Rutgers beats Louisville 28-25

Well Kristie said I had to write since I had said that the Cardinals looked better. It was certainly true for the first half, heading into the locker room 25-14, but Rutgers head coach Greg Schiano must have really been inspiring in the locker room. Rutgers defense came out swarming. They completely shut down the high-powered Louisville offense. The defense was swarming to the ball, seemed like every tackle involved 4 or 5 defenders. They were absolutely a team on a mission. Their own offense did a very good job of scoring 21 unanswered points - 14 in the second half. To quote Lou Holtz they controlled both sides of the line of scrimmage. Interestingly this is one of only a few football games I have watched from beginning to end.

The last game I really sat and watched - besides Super Bowls was Penn Trafford losing to Upper St. Clair in 1997 WPIAL AAAA finals. That game ended very similar to the Rutgers game. At the end of the PT game the kicker shanked an extra point that would have tied the game. At the end of the Rutgers the kicker shanked a field goal attemp, but lucky for Rutgers there was a defensive penalty and the kicker got another shot at it. He split the uprights and gave them the lead. The ensuing kickoff was quite exciting as the kicker needed to help out with the tackle, the students swarmed the field and had to be sent back to their seats. Fortunately the last play of the game appropriately ended with another sack of the quarterback. The final play was more impressive since Rutgers sent 6 defensive player deep to protect agains the hail-mary the fiver front guys just blew through the line and once again swarmed the QB! GAME OVER and the fans poured onto the field.


It was quite a game.

Rutgers vs. Louisville

Well I haven't ever been much of a college football fan. However, since Kristie (my daughter) is now attending Rutgers, I decided to watch the game. Currently the score is 15-7 Cardinals with only a few minutes to go in the first quarter. Louisville does appear to be the better team. Rutgers special teams don't seem to be really on top of their game. The main reason I'm writing is that the game is on ESPN-HD. For the leading sports network in the nation this is terrible coverage. The announcers are OK, however the camera angles, zoom in, zoom out, over use of the skycam is very very irritating. In fact Louisville just faked a punt, and the cameras didn't even catch the action. HD provides WIDE-SCREEN visibility - use it - don't constantly zoom all the way into a full head shot. Let me see part of the field, let me watch the play develop. I haven't watched much football but I don't remember the Superbowl coverage last year being this bad.