Category: History and More

The title game of the NFL is still nine weeks away, but North America’s other major professional outdoor football league crowned its champion on Sunday.

And it’s going to be really, really hard for Super Bowl LII to match it.

The 105th Grey Cup featured the Calgary Stampeders (14-5-1) and Toronto Argonauts (10-9), the last teams standing in the Canadian Football League.

By the end of a spectacular, snowy night before 36,154 fans at TD Place in Ottawa, Toronto was 11-9 and owners of an amazing 27-24 victory.

How amazing?

Try a 100-yard pass play to account for the Argonauts’ first score of the game, and a 109-yard return of a fumble for a touchdown that flipped the contest from a sure Stampeders win to a thrilling comeback – and upset.

With Calgary leading 24-16 and threatening inside the Toronto 10, Kamar Jordan caught a pass, but fumbled while trying to squeeze his way closer to the end zone. Cassius Vaughn picked up the loose cargo at his own 1 and took it to the house.

The 2-point conversion tied the game, and then Lirim Hajrullahu kicked a 32-yard, game-winning field goal with 49 seconds to play.

I have no idea how many other people in the United States besides me watched last night, but those who didn’t missed out on something special. It was the culmination of another great year in a great league, one that receives little attention here but has my full attention once its regular season begins in the summer.

I’ll even go so far as to say I usually enjoy the Grey Cup more than the Super Bowl: this was the sixth of the last seven CFL championships decided by a touchdown or less.

And it’s significant to note that the game is played while it’s still gridiron season. Quite frankly, by the time the NFL hits the first Sunday in February, I’ve been ready for football to be over for a month. It doesn’t help matters that the Super Bowl has become an overblown TV production with far too many extended timeouts and a lengthy halftime that disrupts the flow of the game.

Of course the Grey Cup halftime was extended from the usual 14 minutes to 28 (Shania Twain was the featured performer, arriving via dogsled), but that’s OK.

The game itself, which started around 6:40 p.m. EST, clicked right along at a snappy pace, and Toronto players were awash in confetti three hours later.

For American fans tuning in for the first time, they might not have recognized a lot of the names and faces in the contest.

Calgary’s QB is Bo Levi Mitchell, who started his college career at SMU and finished at Eastern Washington. Last year’s league MVP (or Most Outstanding Player, as the CFL calls the honor), Mitchell threw for 5,073 yards and 25 touchdowns in the 2017 season.

The Stamps also had a 1,000-yard rusher in Jerome Messam (1,078 yards) and Marquay McDaniel was the top receiver on the team with 906 yards.

Toronto was led by longtime CFL signal caller Ricky Ray, who amassed 5,843 yards and tossed 29 TDs through 19 contests. His title game stat line was 19-32-0 for 297 yards and a TD in what might have been his pro football curtain call.

S.J. Green was Ray’s favorite target during the year – to the tune of 1,518 receiving yards – and James Wilder was an effective runner for the Argos with 885 yards on the ground.

On this night it was former Ohio State standout DeVier Posey who took MVP honors, catching seven balls for 175 yards and a touchdown.

Ray became the first CFL starting quarterback in history to win four Grey Cups, and he did it at the ripe young age of 38.

Successful quarterbacks in the CFL will always put up dazzling numbers, because when you have just three downs to make 10 yards, you’ll throw the ball a lot.

But I’ve already been over the rules (check out my column from Nov. 9), which are peculiar to those unfamiliar with the Canadian game but terrific once you get used to them.

Look, I get that it’s hard for some Americans to warm up to this brand of “international” football.

The NFL is the top-tier of the game, and NCAA football is wildly popular.

Just as there are people who can walk and chew gum at the same time, though, some of us can enjoy CFL, NFL and NCAA football all at once, too.

And Sunday – for me – Canadian football took center stage.

I’m already looking forward to its return next June.

While much of the American sporting world has turned its attention to the NFL today (or, in my case, the CFL’s Grey Cup), thousands and thousands of college football fans are still either celebrating rivalry wins or groaning about losses that will have to stay with them for an entire year.

And for a guy who didn’t have a stake in any of yesterday’s heavyweight battles, it was fun to just plop down at ringside and watch how things unfolded.

And what did I learn?

A lot.

For starters, Clemson (11-1) might just be the best team in the Football Bowl Subdivision – again. While the Tigers’ 34-10 win over South Carolina was expected, only those who watched saw just how dominating it was.

The Gamecocks have improved under Will Muschamp, and entered the contest with an 8-3 record, home field advantage and a real hope they could avenge last year’s 56-7 beat down.

