You know Indiana's a basketball state because Bob Knight and Gene Keady and Rick Mount and Steve Alford, and also because that Milan thing, and also because Oscar and Crispus Attucks and Marion and Muncie Central and a bunch of other stuff.
But yesterday it wasn't the comforting round symmetry of a basketball that captivated Hoosiers. It was that weird funny-looking thing called a - what it is again? - football.
Down in Bloomington, Indiana University, not historically competent with that weird funny-looking thing, picked it up and shoved right down Michigan's gullet, 38-21 -- a result regarded as an upset by delusional folks in Michigan who failed to notice Indiana was ranked 13th, and right now is a much better football team than the Wolverines in every way.
If Michigan had beaten the Hoosiers, in fact, that would have been an upset. And when's the last time you could say that, aside from never?
Meanwhile, up in South Bend ...
Well, up there, Ian Book's name just entered the Lore Lair at Notre Dame alongside those of Tom Clements and Joe Montana and Tony Rice and Terry-Joe Hanratty-Theismann. And that's because Ian Book and the Irish hauled off and beat No. 1 Clemson 47-40 in two overtimes.
It was the first time Clemson had lost in the regular season in 37 games, and the first time the Irish had beaten a No. 1 since Shawn Wooden knocked down Charlie Ward's final pass 27 years ago, and the Golden Domes took down Bobby Bowden and Florida State.
Last night, Book passed for 310 yards and scurried away from the Clemson pass rush for 68 more, as Notre Dame took a 23-13 halftime lead, blew the 23-13 halftime lead, and then went into guts-up mode to tie it with 22 seconds left in regulation on Book's touchdown throw to Avery Davis.
Then they scored in overtime, scored again in the second overtime, and sacked Clemson quarterback D.J. Uiagalelei on consecutive downs to seal the deal.
So Book gets a statue now and Kyren Williams does for his 140 yards rushing and three scores, and Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah for leading a defense that limited Clemson's workhorse back Travis Etienne to 28 yards, forced three turnovers and spent half the night in Clemson's backfield.
(And, please, none of this "Well, Clemson didn't have Trevor Lawrence." No, they didn't. They had another five-star quarterback, and all Uiagalelei did was go 29-of-44 for 439 yards and two touchdowns. So they didn't noticeably suffer at that position.)
In any event, this was a statement win for Notre Dame, and the statement was "We're good enough now to put up statement wins instead of statement losses." Also, "We're good enough now not to reward our head coach with a 10-year contract extension just because he came close to beating a No. 1 team," which is what happened with Charlie Weis 15 years ago when the Irish almost beat USC.
Well, "almost beat" just became "beat." And so you could almost forgive everyone in Notre Dame Stadium losing their minds and swarming the field postgame. It will be interesting to see, a couple of weeks hence, how much of a statement moment that was for the Bastard Plague.
But, hey. When you're Notre Dame and it's been three decades since you were, you know, Notre Dame, these things will happen. And when you're Indiana and it's been 33 years since you beat Michigan, and the only other time before that was 53 years ago ...
Well. It doesn't really matter if Michigan is pretty sad these days, and if all the shine has worn off Jim Harbaugh and revealed him to be just another hump in $8 khakis. It's still Michigan.
The Wolverines may not be the Wolverines anymore, but Indiana isn't Indiana anymore, either. And Notre Dame isn't "Woo-hoo, we almost beat USC!" anymore, either.
We may still love the way a basketball looks when it sluices cleanly through nylon. But Saturday, the weird funny-looking thing had itself a day.
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