Before we get too far into the more thought-provoking posts (butterfly effects, "best of" posts, and the like), I wanted to put the 2016 season to bed. See below for some of my overall thoughts of the season gone by:
- Congratulations to Clemson, winners over Alabama in the CFP Championship Game! After reading Dabo Swinney's personal story, it's hard not to be happy for him - and for the whole team!
- As a whole, this is probably the best group of New Year's Six games yet. Although the semifinals were duds, at least there was plenty of drama elsewhere:
- The Rose Bowl and Orange Bowl will likely be year-end Top 10 games. Possibly Top 5.
- The Sugar Bowl was the only real dud out of the non-semifinal NY6 games. But congrats to Oklahoma, who now has the nation's longest winning streak (10 games).
- I was also happy to see Western Michigan stay competitive with Wisconsin. A "close loss" by the smaller team hasn't really happened before in these high-level bowls.
- In the NY6 - and the BCS before that - we either saw the small-conference team lose convincingly (Hawaii, Northern Illinois), or win the game (Boise State, Houston).
Accomplishments
- Even without the CFP (or even the NY6) to play for, how about some of these accomplishments:
- ODU, in its first-ever bowl game, won the thing and secured a 10-win season!
- Props to Idaho - a team about to drop to FCS, but not without winning a bowl first!
- Army, breaking a 14-year losing streak to Navy. They also beat Temple to start the year, giving the Black Knights wins over both American Championship Game participants.
- Way to go, ACC! A banner season as a conference!
- 8-3 in the bowls, PLUS the National Championship Game
- Heisman winner (and runner-up, who many feel now should have won it)
- 5 year-end ranked teams (and Georgia Tech just missed the cut)
- Best non-conference record of all the conferences
- Virginia Tech - oh boy!
- First 10-win season under a first-year head coach
- Largest comeback in school history (24 points) to win the Belk Bowl vs Arkansas
- Three bowl wins in a row (first time ever)
- Took part in the Battle at Bristol, which set a world record football attendance
- Here's a look-ahead for the offseason posts ahead:
- A revisit to my 2016 season picks. It's comical just how wrong I was about some things!
- A trip to the multiverse, where I explore how the season might have ended in different eras (old bowl system, BCS, and a theoretical larger playoff).
- Want some more "butterfly effect" posts? They're coming!
Closing Thought
There are now 5 active head coaches who have won a National Championship. I created an image below to show just how they have fared against each other.
Notes:
- Dabo Swinney is the only one who has at least 1 win over all of the others
- Nick Saban doesn't have a winning record - or a losing record - against any of the others
- The ACC is the only conference with two of these coaches currently in the conference, although the SEC has the greatest number of schools represented by these five coaches
- LSU and Alabama for Saban, Florida for Meyer (who also has one for Ohio State)
- The PAC-12 is the only Power Conference without an active coach who has won a national championship.
- The only matchup yet to take place is Saban vs Fisher, which will occur in 2017 when Alabama battles Florida State in the new Dome in Atlanta.
- Interestingly, there were 5 active national title-winning head coaches a season ago. Out went Les Miles, in came Dabo Swinney.
- I will break down each of these head-to-head histories in a future blog post
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