They couldn’t.

Oh, the score line was better this time around, but there was never a moment when the defending national champions were threatened (unless you count the threat posed by some idiot fans who threw projectiles from the stands at Williams-Brice Stadium.)

You’ll likely never see a more dominating 24-point victory.

“I do think we’re starting to play our best football, I really do,” said Clemson coach Dabo Swinney, who picked up his 100^th career victory last night and has led his team to four road wins over Top 25 foes this year. “And that’s where you want to be as you get to the final stretch.”

The Tigers should be ranked No. 1 in Tuesday’s College Football Playoff rankings, and a win over Miami (10-1) in Saturday’s ACC Championship Game in Charlotte will lock down the top seed in the playoffs and a Sugar Bowl berth.

On the other hand, if the Hurricanes – ranked No. 2 in the recent playoff standings but upset by Pitt on Friday – beat Clemson, they’ll be the ACC reps in the CFP.

Although Clemson was No. 3 and Oklahoma, No. 4, in last week’s playoff poll, there is a chance Oklahoma (11-1) could surge to the top of the heap come Tuesday.

It’s all subject to the whims of a selection committee, after all.

The Sooners crushed West Virginia on Saturday, 59-31, and are riding a seven-game winning streak.

All that stands in the Sooners’ way of a playoff trip is a win over TCU in the Big 12 Championship Game on Saturday.

In the teams’ regular season meeting on Nov. 11 OU won, 38-20.

Meanwhile at Jordan-Hare Stadium, the Iron Bowl had the feel of a play-in contest, and in terms of the SEC Championship Game, it was exactly that.

With Auburn (10-2) beating top-ranked and previously unbeaten Alabama (11-1), the Tigers won the SEC West and will face Georgia (11-1) on Saturday at Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

If the Tigers defeat the Bulldogs for the second time this season, you have to figure the committee will award them one of the four available playoff spots.

“This time of year, very few teams are playing their best football and we’re doing that,” Auburn coach Gus Malzahn said after his team’s 26-14 win. “We must continue doing that moving forward. Playing Georgia, we know they’re going to have a chip on their shoulder. We’re playing our best football right now and we need to continue to do that.”

One of Auburn’s regular season losses was to Clemson in the second week of the season, a 14-6 defensive showcase.

“We’re a completely different team,” Malzahn said. “I’m not taking anything away from Clemson. They’re a great team, and I think everyone sees that. They were No. 2 when we played them. We’ve played two No. 1 teams now. Back in September, we were still trying to figure out our identity. We had a new quarterback, new coordinator and you saw us getting better and better.”

Shortly after the loss to AU, Alabama boss Nick Saban was already lobbying for the Crimson Tide to make the CFP.

“I think this team deserves the opportunity to get into the playoff by what they’ve been able to accomplish and what they’ve been able to do,” Saban said. “Certainly not in this game, but I think the team we played tonight is a very good football team, probably one of the best teams in the country. We’ve won 11 games, and not many teams have been able to do that.”

Another football Final Four berth for UA is possible, of course, but I’m not sure there would be much enthusiasm for it outside Tuscaloosa.

Bama’s biggest wins coming into the game were against a three-loss LSU team and a four-loss Mississippi State squad. The Tide had a chance to prove it was the best in the West and it failed to do that.

As for Georgia, which dismantled Georgia Tech, 38-7, its path to the CFP is simple.

Beat Auburn, avenging its 40-17 loss from Nov. 11, and the Dawgs are one-loss SEC champs and playoff bound.

But what about Wisconsin, 31-0 winners over Minnesota on Saturday?

The Badgers (12-0) are the last unbeaten team left in the FBS, but were on the outside looking in at the CFP coming into the final week of the regular season, ranked No. 5.

They’ll be in the top four this Tuesday, though, and will stay in if they beat Ohio State (10-2) in the Big Ten Championship Game.

A Buckeye win, though, gives another two-loss team a puncher’s chance at reaching a national semifinal.

Ranked No. 9 in the CFP, it’s unclear how much ground Urban Meyer’s charges will make up this week after a 31-20 conquest of Michigan. If they can top Wisconsin on Saturday, they’ll at least be in position to bitch and moan if they’re left out of the playoffs.

And Meyer loves to bitch and moan.

My crystal ball tells me Clemson will beat Miami and I have a feeling Georgia will edge Auburn in the rematch. I’m also counting on Oklahoma to top TCU.

If those predictions hold, three of the CFP spots will be secured.

