OT: Notre Dame declines bowl bid | Page 10 | The Boneyard
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OT: Notre Dame declines bowl bid

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Bevacqua talked about how finite football is for the athletes. And then ND opts out of a bowl so that the players have one less game to play. Hard for me to reconcile that no matter how meaningless the game is. I always assumed that football players want to play football games.
 
I watched Bevacqua's presser and was underwhelmed. He came across as petulant and entitled.
The reasons for their collective anger and alleged shock at the CFP selections has migrated from "we deserved it" to "for 6 weeks we were told that we belonged". Well it is the last vote that counts and I submit the CFP Committee got it right. Simply put, perhaps they didn't belong.

As of the last poll, ND had beaten only one ranked team (#16 USC at home by 10 points.) Other than that and narrowly losing to 2 CFP teams, ND played essentially a "tomato can" schedule. 6 of their opponents were provided with their ACC scheduling agreement. Miami was the real deal and beat them game 1. The other 5, NCSt, Pitt, Syracuse, Stanford and BC, were reliable victims. ND avoids running any gauntlet because of its independence and ACC scheduling agreement. They are also benefited by lack of exposure to a conference championship game. Ask Kirby Smart and Carson Beck how important that is!

Also, ND has a hard time convincing me that they were relying on the CFP preliminary rankings when you look at their last 2 games - Syracuse and Stanford. Marcus Freeman does not strike me as the kind of a coach who would gleefully stomp a team 70-7! (Syracuse avoided the shutout with 8 seconds left.) Freeman could have throttled back and beat them 49-7 or 56-7. At Stanford, late in the 4th, ND was still throwing deep up by 29. Maybe they were thinking that the CFP would only be impressed with "Roman Colosseum" type victories given the quality of their last two opponents.

In any event, ND lost the two games that truly would have made a difference. Sure they ran the table thereafter against weak opponents (save USC), but CFP rates your competition too!
 
I watched Bevacqua's presser and was underwhelmed. He came across as petulant and entitled.
The reasons for their collective anger and alleged shock at the CFP selections has migrated from "we deserved it" to "for 6 weeks we were told that we belonged". Well it is the last vote that counts and I submit the CFP Committee got it right. Simply put, perhaps they didn't belong.

As of the last poll, ND had beaten only one ranked team (#16 USC at home by 10 points.) Other than that and narrowly losing to 2 CFP teams, ND played essentially a "tomato can" schedule. 6 of their opponents were provided with their ACC scheduling agreement. Miami was the real deal and beat them game 1. The other 5, NCSt, Pitt, Syracuse, Stanford and BC, were reliable victims. ND avoids running any gauntlet because of its independence and ACC scheduling agreement. They are also benefited by lack of exposure to a conference championship game. Ask Kirby Smart and Carson Beck how important that is!

Big deal if they thought they were in good position. It’s not like they made any decisions based on that perceived position such as canceling games like baseball to retain strength of schedule.

They were surprised and disappointed in not being selected. Most of us on this board have been disappointed multiple times. Life goes on. Get up, dust yourselves off and man up.
 
You’d think someone from ND would know the difference between dominate (a verb) and dominant (an adjective)

Is McMurphy and ND grad?

I'm reading as McMurphy typing what he heard Backlava say. Or, was there a press release which had it wrong?
 
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Join a conference ND. Or better yet, all P4 teams should drop ND from their scedule first chance. It might take a while since games are scheduled in advance. But I think ND signs on before that happens.
 
If you look at it, the comittee told them what was coming, in a very strange way anyway. For weeks they would answer the Miami/ND question by saying they were looking at groups or "pods" of teams, so the head to head was not the only consideration. They even came out and said that idle teams could move up or down depending on other situations. It should have been pretty clear when they put Alabama at 9 that they were not going to punish them for losing their championship game. So that created a group of BYU, Miami, and ND. BYU clearly was not going to get the leeway that Alabama had, so once they were out it was Miami and ND alone for that last spot, and that made it an easy choice. Now I think Alabama should be out, but no way is the top seed in the SEC regular season ever going to get bumped, not in my opinion anyway.
 
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My two cents:

Glad ND was jilted. Don’t want to watch them anyway.

The ACC owes allegiance to ND in FB is ridiculous.

I will gladly watch JMU and Tulane play. It is refreshing and I would love to see an upset. Isn’t that why we love 1-16, 2-15 and 5-12 BB matchups?

ND should join a conference, but auto bid for a top 12 will prevent that. What an easy path for them. If true, then I do not see why everyone thinks Alabama doesn’t deserve in. Alabama actually played a tough schedule. They deserved their rating despite three losses.

The BE doesn’t need ND, but I am sure they would accept them if ND feels that strongly about the ACC backstabbing them.
 
The ND hate is ridiculous. Stop and look at it rationally. ND team at present is far better than Bama or Miami. Ranked ahead of Miami at the time these jokers were deliberating, and they also decided they needed 5 SEC teams in the 12. Really? It’s political, money, blah blah blah, join a conference fully, blah. ND, Canes in, Bama out.
 
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The ND hate is ridiculous. Stop and look at it rationally. ND team at present is far better than Bama or Miami. Ranked ahead of Miami at the time these jokers were deliberating, and they also decided they needed 5 SEC teams in the 12. Really? It’s political, money, blah blah blah, join a conference fully, blah. ND, Canes in, Bama out.
Cry me a river
 
The ND hate is ridiculous. Stop and look at it rationally. ND team at present is far better than Bama or Miami. Ranked ahead of Miami at the time these jokers were deliberating, and they also decided they needed 5 SEC teams in the 12. Really? It’s political, money, blah blah blah, join a conference fully, blah. ND, Canes in, Bama out.

Your opinion is ND is better.

Get back to us with some facts.
 
The ND hate is ridiculous. Stop and look at it rationally. ND team at present is far better than Bama or Miami. Ranked ahead of Miami at the time these jokers were deliberating, and they also decided they needed 5 SEC teams in the 12. Really? It’s political, money, blah blah blah, join a conference fully, blah. ND, Canes in, Bama out.
Based on what? Has something changed that would allow ND to handle them on both lines of scrimmage? Maybe Love could manage more than 30 yards rushing if they met again. Maybe. Not that it matters though, because ND is out.
 
Your opinion is ND is better.

Get back to us with some facts.
Have you watched these teams over the past few weeks?
ND would be favored by 4+ over both. They lost early to the Canes and A&M (close) and then ran roughshod over their schedule. You can argue for Miami, but not a 3 loss Alabama that is limping into the playoffs.
 
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