“their 1988 team was a one-point loss to Illinois and a John Kolesar TD vs Ohio State away from sharing the Big Ten title”

A Michigan loss would have made them 6-1-1 in conference and an IU win over Illinois would have made them 6-2, so I’m wrong there. They were good enough to win the Big Ten in 87 and 88, though; I stand by that.

1) Eww on the gushing over the Aggies. You should try them more than once a decade and see how much you like their fans.

2) The ’87 Cotton Bowl was indeed the first game in which Earle wore the fedora and dark suit. He wore it throughout the subsequent season.

3) Vico, re: Indiana– actually, neither of those results (1986 or 1987) against the Hoosiers should be considered all that surprising in the analysis of perfect hindsight. Bill Mallory was building Indiana into a competitive program. 1986 was a hint of what was to come; the Hoosiers were still too young to knock off Ohio State, Michigan, or Florida State, but they were largely competitive in those games. In 1987, they managed to beat OSU and Michigan, and their 1988 team was a one-point loss to Illinois and a John Kolesar TD vs Ohio State away from sharing the Big Ten title. We were all shocked at the time, whether it was 24-22, 31-10, or (WTF) 41-7, but the fact is Indiana was close to as talented as Ohio State from 1987-1990, generally better coached, and much, much hungrier.

Indiana was 2-1-1 against Ohio State from 1987 through 1990 before the program began to settle and then sag. That was the high point of Mallory’s efforts to build that program. Take away that brief window, and Ohio State is 44-0-1 against Indiana since losing to the Hoosiers in Woody’s first year. Wow.

4) The scarlet shoes– yes, the ’87 Cotton was the first time they’d been worn since Earle took over and, I believe, since Archie was on campus.

To me, a head football coach needs to be judged on four things:

Recruiting
Teaching/Development of Talent
Motivation
game day/gameplan

Earle was an above average teacher. A tremendous motivator. An average game day coach and a substandard recruiter.

Also, don’t worry about posting bowl wins – they’re hard to come by these days, so let’s revel in the ones we have!

That said, you can’t really help but admire ol’ Earle’s motivational skills – the atmosphere for THE GAME after the firing was much more electric than usual, and the players were pretty obviously amped up to send him off a winner.

On the subject of Jennings, I guess I’ll just note that the idea of REAL, “non-football” reasons he fired Bruce, and that he deserves credit for taking the heat is something I’ve heard before, but you said yourself that you got that information from Jennings’ “friends and confidants”. I know people who knew Jennings that don’t really have anything good to say about the guy – maybe because they weren’t his friends. Who’s right? Who cares? If there isn’t public information on the subject of the “real” reasons – and I’m not aware of any – all this barely rises above the level of pure gossip. But that’s all right – I think this episode is fated to remain a controversial and colorful piece of Buckeye lore for good, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Competing versions of past events like this are part of what makes College football so fun and compelling, right?

My parents (aforementioned Grandma Buckeye) were friends and confidants of the Jennings. The only thing I am free to say is that there were non-football reasons for the firing. I give credit to Mr. Jennings for taking the heat without making thiings worse for good ol 9-3 Earle.

People forget that the underclassment behind Spielmann and friends were an underwhelming group. Recruiting had deteriorated in the last years of Earle’s tenure. He had alienated the high school coaches in Ohio. The evil empire up north was starting to take waaaay too much talent out of this state. Remember, SPielmann wanted to play for them too, and it was only the threatened ass-kicking by his Dad Sonny that made him come to Ohio State.

It was pretty much time for Earle when he was fired. The controversy really blew up over Rick Bay’s grandstand play to the papers.

you get the pic

Ewwwwwww

P.s. was Tarvaris Jackson the a&m qb??? Horrible