drank a lot of gin that day. Not my finest hour
In fairness, none of us expected to still be around on that day
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thankfully, the computer world did NOT come to an end
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In fairness, none of us expected to still be around on that day
Hah!! I remember watching people at the stores buying water (for 5 times the normal price) while I was buying lobsters and steaks.
Admittedly, I did sanitize and fill up my bathtubs with water, and I did buy a few tanks of propane. Heh. At least the propane got put to use for cooking.
Y2K my ass.
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That was probably the worst FSU defense of the peak Bowden years right?
But that offense was terrifying. I do think Nebraska eliminates Vick in the semis, but that would be a hell of a game. Noles over Huskers in the final.
Florida State was the #1 offense by Connolly's metrics, but who was #2? 8-4 Georgia Tech, led by Joe Hamilton. That was a super fun team. They scored 35 or more in 2 of their 4 losses, but allowed 31 or more in 4 of their wins, including 51-48 over Georgia, and 45-42 over Clemson.
Yes, specifically the pass D. Among national championship-level teams and elite 1-loss type teams, the pass D was putrid. The Noles allowed over 70% of passes to be completed against them - an unheard of stat among good teams.
Michigan also had a bogus pass D, so I wouldn't start waxing poetic on them, either. And Tom Brady wasn't great in college - PLEASE learn how to differentiate, people! For his era, and believe me I've done some comprehensive deep-dives on this stuff, I start to consider a QB "good" or "very good" north of a 140 passer rating. Bad or really bad is 120 or less. Elite, great, is 155+. Brady's '99 season was at 138.
Mr. GOAT wasn't good enough not to be outplayed by Kurt Kittner in a loss to Illinois. Besides his NFL exploits, Brady gets a halo effect because of how bad or pedestrian Henson was that year.
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Kittner was a very good college player. Brady not so much.
I voted for FSU in this thing.
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That Citrus Bowl makes me want to drink. From the weather to the halftime show to 5'8" Cromartie "covering" 6'6" Burress - not a fun bowl experience in person.
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Boy, Peter Warrick was good. I hope those clothes he got from Dillards were worth losing the Heisman.
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Warrick was special . I need to watch that sequence when Beamer tried a fake fg and chose to run option with his kicker and holder with Vick standing aghast on the sideline.
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Oh yeah, that Michigan secondary was horrid too. Burress went for over 200 on them I think.
I'm not saying they would have won, but they might have. Once they finally put the Henson thing to rest they played well down the stretch. That was a loaded Big Ten, went 9 deep. Probably the only year of my fanhood I think it was the best conference. 7 ranked teams, OSU in 8th, Randle El and Indiana in 9th. Only free passes that year were Northwestern and Iowa.
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10 Rec, 255 Yds
Ehh, that Michigan team also only averaged 3.2 yards per carry. That's reeeeeally bad.
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All four teams every year are very very good (duh) and any of them COULD win a playoff (maybe 95 Nebraska excepted).
If the best team has a 70% chance of beating the other teams singly, they still have less than a 50% chance of beating both.
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Explain that to the people wanting to expand the playoff. It mathematically guarantees the better teams don't win the NC as often (think #1/#2 vs #7/#8, not that 1-8 is in the actual order of how good they are).
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Explain that to the people wanting to expand the playoff. It mathematically guarantees the better teams don't win the NC as often (think #1/#2 vs #7/#8, not that 1-8 is in the actual order of how good they are).
Does anyone advocating for an expanded tournament say they want it to the ensure the best team wins it?
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most advocating for an expanded tournament simply want a piece of the $$$ pie
UCF and the P5 conference champ(s) that get left out
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Does anyone advocating for an expanded tournament say they want it to the ensure the best team wins it?
If the sliding scale strays too far from the middle between competition and entertainment, the regular season is ruined and the sport has a low ceiling on how big it can be.
Not caring if the champion is the best or one of the best teams is skewing way too close to entertainment and way too far from competition.
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most advocating for an expanded tournament simply want a piece of the $$$ pie
UCF and the P5 conference champ(s) that get left out
Well then build a program over a number of years and win the beauty contest. It's what everyone else had to do, too.
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Well then build a program over a number of years and win the beauty contest. It's what everyone else had to do, too.
yes, but that is difficult and takes time
I want my money NOW!!!
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If the sliding scale strays too far from the middle between competition and entertainment, the regular season is ruined and the sport has a low ceiling on how big it can be.
Not caring if the champion is the best or one of the best teams is skewing way too close to entertainment and way too far from competition.
I think they've already done that. 95% of the games during the regular season are meaningless. I'd rather be entertained at this point, we aren't solving world hunger, we are providing a form of entertainment.
