NCAA Football Colorado State Football

That didn't take long.

Two minutes into his collegiate debut, Cody Hawkins has engineered an 83-yard touchdown drive for Colorado. The capper was a beautiful 20+ yard touchdown pass to put the Buffaloes up 7-0 over rival Colorado State.

Hawkins is coach Dan Hawkins' son whose game is reminiscent of Chris Leak. Colorado is about a three point favorite in this hotly contested rivalry game.

New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has issued subpoenas for 39 collegiate athletic departments in a probe of their relationships with student loan providers. At its most basic, this investigation is asking whether or not cash, kickbacks, gifts and other bribes or misleading measures were communicated between various student loan providers and the cited athletic departments.

Cuomo is investigating whether athletic departments at these universities agreed to promote SFS loans to students in exchange for kickbacks.

"Students trust their University's athletic departments because so much of campus life at Division I schools centers around supporting the home team," said Cuomo. "To betray this trust by promoting loans in exchange for money is a serious issue, especially when Division I schools already generate tremendous revenue from their student athletes. Today's action is an important new step as we continue to examine the unethical conflicts that pervade the student loan industry.

"The Attorney General's office is specifically investigating whether athletic departments evaluated UFS interest rates before recommending their federal loans, or if their endorsement of UFS was based purely on payments from the lender. Such an arrangement would constitute revenue sharing, which is a violation New York state consumer protection laws, as well as a violation of federal law.

D-IA football schools named (prominent schools in bold): Arkansas State, Auburn, Bowling Green, Central Michigan, Colorado State, East Carolina, Florida Atlantic, Georgia Tech, Ohio, Oregon State, Rutgers, TCU, Tulane, Alabama-Birmingham, UCLA, UCF, Houston, Kansas, Louisville, Oregon, Pittsburgh, USF, UTEP. See link for complete list.

Of note: USC and Texas have also been scrutinized in a similar probe, but to my knowledge it has not been linked to their athletic departments but rather the university-wide financial aid offices of the schools.

It's good that athletic departments have an awareness of and working relationship with loan providers, but obviously there's a problem when that relationship gets too cozy and bad loan options are pressed upon students and student-athletes.

(Via: Yahoo!)

With the Big Ten fledgling network still involved in a public spat with Comcast, comparisons to the Mountain West's less than spectacular first year with "The mtn." sports channel are inevitable. In the first year of operation, the mtn. has made it to a whopping 1.2 million homes.

It appears to be a flop. Utah and BYU took the lead and got the rest of the Mountain West members to help foot the bill in hiring an attorney to explore options with their TV deal.

In its annual meeting Tuesday, the MWC Board of Directors voted unanimously to retain Kelly Crabb, the lawyer originally hired and retained last week by BYU and Utah, in efforts to clarify the nature of the TV contract and delineate distribution strategies of The mtn. network.

Crabb will work with Commissioner Craig Thompson and an ad hoc committee made up of three Board members - BYU President Cecil Samuelson, Texas Christian University Chancellor Victor Boschini and Colorado State University President Larry Edward Penley. The conference presidents spearheaded the TV deal that the MWC settled on a year ago with the network co-owned by Comcast Cable and CBS' College Sports Television.

However, there is widespread displeasure because of the troubles in getting The mtn., distributed.

This has fueled speculation that the Mountain West may try to find a way to get out of its deal, and pull the plug on the mtn. The mtn. has not been picked up by either satellite provider, and very few sizable cable operators in the markets (PDF) where the schools operate (Comcast in Utah and Cox in Las Vegas and San Diego are the largest carriers that have it).

A four-year-old on the sidelines of a football game seems like an idea on a par with "Baby's First Shark Cage," but Colorado State needed that clarified:

It was the spring youth football festival at Colorado State on Saturday, and Caden Thomas was wandering along the sidelines with his father during the team's intrasquad game. They were near the end zone when wide receiver George Hill, trying to catch a touchdown pass, didn't see the boy in time and crashed into him.

The kid is fine, so it's probably okay to embed the following uncomfortable video of a toddler getting plowed into a wall.



The end result?

