sutomcat
No recent Cali or Iggy awards; Mr Irrelevant
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- Aug 15, 2011
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Welcome to Blame It on the Large Hadron Collider Day!
Blame It on the Large Hadron Collider Day was created in 2008 to shift blame for losing things from the people who actually lost them, to the Large Hadron Collider. "The Large Hadron Collider probably has your car keys, your missing socks, and your rent money, perhaps sucked into a black hole," one source notes. The day takes place on the anniversary of the date that the Large Hadron Collider was first fired up in 2008.
The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world's biggest and most powerful particle accelerator. Located just outside of Geneva, Switzerland, on the border with France, it was built by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN). The idea for it was conceived in 1984, and the final go-ahead for its construction was given a decade later; it took $5 billion just to get it up and running. It operates as such: protons come from a tank of helium gas and are accelerated almost to the speed of light while being directed in two beams down a circular track. The track is nearly 18 miles long and is between 165 to 575 feet below ground. A great amount of energy is released when the protons collide together. One of the goals of the LHC was to test the Big Bang Theory, by creating the conditions of the beginning of the universe according to the theory. In 2012, the LHC was used to find the Higgs boson particle.
SU News
Syracuse football bowl watch: Orange odds improve as future opponents flounder (PS; Carlson)
The Syracuse football team hasn't earned a bowl bid since 2013, but for the second consecutive week there's reason for increased optimism.
The Orange stayed unbeaten by earning its near-guaranteed win over Wagner. But the bigger reason for belief comes from elsewhere, where a number of future opponents struggled.
Suddenly a 4-0 start looks reasonable. Syracuse already has two wins in hand and ESPN's Football Power Index rankings favors the Orange in five of its next six games.
Here's a look at where Syracuse's bowl hopes sit after the first two weeks of the season.
Last week's result: Win 62-10 vs. Wagner
What it meant: The win was virtually guaranteed so it doesn't mean much on its own. Syracuse hasn't lost to an FCS opponent since 1958. Even when Syracuse hasn't been bowl-worthy it has usually dominated inferior opponents like Wagner.
This week's game: Saturday vs. Florida State, noon
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Syracuse Football: Top graded players against Wagner (itlh.com; Carey)
A number of players from the Syracuse football team turned in a great performance during the school’s win over Wagner on Saturday.
The Syracuse football team played their yearly game against an FCS school on Saturday and improved to 17-0 in all of those contests.
The Orange held the Wagner Seahawks’ ground game in check, which really allowed them to pull away in the end. Wagner is a very run-oriented team, so Syracuse holding Seahawks running back Ryan Fulse to just 47 rush yards on 21 attempts was impressive. Last week, Fulse ran for 200 yards.
The Orange, once again, dominated on special teams, winning field position all day, while freshman kicker Andre Smzyt was still impressive, nailing a 50-yarder. Smzyt has yet to miss a field goal or extra point in his two games with Syracuse this season.
On the offensive side of the ball, Orange senior quarterback Eric Dungey spread the ball around to his different weapons on the outside all day long. Eight different players caught a pass for Syracuse and their receiving threats on the outside looked much more dangerous than they did against Western Michigan.
Dungey’s performance was not one of his better ones. Despite throwing for five touchdowns and just one interception, his accuracy looked off all game.
On his lone interception, Dungey underthrew Orange receiver Devin Butler significantly in the end zone, resulting in an easy pick for the Wagner defense.
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Syracuse Football: Grading the Orange’s win over Wagner (itlh.com; Patrick)
How did each positional group for the Syracuse football program perform during Saturday’s blowout win over the Wagner Seahawks?
It was an explosive afternoon for the Syracuse football program on Saturday as they cruised to an easy 62-10 victory over the Wagner Seahawks. With the win, the Orange are now 2-0 this season.
Obviously, to score 62 points, a lot had to go right for Syracuse. And it did.
The Orange were impressive in all three phases of the game on Saturday and it led to them scoring the most points in a single matchup since 2002 when they defeated Rhode Island by a score of 63-46.
Syracuse was expected to come away with a win over Wagner on Saturday. But the way the Orange defeated the Seahawks left no room for doubts.
