Purdue Pete Learns the Truth

More Than You Care To Know

How much do you know about Eastern Michigan University?

Liar!  You do not.  Except for you.  Yeah, you there in there corner of the Internet, hunched over your computer in your mother's basement wearing the EMU sweatshirt.  You know, but you went there.  That doesn't count.

For the rest of us, EMU is a school (we presume) in Michigan (one of the 50 states that is not Alaska or Hawaii) and probably, but not necessarily, in the eastern part of that state.  It might as well be in Kalamazoo for all I know.

Well, after exhaustive research (somebody from EMU owes me a beer) I discovered that EMU is in Ypsilanti, Michigan.  It might as well be in Kalamazoo for all I know.  Kalamazoo would be better.  Or Hell, Michigan.  Actually, a city in another state might be best.

For many years, the school played under the name Michigan State Normal College, probably to distinguish it from the Michigan State Abnormal College (which ultimately adopted the wolverine and became THEM.)  The MSNC were known as the Hurons and had an Indian mascot.  Perish the thought!

So like any liberal University that eschews censorship and narrow mindedness, they bent to politically correct pressure and cast their Indian Heritage aside for the eagle.

Now I ask you, why didn't they just the keep the Hurons and adopt the Great Lake as their mascot?  Okay, a great lake as a mascot would be pretty silly.  Maybe the Herons--like the bird.  Not as noble as the eagle, but certainly rare among mascots.  Or even the emu, kind of an obvious choice if you ask me and there aren't many emu mascots running around.  Just ask this guy.

I'm a Great Lake . . . only smaller!

But they didn't.  They adopted the Eagle over the Green Hornets and the Express.  I have absolutely no clue why the Express would be considered in this discussion.  Maybe it's like the first level of Who Wants To Be A Millionaire and it's just a humorous choice that only a moron would pick. 

There is actually a Huron Restoration Chapter of Alumni . . . "once a Huron, always a Huron!"

Alrighty then.

Their school colors are GREEN and WHITE.  Like Michigan State, only more eastern and less Greek.

The team is coached by Ron English, erstwhile defensive coordinator from THEM, who is 4-23 in his third year.   Of course, the bar is considerably lower in Eastern Michigan.

• an all-time record of 428-519-47
• never ended a season ranked in any major poll
• eight winless seasons, in 1891, 1910, 1941, 1949, 1960, 1961, 1981 and 2009
•  is among the worst Division I FBS schools both in all-time win percentage (45.4%, for 107 out of 120) and in all-time scoring margin (-1898, for 108 out of 120)
• a 27-game losing streak in the early 1980s
• lost 14-3 in the 1971 Pioneer Bowl in Wichita Falls, TX

That is some unimpressive history there.  But they did win a bowl game, upsetting San Jose State in the 1987 California Bowl after winning their only MAC championship.

They have won the Michigan MAC Trophy (awarded to the best team among Eastern, Central and Western Michigan) twice, in 2007-8.

Their stadium is named for a former coach, Elton Rynearson, who sounds vaguely, and perhaps disturbingly, like Ned Ryerson of Groundhog Day fame.  This man was able to lead this team to two undefeated seasons--in the 1920's.  He also played baseball for the Kalamazoo Kazoos!  He died in Ann Arbor, probably under suspicious circumstances.

Famous Alumni include George Allen, and current NFL players Charlie Batch, Jason Jones, T.J. Lang and Kevin Walters.

What more do you need to know?

Don't ask me, ask the guy with the Eastern Michigan flag hanging in the corner of his basement.

Trophy Tragedy Comes Up Short

Those crazy folks from the Corn Belt have tried to one-up the famous Land-Grant Trophy.  They have made a good effort, but they have failed.

Here is the unveiling of the new and improved Cy-Hawk Trophy:

Which bird will crap on it first?

The guy on the left is Corn Man (known as Maize Man in Michigan.)

Here is how the new trophy compares to the old one:

Is that an ear of corn, or are you just happy to see me?

At least the old trophy had a football on it.

The new Cy-Hawk trophy barely edged out its competition:

But no one can hold a candle to the Land Grant Tragedy Trophy when it comes to sheer ugly:

Complete with its own furniture dolly!

