Can't believe this blowhard would come out and say this kind of stuff..... I
realize that the bigger conferences have a tougher schedule but for a guy
whose team isn't even pushing for a national title right now would lay this out.
Another good reason to dislike THE Ohio State U. The numbers might back up
his bravado but I think TCU or Boise would be able to hang against any of the
big boys for one game on a neutral field.


COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Even if TCU and Boise State run the table, they still don't deserve to be in the Bowl Championship Series title game, Ohio State president E. Gordon Gee said Wednesday.

In an interview with The Associated Press, the president at the university with the largest athletic program in the country said that TCU and Boise State do not face a difficult enough schedule to play in the national championship game.

I do know, having been both a Southeastern Conference president and a Big Ten president, that it's like murderer's row every week for these schools. We do not play the Little Sisters of the Poor. We play very fine schools on any given day.

"Well, I don't know enough about the Xs and Os of college football," said Gee, formerly the president at West Virginia, Colorado, Brown and Vanderbilt universities. "I do know, having been both a Southeastern Conference president and a Big Ten president, that it's like murderer's row every week for these schools. We do not play the Little Sisters of the Poor. We play very fine schools on any given day.

"So I think until a university runs through that gantlet that there's some reason to believe that they not be the best teams to [be] in the big ballgame."

Gee, long an admirer of the BCS and the current bowl system, said he was against a playoff in the Football Bowl Subdivision.

"If you put a gun to my head and said, 'What are you going to do about a playoff system [if] the BCS system as it now exists goes away?' I would vote immediately to go back to the bowl system," he said.

He said the current system is better for the student-athletes.

"It's not about this incessant drive to have a national championship because I think that's a slippery slope to professionalism," he said. "I'm a fan of the bowl system and I think that by and large it's worked very, very well."

He cited Ohio State's presence in the 2007 national title game as an example.

The Buckeyes won their first 10 games that season to rise to No. 1 before losing 26-21 at home to unranked Illinois. They fell all the way to No. 8 in the BCS standings.

A series of upsets over the final weeks of the regular season and in other team's conference championship games led to the Buckeyes climbing all the way back to the No. 1 spot in the final BCS standings. They were matched against an LSU team with two losses.

Ohio State led 10-0 early only to have LSU come back and score the next 31 points in a 38-24 victory at the Louisiana Superdome.

"You know, it's a mystery," Gee said. "We were No. 1, then No. 11, then No. 7 and we ended up playing for the national championship. I think I kind of like that mixed-up mystery."

While he was at Vanderbilt, Gee abolished the athletic department since it was underwritten by the university's general fund anyway. He said he has no problem with an Ohio State program that fields 36 intercollegiate varsity teams and has an annual budget exceeding $120 million.

"Here, athletics pays for itself and also pays for academic programs at the institution," he said. "The other thing, of course, that I take a look at and see how well we are doing in terms of that notion of balance, which is what I was all about at Vanderbilt, which I am all about here."

He said Ohio State's eighth-ranked football team, which plays rival Michigan on Saturday, is in the top 10 in the nation not only on the field but also in terms of academic progress.

"That's the kind of balance I want to have," he said.

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Flew too close to the sun on wings of pastrami

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This is a fantastic thread title.

I think there's nothing wrong, given the current system, that major conference teams get in before others. I also think that TCU and Boise would be 11-0 or 10-1 in a major conference this year.

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Fire Phil Emery

E. Gordon Gee, my new hero, it's not that there not in a big confernce, but they play easy competition week after week, just look at Alabama's schedule this year.

Irish Boy, I will disagree with your thoughts that TCU or Boise State would go 10-1 or 11-0, maybe if there in the Big East, but not the others. As much as people put Boise's win over Va. Tech earlier in the season, Boise was up 17-0 and had to score a late td to win and that may not have happenend if the ref had to decided to call a hit in the back on a punt return, instead of picking up the flag, it was close so could have gone either way.

On TCU, I just can't stop thinking when they play a good team, they never look good, last year everybody I heard talk said TCU would roll Boise and lost 17-10 and this year Oregon State with a new quarterback, they still struggled to beat Oregon State and thanks to a bad snap won 30-21, or Oregon State had a chance to tie the game.

What I think you are starting to see is some of the team's coaches or president's are starting to speak out more, Les Miles said a couple weeks ago, that even a 1 loss SEC team deserved to play in the title game, I don't think just talking about his team, but Auburn if they were to lose to ALabama. I can't blame them, they play tougher teams, when Boise and TCU play maybe 1 or 2 teams all year. I will give Boise a little credit if they go into Nevada and destroy them, but I think this will be a close game, and Nevada may win.

