[NU Sports] Sugar Bowl ...

[SjT (Stephen J. Truog)]

> ideas.).  ND's  putative 
> "entitlement" to be invited to the BCS "Dance" is
> just a further  indictment of the 
> whole system and does nothing to enhance Dome U.'s 
> reputation.  I have never 
> felt the visceral hate that some of you have for 
> ND--probably because I grew 

That's it right there -- I certainly don't hate the
institution itself. It's a fine school and beautiful
campus/stadium. A friend of mine from high school went
there and it's a top-notch education all the way.

But the reason I may enjoy throwing in a few jabs now
and the (OK, maybe more :) ) is their sense of
entitlement from their football program. Do they have
an amazing history? Yes. But it's a new era in college
football and they need to stop getting these free
passes -- regardless of whether it was used in this
year's selection, it's ridiculous that it's even
there.

And what irks me and others even more is that these
special exceptions are just feeding the ND monster
because it guarantees a $17 million payday that they
will not share, unlike every other BCS team that has a
conference. Yet if they fail to get into a BCS bowl,
they somehow fall into the Big East's bowl ties. I
don't know why the Big East agreed to this, but it's
ridiculous to let them have it "both ways" and have
their own hype machine, er, TV network.

Would I drop all of this grudge if they woke up,
listened to their academic faculty and joined the Big
Ten? Yes. It'd be great for the league and for Notre
Dame (c'mon - why play for the Commander in Chief
trophy every year ... play for a Big Ten
Championship!). But in the meantime, they get to have
their cake and eat it too and are stealing millions of
dollars from BCS coffers that they really haven't
earned on anything other than past glories.

You'd hope sooner or later the Big Ten would wake up
and stop giving ND two or three respectable games per
year ... or that the BCS schools would wise up and
stop letting them slip in the back door to take money
away from their conferences ... or that instead of the
constant hype during yet another nationally televised
blowout of the Irish that the commentators would
actually dare to ask the question hanging around the
BCS bowls like a 2-ton gorilla: DO THE IRISH DESERVE
TO BE IN THIS BOWL GAME?

But until then, we'll just have to rant on the 'net
and take delight in watching the likes of Oregon
State, NC State, LSU and Ohio State hand out thorough
beatings to Irish teams that come into the game
complaining that they get no respect. When you haven't
won a bowl game in 13 years, you gotta earn it!:) And
in a league like the Big Ten, you can, as we did
coming from nowhere in 1995. But until NBC and the BCS
stop feeding the ego, I guess that won't happen.

Next year's schedule starts out challenging as usual
thanks to their "half of a Big Ten schedule" tour
(games at PSU and Michigan with a new QB could be like
what we saw for PSU heading into South Bend and
Columbus this year) ... but tapers off quickly except
for USC's visit to South Bend. But they'll probably go
9-3 and head for another BCS berth.

GO CATS!!!
-SjT

* * * * * * * * *
STEPHEN J. TRUOG
sjtruog at yahoo.com
GO CATS!!!

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