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Patriots offensive coordinator Bill O'Brien has agreed to become Penn State's next head coach, CBSSports.com's Mike Freeman confirmed Thursday night.
This comes after a week of rumors had O'Brien taking the job, not taking the job, then interviewing for the job in that order on consecutive days. But now that his employment status is set, what does this mean for the Patriots?
It's not the first time the organization has lost an offensive coordinator (or even one to a high-profile college job). Notre Dame hired Charlie Weis in December 2004 and he coached the Fighting Irish through five mostly disappointing seasons before he was fired.
Weis was Bill Belichick's first offensive coordinator in New England, arriving in 2000, the same year the Patriots used the 199th on (wait for it…) Tom Brady. The Pats won three Super Bowls from '00-'04; when Weis headed for South Bend, he was replaced by then-29-year-old quarterbacks coach Josh McDaniels. (McDaniels didn't officially have the title of offensive coordinator until 2006, but according to a 2008 New York Times, story he called the plays during the 2005 season.)
McDaniels was there in 2007, too, when the Patriots went 18-0 and set countless offensive records on their way to the Super Bowl. They lost to the Giants in one of the biggest upsets in championship history, and following the 2008 season, McDaniels was hired by the Broncos to replace Mike Shanahan. He lasted a season and a half before poor personnel decisions and a string of losses led to his dismissal 12 games into the 2010 campaign.
Both Weis and McDaniels reemerged as NFL coordinators; the former with the Chiefs in 2010 (Weis later returned to college, first as Florida's OC this fall before accepting the Kansas head-coaching gig in December), the latter with the Rams in 2011.
O'Brien's NFL journey began in February 2007, when the Patriots hired him after two seasons as Duke's offensive coordinator. After a year, he was promoted from offensive assistant to wide receivers coach. And like McDaniels before him, O'Brien called plays "unofficially" before eventually being promoted to offensive coordinator in 2011.
So how have New England offense's fared the year after losing their coordinator? Unsurprisingly, as long as Tom Brady's upright, it's pretty much all systems go.
In 2004, the Pats' offense ranked third, according to Football Outsiders metrics. In 2005, after Weis left for Notre Dame, the Pats ranked seventh. In 2008, they were eighth; in '09, with McDaniels in Denver, they were first.
Next question: with O'Brien off to State College, who replaces him in New England? CNNSE.com's Tom Curran has a list of names -- some familiar, others less so.
* Chad O'Shea, Pats wide receivers coach
* Josh McDaniels, Rams offensive coordinator
* Jeff Davidson, Vikings offensive line coach
But again, the most critical element to New England's success isn't the guy calling the plays, it's the guy under center. The Patriots go as far as Brady goes. But we already knew that.
Source : http://www.cbssports.com
The 2012 Sugar Bowl is just hours away. We’re sure you have so many questions. We’re here to help. (For an Xs and Os breakdown, check out George Schroeder’s game preview.)
• What’s all this, then? Not the national title game, but near the national title game! The 78th annual Allstate Sugar Bowl will prime the city of New Orleans for the BCS National Championship Game six days later.
• Where will this game be played? The Mercedes-Benz Superdome, home field of the New Orleans Saints and Tulane Green Wave.
• When is it on television? Kickoff is scheduled for 8:30 p.m. on Tuesday, January 3. The game will be televised on ESPN.
• Whom does it feature? Traditionally, the first pick from available SEC teams plus a BCS at-large selection, but not this year.
• What about this year? Thanks to next week’s all-SEC West lineup in the title game, two at-large picks were given to the Sugar Bowl, and the results, on paper, were less than thrilling: 10-2 Michigan will face 11-2 Virginia Tech, a matchup that inspired waves of hostile bewilderment from onlookers who expected the Sugar Bowl to maybe pick at least one top 10 team.
• Who will call the game? Brad Nessler, Todd Blackledge and Holly Rowe.
• Who sponsors the game? Allstate, purveyor of insurance and employer of Dennis “President Palmer” Haysbert and Dean “Dennis the Beeper King” Winters.
• Enough about the football. What about the loot? Ready to stand and declare your love for the BCS?This hat is your ticket to doing that!
