The excitement is picking up around CC and the rest of Cardinal Nation for football and I have even found myself thinking about a red-tinted 9-3 season, but I also couldn't help thinking of some things that I was not looking forward to this year. In no particular order, here are 3 things that would make me extraordinarily happy if I never saw/heard at PJCS again.

1. Receivers lining up wide open- It's a simple, modest goal, but I am sure Ron English might have this near the top of his list as well.

2. That damn P.O.D. (?) song they play when the D makes a play- Nothing pisses me off more than hearing, "Boom, here comes from the boys from the South" as we are losing to Syracuse by 2 TDs in the fourth quarter. Surely to God there is another song they can play when the D steps up and rocks some poor soul's world.

3. The Koaching staff's black pants/white shirt combo choice-

via cache.viewimages.com

Maybe it is just me, but there approximately 1,467 better outfit choices than that.

Obviously, these are all little things, but, along with shitloads of Maker's Mark, ice cold beer, and spread-covering Ws, would go a long way to making this season as enjoyable as possible. Anybody got anything else that has been sticking in their crawl since last year besides the same ol' bitching points (people leaving early, drunks throwing up on your shoes, and oh yeah- home losses)?

Officially being Marquette week, I thought I would post a video my buddy from Milwaukee took last year from the Marquette game.  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8UbIgXHL4E#GU5U2spHI_4

The quality is not great, but hell, it is almost better than the shitty ESPNU feed. This is still one of the highlights for all of last season for me.

Also, this the only video that comes up when searching "tom crean sucks" on youtube. I feel like there should be more.

Obviously, the thing most of us are going to take away from our lost football season is the inability of Kragthorpe and Stubbs to properly utilize the many returning pieces of one of the great offenses in UL history. Basically, we pissed away talent more carelessly than Pluto in Animal House. My question is now, how did it happen?

Most people are blaming the playcalling which I certainly agree has been atrocious, but I think it goes deeper than that. It goes to Krags' overall philosophy on offense. From what I see, we basically have turned into a dink and dunk passing game and "taking what the defense gives us".

This is bullshit. We are playing right into the defense's hands with this.  A highly successful defensive philosophy (in the NFL at least) uses this exact same philosophy in stopping offensives (the Tampa/cover 2). The Cover 2 gives the offensive the underneath and check down crap and forces you to string together long, efficient drives. Even in the NFL, offenses struggle to but together sustained drives consistently, so what makes us think it is going to work in college?

We need the big play back in the offense and we need it bad. It will open up the running game and give us a chance to be relevant again. Instead, I head to Tampa next week thinking I would rather be in the `Ville watching us take on Hartford and Jackson St. Depressing.

Few  other quick notes from the game:

-Deon Palmer played as well as I have seen a UL safety play since Kerry Rhodes. I know he might have taken a bad angle on the White run, but overall, very impressive.

-Thursday Night Football took a huge turn for the worse when Herbstreit went to Saturday nights. Mike summed it up best- Craig James Sucks.

-I wish Owen Schmidt would have knocked himself out with that fucking helmet.

I know most many people are completely done with this guy, but here was blurb I saw on profootballtalk.com I thought was a little interesting. Most likely a just an unfounded rumor, but I wonder if getting Brohm or not would make a difference?

PETRINO TO AUBURN?

A year after one NFL head coach bolted to Alabama, could another one be bolting to Auburn?

Per our new guy who'll soon be unveiled as the dude to carry the flag for CollegeFootballTalk.com, there are rumors that Falcons coach Bobby Petrino is very dissatisfied with his NFL gig and that he could be eyeing the Tigers job if coach Tommy Tuberville is gone after the 2007 season.

Let's be clear -- this is pure rumor.  But so was talk last year that the Nicktator was unhappy with the Fins, and possibly planning an exit back to the NCAA.

Saban was able to bolt without consequence because his contract with the Dolphins allowed him to do so.  It's unknown whether Petrino has the ability to flee the Falcons absent any limitations.

I saw this while checking the Theus hire links on Deadspin. It comes from Sactown Royalty Blog-  http://www.sactownroyalty.com/story/2007/6/20/10538/9036.

"As for Theus, at least it will be entertaining. A very sentient thought was made in the below thread, regarding Reggie's credibility in the locker room and how Francisco Garcia is related to that. (Garcia played at Louisville when Theus was an assistant coach there.) Garcia is beloved in that locker room -- I've heard he's Kevin Martin's best friend, he's Mike Bibby's workout buddy, he's close with Shareef Abdur-Rahim and Corliss Williamson, and he's the only guy near Ron Artest. How much of all that is true? Who know. But smoke, fire, etc. If Garcia spreads the good word about Theus before the vultures get to him, the coach is in an infinitely better starting position than Eric Musselman was. Locker room credibility goes a long way, as we saw with last season's disaster."

I thought it was interesting that, in their opinion, Cisco means so much in this whole to the team embracing Reggie and that he is such a popular player. Hopefully this will mean good things for him in the future.

Just saw this on Deadspin-

http://deadspin.com/sports/college-basketball/lexingtons-long-national-nightmare-now-over-246391.php

Could the dynasty defenders been right all along? I am sure Minnesota will be a good fit the Tub and now, like Mike said in recent post, we can go back to really hating UK.

I am not here to bash Pitino, but why does he not draw something up when holding the ball at the end of the first half?  Instead, we hold the ball not doing anything with it until 4.1 seconds, drive in, miss the forced off-balanced shot, and leave no time for a possible easy put back as every defender is trying to block the shot instead of blocking out. If your not going to call a play, why not start this at 8 seconds like every other team in America? I will take our chances giving the opponent 2 seconds and 94 feet if something goes wrong. This has just been drinving me nuts!

Go Cards!