Survive and Advance: The Definition of College Football Adversity

It will become the new mantra of the ‘new’ College Football Era: Survive and Advance. With every media outlet in the nation reaching for their Book of Superlatives to help them describe this period that we’re in, the college football fan has to be ready for whatever lies ahead. A playoff berth is at stake. Even in September, all games matter. The Top 4 have got barbecue sauce on them as they run rampant across the gridiron cause everyone wants a piece of them, every single week.

What Could Have Been

They must’ve tasted it. The following teams had their opponent’s jerseys ripped to shreds and were hankering for more. Clemson could’ve made The Jameis Winston Circus pack up its tent and head to the next town. 2nd and 2, 1:41 left in the game from the 18 yard line and Clemson RB C.J. Davidson gets the ball, gets the first down, and…fumbles. Seminoles recover, run out regulation, win in OT. There would’ve been no more single camera shots of Jameis for the time being or near future. Clemson had that shot for us.

No doubt Kansas State woke up Friday morning as well, feeling the effect of ‘what could have been.’ Turnovers in the red zone and missed field goals doomed the Wildcats against the #5 ranked Auburn Tigers.

Washington State took #2 Oregon to the wire in the late night game in the Pac-12. The Cougars matched every step that the Ducks took, gashing their defense and marching up and down the field to set up quick scores. Oregon had the benefit of a horrible ‘no-call’ towards the end of the game with WSU down by 7 late in the 4th. I saw it. The rest of the world saw that Yellow and Green Nike Backpack hanging onto that Washington State receiver, but the officials alas, didn’t. That’s how teams survive and advance.

The one thing about these teams though that their next opponents will converge on is the fact that they look ‘beatable’ and that you don’t have to bring your ‘A’ game to defeat them. One play here or there and Oregon goes down. One less fumble or one less bad snap by Clemson and both #1 and #2 go down on Saturday. If Kansas State had made just one field goal and that touchdown in the 1st it would’ve turned the tide on everything, sending the playoff picture back to the drawing board, which is what we want to see, unless of course it’s your team. Sorry LSU. Sorry Missouri. You didn’t go unscathed.

And now the word of the week and its true definition: Adversity.

Adversity is defined as: a state or instance of serious or continued difficulty or misfortune.

It was used several times this week. At the end of the Oregon Ducks escaping Pullman Washington with a win, Coach Helfrich said, “A road win in this conference is hard,” who’s Ducks rallied to beat Washington State for the eighth consecutive time. “We are 4-0 and we got a big win on the road. “There was a ton of adversity,”

Winning in a tough environment like Pullman was indeed tough and it was a continued difficulty, so yes this can be construed as ‘adversity.’

When asked at his ‘weekly’ press conference to go over his ‘weekly’ transgressions and blatant dumbassery, Jameis Winston was asked what it was going to feel like to not go out and play in the 1st half against Clemson. (It was later changed to a full game.) His response: “You know you have to overcome adversity, and that’s one thing at Florida State that we do. We work on overcoming adversity.” That’s not the definition of it, but go right ahead and think that Jameis. One doesn’t create their own adversity, perhaps ‘wading through my own stupidity’ would have been the proper phrase to use.

But when you think about it, Jameis Winston might be right but it’s a self-inflicted ‘continued difficulty’ or ‘misfortune.’ I know he’s on the right campus to be saying this though. When the suspension was brought up on College Gameday in Tallahassee, a legion of Seminole’s finest in the background began chanting ‘B.S! B.S!’ only it wasn’t the abbreviated form. Classy.

You had them Clemson. You had them Kansas State. You had them Washington State. Your teams had the true adversity and you let it slip away. The teams you played should be on upset alert though, cause better teams will come along and bring a whole lot of ‘adversity’ with them…