• What mild indignities/wacky activities will visiting teams be subjected to while in town? This is New Orleans; is anything the teams get up to not going to be delightfully off-kilter in some crucial aspect?
• Please impart any miscellaneous knowledge you might have concerning the 2012 Sugar Bowl. Though you’ll hear more from him about his game week restaurant selections than his playing history, please note Todd Blackledge, as quarterback for the Penn State Nittany Lions, was Sugar Bowl MVP in PSU’s 27-23 victory over Georgia in 1983. Also, the turf in the Superdome used to be called “Mardi Grass”; how is that not still a thing?
Stay tuned for more postseason FAQ sheets, and stay on top of a hectic postseason slate with our complete 2011-2012 College Football Bowl Schedule.
Source : http://college-football.si.com
Source : http://college-football.si.com
The elements will have an impact on the 2012 NHL Winter Classic, but when it comes down to it, this battle for Atlantic Division supremacy between the Philadelphia Flyers and New York Rangers won't be decided by bad ice, atmosphere or weather.
Jan 2, 2012 - The Philadelphia Flyers have yet to beat the New York Rangers in a game of ice hockey this 2011-12 NHL season, and as the two Atlantic Division rivals prepare to take things outside for Monday's Winter Classic, there's a general sense that it's a much more serious game than we've seen in previous seasons.
Not that last year's game between the Pittsburgh Penguins and Washington Capitals lacked in the competitiveness department, or that the 2010, 2009 and 2008 games lacked there either. But this year's edition just seems like there's a whole lot more on the line.
Then again, that's probably because there is a whole lot more on the line. The winner of Monday's game will grab the top spot in the Atlantic and in the Eastern Conference, a spot currently held by the Rangers. And while New York has taken both games in the series so far this season, all of that gets thrown out the window on Monday afternoon at 3 p.m. when the teams take the ice at Citizens Bank Park.
Here are a few factors to consider now that we're taking this rivalry outside.
THE WIND
It's going to be a windy day in Philadelphia, and Eric Lindros told current Flyer Zac Rinaldo after the Alumni Game on Saturday about how that wind impacts the game.
LINDROS: It's getting colder the next couple days, but as soon as that wind picked up...
RINALDO: Can you feel the wind? Even with the glass there and stuff like that?
LINDROS: Yeah, you can feel the wind a little bit. You can feel it coming through, and the ice started to tighten a little bit. It was good. Yeah, it's conducive. You guys will be able to play.
So that's the good news, that the wind seems to help the quality of the ice a bit. On the flip side, weather.com reports that the winds are going to be moving west-southwest Monday, meaning they'll basically be pushing towards the third base side of the baseball diamond.
The team that shoots at that end in the latter half of the third period could have an edge as they try to make a final drive in what expects to be a close hockey game. The teams will switch ends midway through the third period to try to eliminate any competitive edge, but when push comes to shove, one team will likely be aided with the wind at their backs in the waning minutes of the hockey game.
PHYSICAL PLAY
These two teams absolutely hate each other, and while they've generally been pretty disciplined against each other so far this season, that doesn't mean the games have been physical. It won't be terribly cold on Monday afternoon, with game time temperatures estimated at about 41 degrees, dropping off to just about 37 degrees over the course of the game, but it'll obviously be substantially colder than the typical indoor game.
How will the elements impact the physical play between the teams? Whenever these two teams get together, you can guarantee that the game will be hard-hitting, and those hits can feel absolutely bone-crunching when you factor in the wind and the cold. Teams often talk about wearing down the opposition, and in an outdoor game, the team that's in front of the physical battle could have even more of an edge than usual.
SERGEI BOBROVSKY GETS THE START
There's no question in the New York crease, as Henrik Lundqvist looks to keep up his hot play of late. He'll likely do just that outdoors on Monday. But across the ice in the Philadelphia crease, there are question marks. And all of them are being answered by backup goalie Sergei Bobrovsky.
Bob will get the start over the $51 million man, Ilya Bryzgalov, in the big game Monday afternoon, a sign from coach Peter Laviolette that symbolism means nothing and this is a game the Flyers need to win. By starting Bobrovsky, Laviolette is assuring his team the best chance to do just that, as Bryzgalov has played awful hockey lately. Bob, on the other hand, has played very well, most recently defeating the Pittsburgh Penguins on Thursday night.
