I had to call in the Kansas Department of Health and Environment to make sure there was no toxic mold on my blog. Five months without posting is inexcusable. It shows how lazy I am, and in this case, lazier than usual.
No mold on the blog, but I needed to use a whole can of lemon Pledge, which I use despite the highly annoying Consuela on Family Guy always demanding it from Peter, Stewie, Brian, Joe and just about any other character you can name from the show, which I no longer watch weekly like I did in the late 2000s. I understand Seth MacFarlane is so left-wing he will be a major supporter of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez if she runs for president, but it’s gone way too far. There are ways to communicate your support without going so far you have to question someone’s sanity.
Speaking of politics and sanity, I wish Donald Trump would go the hell away. Forever. Disappear. Get lost. I hate him. I hate him for forcing us to live through Dementia Joe’s presidency. I didn’t vote for Trump either time (and I didn’t vote for Hillary or Biden, either), and I never will. He gives real conservatives a bad name. He is not a conservative. He is an autocratic, narcissistic despot.
Enough about politics. ENOUGH ALREADY. The next year is going to be living hell between Despotic Donald and Dementia Joe. If this is the best American political parties can do for presidential nominations, then this country is truly the worst developed nation on earth. Period.
Kansas is ranked two places ahead of LSU (17 vs. 19) in the latest College Football Playoff rankings. It’s the first time the Jayhawks have been ahead of the Bayou Bengals in any college football survey since the final polls of the 1995 season.
That year, the Jayhawks had their best season since the Big 8 championship and Orange Bowl campaign of 1968, going 10-2 and defeating UCLA 51-30 in the Aloha Bowl in what was the last game for Bruins coach Terry Donahue. Kansas’ losses were to K-State (of course) in Manhattan and national champion Nebraska in Lawrence.
The Jayhawks were ranked ninth in the final Associated Press poll and 10th in the coaches poll. LSU, which went 7-4-1 in Gerry DiNardo’s first season, its first winning campaign since 1988, was not ranked in the final AP poll, but snuck into the coaches poll at No. 25.
Kansas coach Glen Mason, who inherited the Jayhawks after a 1-9-1 season in 1987 which included the infamous 17-17 tie vs. the Wildcats known across the Sunflower State as the Toiler Bowl, and slowly built KU back into a respectable program, including an 8-4 season in 1992 with an Aloha Bowl win vs. BYU.
On Christmas Eve, it was leaked Mason would be leaving Lawrence to take the reins at Georgia, which fired Ray Goff, the quarterback of the Bulldogs’ 1976 SEC chamnpionship team, after seven seasons. Goff had the thankless task of succeeding his coach and UGA legend Vince Dooley, and struggled to live up to the Bulldogs’ lofty past, failing to win a conference championship and falling far behind Florida and Tennessee in the SEC East.
Hours before kickoff in Honolulu, Mason reversed course and announced he was staying with the Jayhawks. UGA hired Jim Donnan from Marshall instead.
Mason spurning the Bulldogs to stay at Kansas, where he would be making less and was in the massive shadow cast by Roy Williams and what went on in Allen Fieldhouse seemed curious, but in retrospect, Mason at Georgia would have been an odd fit.
He played for Woody Hayes at Ohio State in the early 1970s, and later found his way back to Columbus, serving as an assistant to Earle Bruce. Also on the Buckeye staff in 1980 and ‘81 was a young defensive backs coach named Nick Saban. He’s done alright.
Mason spent six seasons as Ohio State’s offensive coordinator before being named as head coach at Kent State, Saban’s alma mater. Following two seasons with the Golden Flashes, he went to Kansas.
Mason never spent a day of coaching in the southern United States. I could see Georgia fans turning virulently against him if the Bulldogs had trouble against Florida, Tennessee and Auburn.
As it turned out, Mason didn’t last much longer in Lawrence.
Following a 4-7 season in 1996, he took over at Minnesota. He lasted 11 seasons with the Golden Gophers, going 64-57, making him the third most successful coach in school history after Bernie Bierman and Murray Warmath.
Kansas did not return to the polls until 2007, when fatso Mark Mangino took advantage of a weak non-conference schedule, K-State languishing under the turd that is Ron Prince, Nebraska falling apart under Bill Callahan, and not having Oklahoma or Texas on its schedule, to win its first 11 games.
That 11-0 start pushed the Jayhawks to second in the polls, including the BCS, which began in 1998.
The only team ahead of Kansas heading into Thanksgiving weekend 2007? LSU, which regained the top spot one month after losing in three overtimes at Kentucky.
LSU seemingly squandered its second chance when it lost on Black Friday at home to Arkansas…in three overtimes.
This meant if Kansas could beat Missouri the next night at Arrowhead Stadium, it would rise to No. 1 and earn a spot in the Big 12 championship game vs. Oklahoma.
The Jayhawks failed, falling 36-28. Mizzou and West Virginia were the top two teams in the next polls, but neither played for the championship; the Tigers lost to Oklahoma in the Big 12 title game, and the Mountaineers choked vs. archrival Pitt at home.
Ohio State and LSU ended up playing for all the marbles in New Orleans, and the Bayou Bengals rolled 38-24 for their second crown in five seasons.
Two years after winning the Orange Bowl vs. Virginia Tech, KU started 5-0, only to lose their last seven. Mangino was forced to resign when rumors of player abuse surfaced.
The Jayhawks then fell into one of the deepest abysses in the history of power conference football, rivaled by those experienced by Northwestern and TCU through most of the 1970s and into the 1980s.
Kansas did not win more than three games in any season from 2010 through 2021, hiring and firing four coaches (Turner Gill, Charlie Weis David Beaty, Les Miles) and finishing last in the Big 12 EVERY SEASON.
Lance Leipold, who succeeded Miles and went 2-10 in 2021, has turned around the Jayhawks.
Last year, he got them to their first bowl since 2008.
This year, KU has a huge win vs. Oklahoma, and a 10-win season is not out of the question. The Jayhawks are favored this Saturday vs. Texas Tech and will be in their regular season finale at Cincinnati.
In between is the annual rivalry with K-State. The Wildcats have owned their rival to the east the last 30-plus seasons, but this year gives KU its best chance to beat its in-state rival in 15 years.
That’s all for now. Apologies for rambling, but it’s better than the radio silence I’ve provided since mid-June.
Foots Prints 