Are you against putting them up against the BIG BOYS and said
BIG BOYS losing? If they are creampuffs than let them steamroll
them on national TV and be done with it.

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Flew too close to the sun on wings of pastrami

ohio st. deserves to go to the national championship every year, so they can get pantsed like they should.

Ohio State plays a shit schedule every year and its by choice. They schedule 1 challenging game and its usually at home and the rest of the schedule that they have control over is usually bad MAC schools. I think Boise would shove it up there ass this year if they played them. TCU would be an evenly matched game.

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That's my purse! I don't know you!

You were the one that was convinced Miami would easily handle them, no?

Ohio State generally has one big one-and-one scheduled at any given time. So half the time their big game is at home, and half the time it is away. Pretty standard among big programs.

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Fire Phil Emery

Well, I wanted to believe that because I like the U...... Since I have lived in Ohio I just haven't seen them play many quality teams. Having Michigan and Penn State being subpar and not having Michigan State on the schedule and losing to Wisconsin doesn't impress me. Put West Virginia on the schedule, put Virginia Tech on the schedule, put Pittsburgh on the schedule since all three of these are geographically relevant and interesting and decent opponents....hell put Boise on the schedule since they are asking for it. If they are going to run their mouths then put them on the schedule.

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That's my purse! I don't know you!

yup. and this is one reason why i DON'T like college football.

Gee, looks like he was right

Gee looks like a moron when his team consistently gets embarrassed by real competition. Must be because that tough little sisters of the big ten schedule doesn't prepare his team for real competition.

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Forward, Together Forward

Go Huskies!!!

The irony is in his "little sistes of the weak" comment is that Boise has a tougher schedule than the Buckeyes'.

Exactly. I'll be interested to see how they fare in a BCS bowl this year.

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Flew too close to the sun on wings of pastrami

What have they really done in the last 7 years?

Edit: Never mind, 4-3, but 2 of the losses were in the National Championship game, and one win was against Notre Dame, which doesn't really count.

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They also won their conference 5 of those 7 years

At the current moment yes, but that changes this weekend when Boise plays the 4-7 Utah State Aggies (for those of you at home are rated 114 in the latest Sagarin ratings)

Ohio State gets a really bad reputation because they matched up with two great college football teams in the national title game. Outside of that they've been one of the best and most consistent teams in the modern era if you judge the whole Tressel era. I've never seen a team get put down so much for being #2 twice. They were still better than everyone else.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

My memory is a little fuzzy, but wasn't there some sort of controversy when they played LSU? Something about LSU jumping an undefeated team even though they had one loss...or I may be thinking about the year the beat up on Oklahoma in the National Title game.

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So the SOS may vary from week to week. He's a douche for making those comments when OSU's SOS is comparable to Boise's (and currently lower).

Missouri and West Virginia both lost on the last game of the season. Hawaii was undefeated, and some people thought they deserved to play in the game because Ohio State and LSU had two losses, but Hawaii was a really bad team that probably wasn't one of the top 15 teams in the country even though they were undefeated.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Ohio State had only one loss in 2007 (Juice!) before the Championship Game. They would have been just about the last one loss team taken, but everyone else crapped out and lost a second game. Once that happened, they were practically a lock for the championship.

Hawaii was the only undefeated team, and everyone pretty much understood that they weren't a championship level team. Turns out they weren't even a particularly good team and they were destroyed by Georgia in the Sugar Bowl.

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Fire Phil Emery

I remember Hawaii getting smoked by Georgia in the Sugar Bowl that year

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Georgia blasted Hawaii 41-10 and Thom Brennemen was tool during most of the second half, while Charles Davis explained college football to him.

That's right. I watched that game in a bar, so I didn't hear the sound. B&B jumped on the "this announcer is awesome!" train, and I couldn't wait to hear what outstanding knowledge this Charles Davis character was dropping.

Charles Davis makes my ears bleed. Ugh.

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Fire Phil Emery

Charles Davis not one of the best, but better than Brenneman, of course these 2 were part of the infamous national title game with Florida vs Oklahoma, with Tebow and the guy's didn't know the downs on one series.

In the Hawaii-Georgia game, Brenneman was mad when Georgia was up big and during a replay, Georgia fans were chanting overated, and he was asking how many people will care that Georgia wins by 31 than 24, and Charles Davis said yes and heck Georgia started out the next season number 1.

Yes, the famous Tebow game will go down in history. I have no use for Brennaman, either.

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Fire Phil Emery

Looks like you were likely proven right on TCU, IB.

For Gee, Wisconsin represents "murder's row" after crushing Ohio State 31-18. After losing to TCU in the Rose Bowl, however, they're just little sisters of the weak.

TCU joins the Big East, so they won't have to worry about hearing any comments, like their the little guy anymore.