Pre-season Countdown: #12

Each year, I try to put together a countdown of the Penn State season, starting with the game we are most likely to win (the easiest opponent) at #12 and ending with the game we are most likely to lose (the most difficult opponent) at #1.

As is the case most seasons, the #12 game is not a highly disputed spot.  The nominees for #12 are Indiana State, Temple, Eastern Michigan, Indiana and Alabama.  Okay, I'm just kidding about Alabama.

And the winner is . . .

INDIANA STATE UNIVERSITY.

The Sycamore Defense--good for blocking field goals; not much else

Unfortunately for the Mighty Sycamores, this game will be played on grass and not inside the Bryce Jordan Center.

When this game was first scheduled, the Sycamores had won just one game in four seasons.  They doubled their wins to two games in five seasons, and last year, they had their first winning season (6-5) since 1996.

The Sycamores have been to three bowl games all-time, the Shrine Bowl in 1949, and the Pecan Bowl in 1983-4.  They have never won a bowl game.  In the championship subdivision, they have made it to the play-offs twice (1983/4) with an overall record of 1-3.  Not much to cheer about since the early eighties.

Not only are we playing a team not in the Bowl Subdivision, but we are playing one of the worst teams in the Championship Subdivision.

Season	Wins	Losses
2000	1	10
2001	3	8
2002	5	7
2003	3	9
2004	4	7
2005	0	11
2006	1	10
2007	0	11
2008	0	12
2009	1	10
2010	6	5
Totals	24	100

Can ISU build on that winning season of 2010?

The answer really has no bearing on whether Penn State will win this game or not.  Seriously, this is not Appalachian State we are discussing here.  Even if the Sycamores ARE better than a year ago, or any other season this past decade, they will not be able to defeat Penn State.

Don't Holy Toledo me here.  This is not the Penn State team of 2000, and this Sycamore team is not the Toledo team that went to a bowl game in 2000.

Penn State has never lost to an FCS level team and this will not be the first. 

So do you even need to watch this game?  No.  But you should nonetheless.

The excitement of this game will be to see who has won the starting QB job.  That's it.  Nothing else to see here.  The game should be over by halftime and the stadium will never be full.  The game itself will be plain vanilla.  There is no way Paterno is going to show Saban anything on tape that will be remotely useful for the next week.

I'm not sure I agree with that theory completely.  It might be nice to show something just to make them worry about things, but not the enough to know our entire gameplan.  I type this as if other teams DON'T KNOW our gameplan!  I sometimes wonder if WE know our gameplan.  Further, whichever QB is selected, he needs some quality reps.  Just dinking the ball to the sideline and handing off will be enough to win this game, but not enough to prepare for the Bama defense.

On the other hand, whichever QB is selected, that person likely sees better competition week in and week out in practice against our own defense, than anything he will face from ISU.

This game isn't even worth the bandwidth to discuss X's and O's.  So let's discuss their mascot.

Originally, ISU was a teacher's college, but the fighting teachers apparently didn't make opponents shake in their cleats like the mighty Sycamore.  Thus was born the Fighting Trees with a Tree mascot.

A tree named Woody????

In 1969, or thereabouts because who really cares outside of Terre Haute, Indiana, they voted Chief Quabachi (cookin' on his Hibachi) as their mascot.

Unfortunately, the University bent to PC pressure and ditched the Indian Chief for no mascot at all.  But in 1995, Sycamore Sam was born.  They didn't win a game that year.  You do the math.  Sam is a woodland animal, like a fox, but not a fox.  Whatever.

Buckeye Beaten

Ohio University's Bobcat apparently took down Brutus during the festivities last weekend.

The Bobcat first went after Brutus as the OSU mascot led the Buckeyes onto the field for the game.

Moments later, the Bobcat mascot climbed on the back of Ohio State's mascot and rode him to the ground. The two then tussled in the end zone while fans booed.

Ohio University has apologized to Ohio State and its fans after the school's Bobcat mascot tackled the Brutus Buckeye mascot, touching off an impromptu wrestling match before Saturday's game at Ohio Stadium.

In addition, the student who was dressed in the Bobcat costume has been banned from any further affiliation with Ohio athletics.

Apparently Bobcat doesn't know that a bag of urine is the appropriate weapon for dealing with Buckeyes.  I can't think of any worse fate than to be banned from Ohio athletics.  Seriously . . . is that a punishment?