College Football's old guard.

Don't look now, but a couple of teams, namely the Penn State Nittany Lions and the Florida State Seminoles are both having a pretty good year.

Penn State at 8-0, and ranked nationally at #2 or #3 where the AP shows it's obvious bias when compared to the Coach's and Harris Polls (Can anyone say "Change!" here, in today's "politically correct" environment?) and sits alone atop the Big 10 by two full games, likely having only to take care of their own business, in order to play for the National Title, although they still have three opponents that should not be overlooked, in Iowa, Indiana, and Michigan State, and whose toughest test should be the Spartans,currently sitting at #2 in the Big Ten, where neither Iowa nor Michigan State is exactly "The Little Sisters of the Poor" on the gridiron, and even Indiana showed a bit of bite, by knocking off a pretty good Northwestern Wildcats team, as well.

[Incidentally, how do two 2-6 teams, namely the AZ State Sun Devils and NC State Wolfpack, get a higher power ranking than the Tulsa Golden Hurricane (7-1, #1 Conference USA) who only manage to rate at #67 out of 119 teams, despite their only loss being at the hands of the Arkansas Razorbacks, who have a very misleading 4-5 record with two losses (KY and Miss) coming by a total of 3 points, and actually played Florida better than did either KY or GA, even thouhg losing, and who other two losses were (then) against undefeated Texas and undefeated Alabama, who were ranked as the #1 and #2 teams in the country, prior to Texas losing to another undefeated team last night, Texas Tech? Or how is it that Ball State (8-0, #45) even though with, granted, a less than overwhelming schedule, only rates three notches above Tennessee (3-6, #48), but I digress?]

Fla. State, at 6-2, currently is a half-game behind Ga. Tech in the ACC and is #2 in the ACC, only due to an untimely 4th quarter hit of a helmet on the football, causing a fumble for what would likely have been a TD, can still potentially tie (or win) the ACC title, by winning out, as well.

Not too awfully shabby for a couple of "old geezers" at the ages of 78 and 81, who are still coaching, and of whom I've heard said, BTW, more times than I can quickly count, that the game had long-since passed them by, and they should have long ago retired (Although someone should tell 'Joe Pa' that now at 81, one of his assistants should really be the one to demonstrate the "how to" of an 'on-side' kick!), one of whom started coaching when I was 2 and the other who started when I was 6, and I'm already 60 years old!

Wonder how many coaches less than half their age would like to have half of their football knowledge and coaching ability??

Ed