Kim Klement- USA TODAY Sports
College football, much like a lot of sports, are built on storylines. We of the male demographic some times poke fun at our female counterparts’ interest in soap operas, which–while sometimes a bit outlandish–are based off of storylines that begin with a ‘Point A’ and end with a ‘Point B.’ Again, this is much of the same in college football.
Example: As early as last season, two of the most traditional powers in NCAA football history, the Alabama Crimson Tide and the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, met in Miami for the national championship. The ‘Point A’ in this case were each’s historical backstories and the ‘Point B’ was the game that was the climax of the 2012 season.
At the time, I assumed that you really couldn’t have a better storyline in college football than those two meeting on the field for the biggest prize. Also, there was the added drama that Notre Dame, of all teams, may possibly be the program to end the SEC‘s string of dominance. As it turned out, they weren’t. But, in hindsight, I’m okay with that because this streak was meant to be broken by one man, and one man only–the innovator of this madness in the first place, Urban Meyer.
In 2006, his second season as head coach of the Florida Gators, Meyer first introduced us to the unbridled carnage that a team from the south can amass when you stick that crystal ball in their face. Seen as the unquestioned underdog heading into the BCS National Championship Game against, ironically enough, the Ohio State Buckeyes, a 41-14 score later proved otherwise. The Gators were bigger, faster, stronger, more disciplined–just overall better in every facet of the game.
This has been a recurring theme during the past seven seasons of the SEC’s dominance. When paired up against teams from another conference, the boys from the south actually look like men compared to their competition across the line of scrimmage. Urban Meyer and the 2006 Gators were the first to bring this to light for the entire college football world to see, and it hasn’t stopped since.
As we all know, Meyer would go on to add the third title to the streak with the 2008 Florida Gators, and then depart the school a year later.
In 2012, Meyer resurfaced and got the wheels in everyone’s head turning. The former two-time national title-winning coach re-emerged as the head coach of the Ohio State Buckeyes. The questions began. “Why would the man who used to rule the strongest conference in America go to the Big Ten?” Well, that answer is easy.
Urban Meyer loves a challenge; and this is the ultimate one. To take a team from a conference that is more-or-less the butt of many jokes around the college football world, as well as probably the least likely to end the streak, would add an everlasting coup to the legacy that Urban has already created for himself.
Coming off the heels of a 12-0, sanction-riddled season in his first year at the helm, as well as a slew of those starters returning, this is the storyline that folks will be paying close attention to this upcoming season.
Are Meyer and the Buckeyes on a collision course with a team from the mighty SEC? Will Urban get the chance to kill the monster that he himself helped create?
I can’t give a surefire answer to those questions. But I can say that for the sake of the game we love so much and the storylines that go along with it in its biggest moments, the answers need to be a loud and resounding, YES!
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Jack is a College Football Contributor for Rant Sports. Follow Jack on Twitter @JackJ14RS