People keep talking about protecting the "best" regular season. Meh. It's the regular season where a loss is the most harmful, but it might actually be the worst regular season. It's the only one where half the teams are irrelevant before a game is even played, and by the halfway point of the season about 90% are.
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The fact that Ohio State wasn't very good in 1999 makes it even more amazing that the Big11Ten was so deep. It is a weird year in Ohio State history. For one thing it was the last time that the Buckeyes finished .500 or better and missed a bowl. They went 6-6 but the losses were:
- By 25 at home to a Wisconsin team that finished 10-2 and #4.
- By 7 on the road to a Michigan team that finished 10-2 and #5.
- By 16 on the road to a Michigan State team that finished 10-2 and #7.
- By 13 on the road to a Penn State team that finished 10-3 and #11.
- By 11 at a neutral site to a Miami, FL team that finished 9-4 and #15
- By 26 at home to an Illinois team that finished 8-4 and #24.
Six losses sucks but that Ohio State team would have been at least 8-4 against most normal schedules. In addition to those six ranked teams the Buckeyes won at Minnesota and the Gophers finished 8-4 and #18 and beat a Purdue team that finished 7-5 and #25. All told, the Buckeyes went 2-6 against eight teams that finished ranked. That isn't great but it really isn't bad either. A lot of teams play half that many ranked teams, go 1-3 and finish in the top-15. If the Buckeyes had played (and beaten) Northwestern instead of losing to one of the five league teams that beat Ohio State and finished ranked then the 7-5 Buckeyes would probably have gone bowling, won their bowl and finished ranked at 8-5.
The Big11Ten in bowls that year:
- #4 Wisconsin beat #22 Stanford 17-9 in the Rose.
- #8 Michigan beat #5 Bama 35-34 in the Orange.
- #9 Michigan State beat #10 Florida 37-34 in the Citrus.
- #12 Minnesota lost 24-20 to nr Oregon in the Sun.
- #13 Penn State beat #18 aTm 24-0 in the Alamo.
- #19 Purdue lost 28-25 to #21 UGA in the Outback.
- nr Illinois beat nr UVA 63-21 in the Micron PC.
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I believe they didn't make 6-6 bowl eligible until they went to 12 games for everyone.
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I think they've already done that. 95% of the games during the regular season are meaningless. I'd rather be entertained at this point, we aren't solving world hunger, we are providing a form of entertainment.
People keep talking about protecting the "best" regular season. Meh. It's the regular season where a loss is the most harmful, but it might actually be the worst regular season. It's the only one where half the teams are irrelevant before a game is even played, and by the halfway point of the season about 90% are.
I guess it depends on who you root for. As a fan of a team that has been in the NC race more often than not over the past ~20 years, it is BY FAR the best regular season because every game matters.
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Every game for your team, if you root for certain teams. Overall like maybe 2-3 out of 60 in a given week.
The ones that matter matter A LOT, but most don't matter. As opposed to other sports where most matter, but few matter very much.
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I think more than 1 game in 20 is meaningful in FBS. A lot of teams are on the cusp of a bowl bid, or a better bowl bid. Nearly every regional FBS game OOC is interesting and meaningful. Well, if Vandy plays Notre Dame, it might not be, unless Vandy wins.
UGA this year has two pastries, two meaningful OOC games, and 8 conference games, all of which I consider meaningful, even if they are heavy favorites in a couple. That;s 10 out of 12, which is pretty good.
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I think more than 1 game in 20 is meaningful in FBS. A lot of teams are on the cusp of a bowl bid, or a better bowl bid.
How is that meaningful? First, we've basically decided bowl games are meaningless, and they more or less are. Second, we've basically eliminated merit based selection to move teams around, so I don't think another win has any sort of bearing on what bowl you go to. 7-5 vs. 8-4 doesn't impact anything with bowl selection, and even if it did, who cares? Is the Gator Bowl better or worse than the Outback Bowl? Who knows? Will your guys even play in it?
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I missed where anyone established that bowl games are meaningless, and if so, I disagree rather strongly, not that it matters.
Vandy played Tennessee last year when both were 5-6, I viewed that as meaningful.
Maybe I am too much of a fan, but I see most games played by FBS teams as meaningful. It's subjective anyway. If the only thing meaningful relates to who wins the NC, then I would agree that few are meaningful, but I don't agree with that assertion.
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Bowl games are important for the practice time, which is a big plus for the next season. 100 out of 100 head coaches would take the extra practices vs not having the extra practices in a vacuum.
Plus it's just something neat for the outgoing players who aren't ending up on NFL rosters (large %).
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That Orange Bowl was crazy.
part of a fine bama tradition... of bad kicking costing us games.
also, shaun alexander should have been listed as notable, imo.
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Alexander wasn't a consensus All-American. Wasn't in the top 10 in rushing, nationally.