"It was kind of scary 'cause I got bonked by the football," the boy said, hugging his own football. "It kind of hurted."

Awwww. Cute!

Colorado State has one of the worst offenses in the nation, but one of the best defense's, statistically. Weber State, Colorado and Nevada are not exactly difficult teams to shut-down, but the Rams have done it, save the second quarter vs. Nevada. Meanwhile, Fresno State has a mediocre offense and a somewhat respectable defense. But the Bulldogs have faced Oregon, Washington and the same Nevada team. However, while the Bulldogs have been able to run the ball effectively, the vertical game is just plain awful. And the defense is not making plays, let alone getting any pressure on the quarterback, but it has done enough to win ball games, if the offense scored some points.

The Rams' problem lies at running back. 2005 starter and 1,000 yard rusher, Kyle Bell, was lost for the season back in August with a torn ACL. Bulldog's problem lies with coaching and execution. The team can only ride the legs of Dwayne Wright for so long. Whether Brandstater's performance against Oregon -- in the second half -- and at Washington, is attributed to poor play and nerves or being beat-up physically, is still a mystery. Regardless, he is not getting the job done throwing the rock. It is not a physical problem, but a coaching problem. He can only throw if the play is called.

Colorado State will line up to stop Wright, and FS Head Coach Pat Hill is not going to repeat the same mistake he did at Washington; he is going to make new ones. Hill loves game-management and giving Wright the ball 30-40 times Saturday seems easy, that is why Fresno State will be hard pressed to top 20 points. CSU will be geared to stop the run, and it would be the perfect game to allow Brandstater to air it out to 6' 2 Paul Williams. Both of the Rams' starting corners are not taller than 5' 10. If Brandstater is still feeling the aches from the Oregon game or if Hill just wants to control the clock, either way the Bulldogs are more than likely not going to be throwing the ball down-field.

What happen to the days of "Sunshine" in Fort Collins? I am referring to one particular quarterback who resembled Ronnie "Sunshine" Bass from the movie Remember the Titans.

Van Pelt arguably was the worst quarterback in college football when he made his debut for the Rams in 2001. He couldn't complete a pass and looked uncomfortable in the pocket in Colorado State's 7-2 loss at Louisville on national television. However, in the next few games he evolved into a respectable quarterback. The coaches let him do his thing and he actually became a play-maker. He was never great quarterback per se, but he was almost impossible to stop, especially when he played Fresno State.

In 2001, David Carr and No. 8 Fresno State marched into Fort Collins with BCS on their minds. CSU was a 7.5 underdog and not expected to come close to winning. The Rams lost, but Van Pelt led CSU on a 4th quarter drive to score the go ahead TD with just :27 left in the game. Fresno State won 25-22 on a FG in overtime.

In 2002, underdog Fresno State led by RFr. QB Paul Pinegar upset No. 24 Colorado State at home. The Bulldogs played an absolute perfect game, while the Rams struggled in the first half. However, "Sunshine" came alive in the second half, and Fresno State needed a missed two-point conversion to avoid overtime. Fresno State won 32-30, after leading 29-15 at halftime.

2003 was "Sunshine's" year; he ran circles around Fresno State. Pinegar made his season debut after missing the first five games with a pectoral injury, but couldn't keep up with Van Pelt. CSU laid the lumber to Fresno, 34-10 in Fort Collins.

The way Fresno State has played against mobile quarterbacks thus far in 2006, I'd be scared if "Sunshine" was behind center this Saturday. However, Ram QB Caleb Hanie is a 6-2 236 pound scrambling threat in the pocket. He hasn't looked great this season, but sometimes playing Fresno State is just the remedy a struggling QB needs.

Just days before meeting their in-state rival Colorado Buffaloes, the Colorado State Rams' football team was rocked with news that three of their players stand accused of fraud and forgery.

Arrest warrants were issued today for freshman defensive lineman Brian Abata, senior cornerback Robert Herbert, and freshman defensive back Micah Crews.

Oddly enough, we thought the whole "football program" thing at the two Colorado schools was a fraud, what with one getting spanked so badly by the USC Trojans that they backed out of the second half of a home-and-away and the other losing to Division 1-AA Montana State.