It was definitely a much better overall performance from Syracuse on Saturday than what they put out on the field during last week’s win over Western Michigan. Especially the Orange defense, which was less than impressive in the school’s Week 1 victory.
So how exactly did each positional unit perform for Syracuse on Saturday? Well, compared to last week, the Orange should be very happy with their grades from the Wagner game.
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ACC power rankings: Clemson, Florida State survive; North Carolina hits rock bottom (fansided.com; Haringey)
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15
NORTH CAROLINA TAR HEELS
Last week: Loss at East Carolina, 41-19
Last rank: 13
Losing to a team that lost to North Carolina A&T the week before is a pretty bad look for an ACC team. That’s exactly what the Tar Heels did this weekend.
It’s not as if Fedora was able to keep his team in the game. Losing in Greenville can happen upon occasion, but you can’t be blown out by one of the weaker Pirate teams in recent years.
If things don’t get better in a hurry for this team you’re going to hear lots of talk about Fedora getting the ax. At this point, UNC fans might welcome that outcome.
14
VIRGINIA CAVALIERS
Last week: Loss at Indiana, 20-16
Last rank: 14
The Cavaliers hung in the game at Indiana, but they couldn’t make the one play they needed to defeat the Hoosiers. In some ways, this represents progress for Virginia, but it’s also a reminder of just how far they have to come as a program.
One big concern for this team moving forward is its total reliance on Bryce Perkins for offense. The talented quarterback was responsible for 229 of Virginia’s 294 total yards in the game. That speaks well of Perkins, but he’s going to struggle to carry that kind of load against superior defenses. The Cavaliers have to find some more offensive weapons in the future if they want to find their way into a bowl game.
13
SYRACUSE ORANGE
Last week: Win vs. Wagner, 62-10
Last rank: 15
Beating Wagner at home generally isn’t good enough to move up in the Power Rankings, but it worked for the Orange this week. This is not a great compliment for Syracuse.
After all, they managed to beat a pretty bad FCS team at home. Credit to the administration for scheduling an easy win for their program, but the Orange’s performance didn’t tell us anything about how they will play in the coming weeks.
It still goes down as a banner day for Eric Dungey at quarterback. It’s pretty unlikely he’ll throw five touchdown passes in another game this season.
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ACC Football Rx: FSU's 2018 Struggles - Explained? (accfootballrx.com; HM)
From CSNBBS, "bronconick" wrote:
Stolen from elsewhere:
a. it’s basically come out that Jimbo stopped coaching after Bama last season, and he stopped the recruiting portion of his job well before then. Not just Jimbo, too, but all his position coaches, so the talent you see on the field right now is basically a year in development behind in even just know how their position works.
2. FSU is hilariously thin at OL and LB. They are playing a RG at RT, and the next man up is basically a walk on. And he’s probably the brightest spot on the entire OL. the LBs are so bad that 2 second (maybe even third) string safeties are starting in place of the entirety of the LB corp. Apparently Jimbo’s staff called them "the speedbumps".
d. Everyone on the field is being asked to play differently. FSU is going from a pro style, 3rd slowest offensive scheme in the country (only the service academies were slower!), to an up tempo, spread team. On defense, we’re going from a Saban pattern match Cover 3 to a Dantonio Cover 4. CBs that used to have safety help no longer have any. Safeties that used to sit deeper in run support are now asked to be ultra aggressive.
5. All of FSU’s personnel has been recruited to run a pro scheme. There are several square pegs being asked to be round.
e. This is likely a comfort and confidence thing as well. FSU is a pretty young team at many positions.
And all of that compounds.
COMMENT: I'm not close enough to the situation to know for sure if what he states is correct or not, but it all seems very plausible and would explain a lot. In other words, instead of just "reloading", the Seminoles will need a year or two to rebuild - so give Taggart time to see if he can fix this mess that Jimbo left behind!
