PAGE 10
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 10, 2014
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
THE DAILY DEBATE
Who deserved the No. 4 college football playoff seed?
By Sean Collins
@seanzie
"BIG 12 TEAM"
Let's start off by saying that once again, college football has proved it is incapable of fairness. This situation, however, is a tough one to figure out. Should Ohio State make the top-four teams for the playoff? Probably. On the other side, why was TCU ranked third in the country in the first place?
The argument for this is that TCU (11-1) won its final game of the year against Iowa State by 53 points and still got knocked out. This shows that no matter what TCU did, it wasn't going to make it as long as Ohio State won against Wisconsin.
Baylor got screwed the most after dominating teams all year long and handling Kansas State (ranked ninth in the country) in its last game of the season. The Bears were the only top-six team all year to defeat another top-six team, defeating TCU 61-58. Dominating on the offensive end, the
Bears held the second-largest margin of victory in the country with 25.9 points per game.
ESPN ranked the Big 12 as the best power conference in the 2014 season (over the SEC and Big Ten). If this was the case, then either Baylor or TCU should've made the playoffs. TCU's only loss of the season was to Baylor by three points, and Baylor's lone loss came to West Virginia, who will make a bowl game. Ohio State had the worst loss of any of these teams, losing to Virginia Tech at home in the second game of the season.
Selecting Ohio State is understandable after the Buckeyes massacred No. 13 Wisconsin, but they are down to their third-string quarterback, Cardale Jones. Even though Jones played a great game against the Badgers, Ohio State could be all over the place in its next game, as it will have to play the Alabama Crimson Tide, which has dominated college football through the past five years.
Baylor, however, could match up well against any of the teams in the top-four as
of now with its high-powered offense. In the 2013 All-State Sugar Bowl, Oklahoma defeated Alabama 45-31, proving the Big 12 can not only play with the SEC but win. But apparently, two of the top teams from the top conference don't deserve to be in the final playoff.
Baylor has the top offense in the country, averaging 48.8 points per game, and blew out the Oklahoma Sooners earlier in the year, 48-14. Outside of Wisconsin, the Big Ten was a weak conference while Baylor won against strong teams all year long in TCU, Oklahoma and Kansas State. Even with Baylor's dominance, Ohio State made it in, carrying one impressive win. We just have to wait till next year to prove that once again the Big 12 is the most dominant and overlooked conference in America.
Edited by Ashley Peralta
By Joey Anguiano
@Joey_Anguiano
"OHIO STATE"
The college football playoffs were supposed to eliminate
posed to eliminate all doubt of the teams in the national championship game,but unfortunately,all it's done in its first season is create more controversy.
Fans of the University of Kansas have seen fellow Big 12 teams like Baylor and TCU play, but not many know just what Ohio State has done this season. The Buckeyes have been through adversity. They played the 38th toughest schedule, according to teamrankings.com, and still had a statistically impressive season.
Not to mention the money, which matters to the NCAA. Ohio State has a more national fan base compared to Baylor and TCU, which offers more in television revenue, ticket sales and merchandise sales.
Adversity is a term every player for Ohio State is probably familiar with. It began in August, when the team's then-starting
quarterback and Heisman hopeful Braxton Miller injured his shoulder in practice and would sit out the entire season. The team would then turn to freshman J.T. Barrett, who would lead the team to a 10-1 record before breaking his ankle in a 42-28 victory against rival Michigan. Enter Cardale Jones, a sophomore, who previously was most known for his tweet questioning the validity of academics to student athletes. Jones led the Buckeyes to a 59-0 demolition of No. 13-ranked Wisconsin in the Big Ten Championship game. Just because a team lost a quarterback or two doesn't mean it shouldn't have a chance to play for the national championship.
Statistically, Ohio State had the 50th most passing yards in the nation, even while running an offense that was run-heavy. They had the 11th most rushing yards in the nation, averaging 260.8 yards per game The offense is extremely efficient, as they are the fourth-highest scoring offense in the nation, averaging 45.2 points per game.
When it boils down to it, there is money to be made in the college football playoffs, and the committee might have that as a motive. While Baylor and TCU are both great schools, their enrollment numbers are just one indicator of their size. Baylor has 13,859 undergraduate students, TCU has 8,647 undergraduate students and Ohio State has 44,201 undergraduate students. But Ohio State is bigger in more ways than undergraduate enrollment. The record for attendance at the Horseshoe, or Ohio Stadium, is 108,610 people for this season's Ohio State-Michigan game. Baylor's stadium holds less than half of that attendance at capacity. More fans of a program just equals more money the college football playoff can make for the NCAA. Whether fans like the fact, money may have been just as important, if not more important to the committee, than any stats or advanced metrics.
— Edited by Ashley Peralta
DAILY DEBATE RESULTS:
Was Beaty the right hire for the KU football head coaching position?
YES: 72%
NO:28%
By the numbers: Head football coach David Beaty
BRIAN HILLIX
@DoubleHillix
Edited by Casey Hutchins
On Friday evening, Kansas Athletics confirmed that David Beaty will become the next football head coach at Kansas. A wide receivers coach and recruiting coordinator at Texas A&M, Beaty has led Texas A&M to impressive numbers in each of those categories. Below is a by-the-numbers breakdown of the layhawks' 38th coach in school history.
BACKGROUND
Age: 44
Years of coaching experience: 21
Years coaching in high school: 12
Years coaching in college: 9
RECEIVING STATS (2014 SEASON)
Texas A&M receptions: 310
Texas A&M receiving yards: 3677
Kansas receptions: 204
Kansas receiving yards: 2435
Texas A&M receiving touchdowns: 35
Kansas receiving touchdowns: 14
RECRUITING STATS
*Texas A&M 4-star/5-star recruits, class of 2015:10
*Kansas 4-star/5-star recruits, class of 2015:0
*Texas A&M recruiting ranking, class of 2015:8
*Kansas recruiting ranking, class of 2015: 72
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