Football Follies 2021: NCAA – Fat lady hits High C

Well, OK, technically B5. See below.

Here it comes.  Monday 10 January is the night of nights, as #1 Alabama and “#3” Georgia, to the surprise of absolutely no one, take the field to decide the CF-OMGwhateverdude National Champeen of the World, in the CFP National Championship Presented by AT&T .

What is there to say?  Both teams are 13-1.  Alabama beat Georgia for the SEC title in December.  Pretty decisively, for that matter:  41-24, in a game that was only close in the first quarter.  As befits Today’s SEC, it was neither a defensive nor an offensive battle.  It was Whole-Spectrum Football, and Bama was better.  By no means an unbeatable juggernaut, but materially and credibly better.

That said, you don’t count Georgia out.

Football Follies 2021: NCAA – Bowls bust their move

We know nothing.  COVID-19 is said to be wreaking havoc with bowl teams and games, but from what we can tell that’s entirely about positive-test “cases” rather than players actually falling ill.  To date we are happy to report that no Inner Circle teams have been affected, but we did lose the much-anticipated Wasabi Fenway Bowl – and that in spite of the 16-person Executive Committee “comprised [sic] of regional business, education, and non-profit community leaders,” which just goes to show you.

To date, the following bowls have been canceled:  EasyPost Hawai’i Bowl, Military Bowl Presented by Peraton, San Diego County Credit Union Holiday Bowl (!), Wasabi Fenway Bowl, and Barstool Sports Arizona Bowl.  C’mon man.

It being a weird year, with bowl games falling right and left, plus players hiding out in back alleys in anticipation of the NFL draft, not to mention transferring with big thuds and bangs like it’s high tourist season on the Washington Metro, it’s hard to make anything in particular of the conference bowl records up to now.

Football Follies 2021: NCAA – Booger goes ballistic

Booger 2: The Revenge is always Booger’s biggest week, and this year the New Year’s Eve games are on Friday.  That’s a whole lotta bowl if we take the entire NCAA week in one gulp.  So this time around we’re going to break it up and knock it off on Thursday (30 December), carrying the CFBP$+ playoffs and other sacred New Year’s Eve games over to next week’s tote.

That still gives us 16 juicy bowls to preview, ranging from the Boogerest to Better.  Game notes for our Inner Circle this week include Tulsa and Wyoming:  TU carried the day 30-17 in the Myrtle Beach Bowl, after an exciting first two minutes in which each team scored a TD.  The Golden H got through the whole game without turning over the ball.  We’re so proud!

On Tuesday, after an early-game struggle, Wyoming downed Kent State

Football Follies 2021: NCAA – Booger Bowls on deck

They’ve already had the dance-off at the Bahamas Bowl Beach Bash in Nassau – that was Tuesday – so clearly we’re running behind and will need to dog-paddle fiercely to catch up with the Booger Bowl action for 2021.  As previously noted, it kicks off on Friday at noon Eastern with said Bahamas Bowl, featuring our Inner Circle’s own Toledo Rockets.

For simplicity, we’ll take the bowls in order and highlight the ones our Inner Circle is gracing.  In a season with some definite ups and downs, the Inner Circle came out pretty well, all but two of the FBS teams going to bowl games (and even Navy, which ended up on the wrong end of 4-8, having the gratification of winning The Game this past weekend).

The parade of Boogers now begins, with all the usual charm and homely delights that attend it every year.

Football Follies 2021: NCAA week 15 – The Game

We hear these crazy reports that not everyone watches the Army-Navy game.  This seems inexplicable.  Communists.

The overwhelming majority of peoplekind knows that there will be a whole lotta runnin’ on Saturday, when Army and Navy go head-to-head in MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford.  We liked it better when they just played in Veteran Stadium in Philly every year, but we’re old fuddy-duddies.  We have to remind ourselves with an electronic zapper that Veteran Stadium doesn’t even exist anymore.

Anyway, the running.  Sometimes Army completes a pass, which is really cool.  Navy rarely does.  But Navy has managed to keep Tai Lavatai in the saddle as QB for weeks now,