Can Bobrovsky keep up that success under the bright Citizens Bank Park lights? Will the outdoors affect him at all? He's been providing solid answers to these questions of late, and if can keep doing that in the Winter Classic, he'll make his coach look damn smart.
HOME ICE EDGE?
The Flyers can't beat the Rangers at Madison Square Garden. The Rangers can't beat the Flyers at Wells Fargo Center. But what about at Citizens Bank Park?
Perhaps the one downside to hosting a Winter Classic is that it doesn't necessarily feel like a home game, even though this game will be played in Philadelphia in front of a mostly orange-clad crowd. And you also lose all the comforts of knowing your home ice. The ice at the ballpark has only existed for about a week, and both the Flyers and Rangers have had equal time to figure out its quirks.
Sure, the Flyers still get the last change and all the strategic positives of playing a home game, but when you take the game outside, the impact of such things becomes much less obvious. Is there really a home ice edge in a Winter Classic? Not really.
CLAUDE GIROUX PACES THE FLYERS
If there's one thing that stands out in the two Rangers vs. Flyers games so far this year, it's the invisibility of the NHL's leading scorer, Claude Giroux. (Okay, technically he's one point behind Henrik Sedin heading into Monday's action, but he's played 32 games to Sedin's 39, so we can probably let that slide.)
Giroux has been held completely scoreless -- not a goal, not an assist -- against New York this season. The Rangers have done a solid job in shutting him down, as they've also done with Jaromir Jagr (no points in one game) and Scott Hartnell (one assist, of the secondary variety and on the power play, in two games).
If the Flyers want to have any chance against such a solid defensive team in the Rangers, their top scorers have to get on the board. Both teams can worry about the elements and the ice conditions and the atmosphere all they'd like, but in the end, it all really does come back to hockey.
For more on this year's Winter Classic, head over to SB Nation's Rangers blog Blueshirt Banter and Flyers blog Broad Street Hockey. For everything Winter Classic in the build-up to the game, head over to our NHL Winter Classic StoryStream.
The New York Jets didn’t just stagger to an 8-8 finish that fell far short of Coach Rex Ryan’s Super Bowl guarantee, they finished with a meltdown in which players were ripping wide receiver Santonio Holmes for quitting.
Some teammates reportedly said that he quit weeks ago and one evencalled him a cancer, but there was visible proof of the situation late in the Jets’19-17 loss when Holmes was benched in Miami.
One Jets player publicly discussed the behavior of Holmes — the Jets’captain — in frank terms after the game.
“Let me just say there were some guys in the huddle that were unhappy with Tone’s demeanor,” running back LaDainian Tomlinson said, via nyjets.com. “When you have a group of guys that’s fighting their butts off, and one guy, for whatever reason, their demeanor’s not with them, you’re going to get some guys to say something to him and tell them how they feel. That’s what you got today.”
Specifically, Tomlinson said players were saying “things like ‘Come on, man. Let’s go.’ ... that type of thing.” The result was that offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer, who’s on the hot seat, benched Holmes, a move that Ryan was not aware of. LT said he intended to speak to Holmes about this latest Jets mess.
“My advice to him, I’m going to talk to him. We’re going to keep it between us, the advice I’m going to give him,” Tomlinson said. “I don’t want to put it out in the media, the stuff I will tell Tone. But we will have a conversation.”
Hmmm...maybe LT’d be a better captain. In any event, Holmes is likely to be back if only because he’d be an enormous salary cap hit for the Jets.
“I’ll tell you what, it’s tough for guys to follow a captain that kind of behaves in that manner. You’re a captain, guys looking at you. You’ve got to lead by example,” Tomlinson said. “You’ve got to play your tail off until the last play. And when that doesn’t happen, you will have guys look at you in the way that captains shouldn’t be looked at. You should always put yourself out there as a leader.”
Tomlinson wouldn’t speculate on what set Holmes off, but said he was “not really into the game. Just feeling like it’s over. Feeling sorry for themselves.” And LT brought up an excellent point. No matter how upset players were “we were still in the game. We were still in the game.”
Source : http://www.washingtonpost.com