I am sick of this argument from ND-haters. It is weak, and moreso, it is incorrect. Everyone loves to say "Hey, ND played all 3 Service Academies. That means their schedule was weak." Um, hello? Can you really diss the Armed Forces in that way when they save your lives everyday? And by the way, Navy is 9-3 and bowl bound so you can't generalize and say that that's a weak portion of a schedule.
And would you say Army+Navy+Air Force (collectively 17-19, just under .500) is worse than the following combinations:
- Combined 10-26 Northwestern, Bowling Green and Illinois?
- Vanderbilt, Northwestern and Ball State at 13-23?
I'd say, ummm, NO. Those are a few sets of teams that tOSU and Michigan played during the year, respectively. Yeah, that's a virtual gauntlet there.
To look at quality of opponents/schedules, I pulled together % of teams that are bowl-bound for some of our top competition, and a few other teams in the top-tier of the rankings.
| % Bowl Teams Played | |
| USC | 69% |
| ND | 62% |
| LSU | 54% |
| OSU | 54% |
| MI | 54% |
| Wisconsin | 46% |
| Louisville | 46% |
Hmmmm, funny. ND is near the top of the list.
Sagarin has ND's schedule ranked as the 19th most difficult in the country. The only other teams in the Top 20 with a schedule more difficult than ND's are USC at #2, Cal at #6, Tennessee at #11, MI at #13 and Florida at #18.
And ND finished out the season ranked well ahead of Cal and Tennessee.
So look here, haters. You can say what you want about our losses to MI and USC. You can say Brady Quinn this and that. You can say we'll lose to LSU or whatever. All of that is either legit, or conjecture, or your own biases talking.
But what you can't say is that ND didn't play anyone. If you do, you're pretty much saying that NO ONE played anyone. And how could that be? If that's true, I spent a lot of time sitting on the couch yelling at a TV with nothing on.
And I haven't lost it like that.
Like my Dad would say: "If dog, rabbit."
By domer.mq December 11, 2006 - 4:04 pm
That headline deserves an image of the effeminate cat from the Yogi Bear cartoons.
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By The Biscuit December 11, 2006 - 4:06 pm
ha! exactly the voice i had in my head.
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By Deep TeaKup December 11, 2006 - 5:56 pm
They’re actually saying ND didn’t beat anybody. for what it’s worth, I actually think the headline deserves an image of Vizzini from the Princess Bride.
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By domer.mq December 11, 2006 - 6:00 pm
If only “big games” also included ones where we won. Ah well.
Though I agree, ND has not beaten a top-5 program this season. It’s just too bad that massively hyped games like the GT and Penn State games didn’t turn out to be the big wins we thought they were. Then again, if PSU and GT actually had quarterbacks in their offensive systems, that woulda helped.
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By Deep TeaKup December 11, 2006 - 7:17 pm
Domer, great point. I really don’t like criticizing individual college players but Reggie Ball is the worst 4 year starter I can think of. Can you imagine what Calvin Johnson would have done playing for a functional QB?
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By The Biscuit December 11, 2006 - 8:22 pm
which is why it’s so sad that Benn went to Illinois. Juice is a decent player, but he’s no Clausen.
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By The Biscuit December 11, 2006 - 8:24 pm
And, along the lines of the post, saying we didnt beat anybody is garbage. We lost to 2 of the top 8 teams in the country. Look at some of the losses of other Top 25 teams and that looks not-that-bad…
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By domer.mq December 11, 2006 - 10:11 pm
You misspelled Cheatermccheaterville University as “Illinois.”
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By Deep TeaKup December 12, 2006 - 11:49 pm
Biscuit, no one is denying you have quality losses, it’s the quality wins which people question.
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