The ACC struggled in Week 2, but it avoided disaster (thecomeback.com;l Ginsburg)
For a few minutes late Saturday night, the ACC appeared to be on the edge of a precipice. The Week 2 schedule — while not appearing too unkind — had suddenly struck the conference. A few more plays, and the ACC’s hopes of being viewed as one of college football’s best conferences would be dashed, at least for this season.
Setting the stage
The earlier games were not kind to the ACC. It’s true, five teams did easily beat inferior competition. Syracuse, Virginia Tech, Wake Forest, and Boston College all blew out FCS teams. Miami (Fl) would later do the same, while N.C. State dismantled Florida State. These six conference teams did what Power 5 teams are supposed to do to cupcakes. On top of that, for the second straight year, Duke picked up what looks like a good win over Northwestern.
Those are about all the positives for the conference on the week. Also in the early games, North Carolina was blown out by East Carolina. ECU was a once-solid Group of 5 program. Unfortunately, this is no longer true. The Pirates beat the Tar Heels by 22 points- six days after losing to FCS North Carolina A&T. Georgia Tech also lost to South Florida. USF is no slouch as Group of 5 teams go, but the Yellow Jackets should be expected to beat a Quinton Flowers-less USF squad.
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NC State’s Bryant talks about his scary injury during the James Madison game (myrtlebeach.com; video; Giglio)
NC State's Eurndraus Bryant talks about the injury that caused him to taken off the field in a cart during the Wolfpack's victory over James Madison in the season opener. Bryant returned that day and played in the victory over Georgia State.
NC State keeping watch on weather conditions ahead of West Virginia game :: WRALSportsFan.com (wralsports.com; video; Payne)
NC State is monitoring the weather conditions because of Hurricane Florence ahead of the Pack's scheduled home football game against West Virginia.
What else can Pitt do but move on? ACC play starts Saturday (post-gazette.com; Batko)
Somehow, Pitt running back Qadree Ollison — one of his team’s precious few standouts Saturday night — sat down after a 51-6 thunderous pounding at the hands of Penn State and declared that the Panthers will not be deflated.
“Not with this team,” Ollison said. “This team is different. This team fought until the end of the game, no matter what the score says, and I think y’all will see that this team is gonna come out ready to play every week, especially the next one.”
Indeed, this team is different in at least one way, that it actually got beaten down by the Nittany Lions even worse than it did a year ago. Pitt’s head coach and players said essentially the same thing the night after taking that defeat.
“We wanna win every game, but we also wanna win our conference and our side of the conference,” Ollison said. “That’s the ultimate goal. I was telling the guys, all our dreams, goals, whatever you wanna call it, are still intact. No one will complain if we win out and go 11-1.”
Of course, that mission went about as poorly as the Penn State matchup did a year ago, with Pitt stumbling to a 5-7 record overall, 3-5 in the ACC, and missing a bowl game. But there’s no denying that Ollison is right on one thing: Georgia Tech, coming off a 49-38 loss at South Florida, will meet Pitt at midfield for the coin toss at 12:30 p.m. Saturday to kick off ACC play.
Still, it’s hard not to dwell too much on the Penn State demolition and wonder what it means for a team that, in theory, is in place to have a banner year with 17 scholarship seniors. More power to them if even one was able to wake up with a spring in his step after being eviscerated in his final game against Penn State, on his home field.
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ACC Football Teams (Atlantic Coast Conference Football Teams) -Here's a rundown of all the ACC teams that compete in football against each other.
Other
There are no more lions at Syracuse zoo; will the king of the jungle return? (PS; Eisenstadt)
The two boys ran up to the glass and pressed their noses to it.
They were looking for M'Wasi, the lion at the Rosamond Gifford Zoo in Syracuse.
Jammi Gensler stopped to read a small, paper notice taped to the empty lion exhibit: "Oh."
The note said M'Wasi had died. He was the last lion at the zoo.
After a succession of the queens and kings of the jungle over the past 40 years, it's unclear when, or if, lions will return to Syracuse.
The zoo, run by Onondaga County, declined to be interviewed for this story. Zoo officials offered a statement. "We are taking into consideration the best options for having lions at the zoo," it reads. The statement goes on to say the zoo is looking at its plans for the future and talking with lion experts about possibilities.
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