If you’re a betting fan, I hope you didn’t lay any money down on Michigan making it to the field of 12 in this – or next – year’s College Football Playoff.
Reporting on this is very preliminary, but it is linked to the Stallions cheating scandal. Before anyone panics about this season though, the early insider has this to say:
The report states that the NCAA could seek to punish Michigan by banning the team from the postseason for one or two years. Balas reports that if this is indeed the case, Michigan would fight the punishment and it’s unlikely the ban would be in place for the upcoming college football season as the case would not be heard by the NCAA’s Committee on Infractions until 2025.
I’m guessing a coaching change and a scandal to boot isn’t going to make navigating the Big 10 schedule any easier, so I’ll make a bold prediction to say Michigan isn’t sniffing the CFP anytime soon.
Question – why wait until this season for a ruling? More decidedly frustrating – would an earlier punishment have meant Georgia could’ve crept into the CFP? You know who is more pissed about this? Let’s check in with our colleagues in Tallahassee for more:
Cue up the self-proclaimed Champions talk again. And while you’re at it, go ahead and attach the * to the 2023 season.
Methinks San Diego looks better by the day for Harbaugh.
I’ve been saying since January that the 2023 season didn’t have a legitimate CFP champion, so it’s like the CFP never happened. I am 100% serious when I say that I consider Georgia to still be going for the 3-peat this season. If Georgia wins the national championship, all of our merchandise should say back-to-back-to-back or 3-peat. Someone call Josh Brooks.
We lost at the wrong time. With how the season shook out with 3 unbeaten regular season champions and Texas beating Alabama in the regular season, the loser of the SECCG wasn’t getting in this past year. I was saying that from mid-October on.
We should have played the game as if we were the underdog and attacked Bama from the opening whistle. Instead, we acted like Jalen Milroe was Tom Brady and Lamar Jackson rolled into one.
CBS has a portion of the B1G’s package. CBS has the media rights to the NCAA Tournament. CBS will put the right amount of pressure on the infractions committee to give the postseason ban to Central Michigan.
If the past is a prelude…
Mike Norvell is the new Butch Jones.
Norvell is a damn good football coach (Butch Jones is a dummy). Do I agree with his focus on the portal when FSU should be a big time high school recruiting destination? No. He finished the regular season undefeated after he lost his Heisman candidate quarterback. He did everything he was supposed to do to get his team to the CFP just to be told your QB’s injury is keeping you out.
He then had to deal with those same transfers walking out the door. His team’s season performance (where that injured QB thoroughly outplayed the eventual Heisman winner in the season opener) shouldn’t be overshadowed by 63-3.
That’s my opinion … YMMV.
Is anyone surprised that when the going gets tough the portal guys don’t stick around?
I wasn’t surprised one bit. We’ll see if Ole Piss is this year’s FSU.
Norvell gets a whole lot of credit for doing a whole lot less than Mark Richt and Richt was always treated like a punch line. Norvell doesn’t impress me at all.
Norvell isn’t as good of a coach as CMR. No doubt about that … Richt is going in the CFBHOF.
Norvell won at Memphis. He has done a good job at FSU turning things around from the mess that was there. We’ll see what he can do long term.
Justin Fuente won at Memphis too. Who cares?
If the facts show that the spying allegations against UM are true, vacating the NC and prior wins should definitely be in the table. This along with a lengthy show cause order against Harbaugh and any others on the staff who participated.
In that case, their current staff is screwed, most are still there from last season including the head coach. The B1G will fight this with all their might and money. The NCAA with one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peal will fold on this like a bad lawn chair.
Should this scenario hold water, Mickey’s committee will intercede and present the trophy to tosu as the national chumpion with a six hour long, PPV acceptance speech delivered by Agent Herbstreit…GO DAWGS!!
NCAA is a day late and a dollar short as per usual. Michigan cheated their asses off and won their natty. What the hell difference does any punishment make now?
Meh, who cares? They beat the teams in front of them even after Stallion was busted. We lost at the wrong time. I’m fine with the results.
Now we choose a tournament champion.
Michigan began cheating starting with the 2021 season. This was a direct cause of a dramatic improvement in their Win/Loss record in the 2021-2023 seasons. Their W/L records prior to 2021 was abysmal, including a 2-4 record in 2020, and they could not beat Ohio State. Harbaugh was on a scorching hot seat and desperate, and so the program-wide cheating began. From a 2-4 record in 2020 and college football irrelevance for two decades, to CFP semi-final appearances in 2021 and 2022. Their (illegitimately attained) success on the field directly resulted in better recruiting classes and more donations/contributions/support for their program over the span of three seasons.
This is why it matters. This is why we can’t be brainless morons and say things like “who cares?” and “they beat the teams in front of them”. Their actions were against the rules and resulted in a drastic competive advantage.
Remember, Michigan was always losing 2 or 3 games a season against teams with less talent because that program and coaching staff was subpar. Once they knew the other team’s signs, those lesser talented teams had no chance because the one advantage they had (coaching) was negated by the sign stealing. This is called a competive disadvantage.
It’s curious how Michgian steamrolled everyone in the 2022 season, only to get embarrassed by TCU. Then we come to find out that TCU knew Michigan had their signs, so they changed them and created a bunch of decoy signs to fool Michigan. As soon as Michigan lost their competive advantage against a less talented team, they folded like a lawn chair.
So yes, Michigan deserves to be punished and all wins from 2021-2023 vacated. This won’t happen of course, but it is the right thing to do.
Best summary to do.
and fully agree, the tell tell sign was the TCU game.
how does a coach get suspended multiple times in a season and their team STILL plays in the post season.
sports talking heads…crickets.
money walks and…
“Brainless morons” Haha! Yeah, fuck you, too.
Why should FSU be pissed? They got their “Unconquered” rings, after all 😂😂
And let’s not forget the common theory that UM provided stolen signals to USC in 2022 in preparation for their late season games against Tenn and Clemson where USC suddenly looked like world-beaters and arguably cleared the way for UM to get to the playoff. USC put up 63 points on #6 Tenn in game 11 of a season where they went 8-5.
If you’re too dumb to change up your signals (or at least what they mean) from game to game, you deserve to get them stolen IMHO.
That doesn’t excuse the allegation Michigan shared Tennessee and Clemson’s signs with Shane Beamer and company. If that’s ever proven, Michigan and South Carolina should both be in trouble.
I really have no problem with sign stealing. If I were a fan of one of those teams Michigan beat as a result, I would probably be more pissed at my head coach and coordinators for allowing them to be stolen and used.