However, I’m not sold on Wisconsin. I expect Ohio State to win that clash on Saturday, even if quarterback J.T. Barrett is forced to miss the game due to a knee injury.

If that happens – and Auburn also finishes off a two-game sweep of Georgia – would there then be a pair of two-loss teams in the playoffs?

Or, would Alabama sneak back in, denying the Buckeyes a berth and making Meyer subject to spontaneous human combustion?

Fortunately, we’ll find out a week from today.

And if Championship Saturday is anything like Rivalry Weekend, it’ll be another great day to be at ringside.

It’s Rivalry Week in college football, meaning it’s time for pundits and fans alike to argue about which one is the biggest, fiercest and meanest in the land.

In my 30 years as a paid sportswriter, I covered several Alabama-Auburn games, quite a few Clemson-South Carolina games, and a handful of Georgia-Georgia Tech games.

So which is the biggest?

Now that I’m an unpaid sportswriter, I can honestly tell you that they are all equally important.

I can also honestly tell you they are equally unimportant – if you don’t have any skin in the game.

Fact is, if it’s the rivalry involving your team, that makes it the biggest rivalry going.

The first 20 years of my career were spent in Alabama, and during that time I sat in the press box for 16 Iron Bowls – including the first one ever played at Jordan-Hare Stadium in Auburn and the inaugural Alabama-Auburn game staged at Bryant-Denny Stadium in Tuscaloosa.

Having grown up among Crimson Tide and Tiger fans, I was conditioned to believe that their rivalry was not only the biggest, but the only one that mattered.

I didn’t bother to get the thoughts of those who had a stake in games such as Michigan-Ohio State, Texas-Texas A&M or Army-Navy – people who might have a wildly different opinion.

Then over the last 10 years I got to witness first-hand the rivalry between Clemson and South Carolina, and quickly realized their fan bases were just as rabid as the ones in my home state.

A decade of the Palmetto Bowl has shown me that to those schools’ faithful, the rivalry is every bit as intense as that of the Iron Bowl.

I will say, as both a live observer and one who followed the Georgia-Georgia Tech rivalry for a few years while serving as a beat writer for the Bulldogs, it has a really odd dynamic.

Georgia-Florida and Georgia-Auburn are traditionally much bigger games for the guys in red hats and silver britches. And while the Dawgs and Yellow Jackets bill their annual showdown as “Clean, Old-Fashioned Hate,” it simply doesn’t have the same pop as many state rivalries.

That being said, Georgia is Georgia Tech’s biggest rival.

So there’s that.

From a national stakes standpoint this weekend, though, the Alabama-Auburn game is the top rivalry showdown on the schedule. The winner finishes atop the SEC West and gets a berth in the SEC Championship Game in Atlanta, and if that team happens to be Alabama, it almost assures the Tide a spot in the College Football Playoff.

Why?

Ranked No. 1 and one of only three undefeated teams left among Power 5 programs (Miami and Wisconsin are the others), even a loss to Georgia in Mercedes-Benz Stadium would likely drop Nick Saban’s top-ranked team no lower than No. 4 in the CFP poll, especially if it’s close.

But if Auburn knocks off Alabama and whips the Bulldogs in the league title game (its second win over Georgia in three weeks), suddenly the two-loss Tigers might be invited to the playoff thanks to winning the SEC title.

Meanwhile, at Bobby Dodd Stadium …

A Bulldog win over the Jackets, coupled with a victory over the Tide or Tigers a week later, negates their regular season loss to Auburn and puts Kirby Smart’s team in the playoffs.

And if that win is over Bama, you can probably count on the SEC taking up two spots in the CFP – a decision that’s going to enrage those who don’t swear eternal loyalty to the Southeastern Conference.

As for the Palmetto Bowl, South Carolina is playing for a chance to derail Clemson’s hopes for a second consecutive national championship and upgrade its own postseason position.

If the Tigers enter the ACC Championship Game with two losses, even a win over Miami might not be enough to secure a spot in the semifinals (although ultimately that’ll be for the CFP selection committee to decide, of course).

However, if Dabo Swinney’s charges take care of business against the Gamecocks and Hurricanes, they’ll be ensconced in one of the four available playoff positions.

Yet before jumping ahead to the postseason, it’s all about the rivalries this holiday weekend – and all are pretty significant.

So if you happen to think the braggin’ rights battle you care about most is the biggest in college football, you’re absolutely right.

Just know that fans elsewhere disagree – and they’re absolutely right, too.