#231: Back End of the Backyard Brawl

---SSL Broadcast #69---


This is the way the brawl ends.
This is the way the brawl ends.
This is the way the brawl ends.
Not with a bang, but a whimper.


Borrowing from poet T.S. Eliot was probably not the way you expect a blog entry to open, but there you have it.

Last night's Backyard Brawl (the annual collegiate football game played between the Pitt Panthers and West Virginia Mountaineers) was likely the last such game for at least a few years.

While the Mountaineers prevailed 21-20 in comeback fashion, the frustrating way the entire game played out only proved to further the argument that the Big East has no business getting an automatic bid for a BCS Bowl. Points were scored mainly by virtue of the other team's miscue, rather than by positive plays made by each team's offense.

And now, with Pitt departing for the Atlantic Coast Conference and West Virginia becoming a member of the Big 12, the clash between the two teams will have to occur in early season play where victory and defeat don't mean quite as much, and that's even if the schools are able to schedule the game at all.

But, perhaps after the teams get beaten up and down the field by their new respective conference opponents, they'll willingly make the time to renew the rivalry on an annual basis. For as T.S. Eliot also observed:


In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.


On today's show:

- Jason Cole from Yahoo! Sports talks AFC North jockeying and other relevant league issues.


- Sidney Crosby finally returns to the ice.

- Steelers may not have as easy a time as folks think.

- Pirates sign a shortstop.

- It was too good to last: Mike goes 0-1-1 in last week's NFL picks (10-11-1 overall).






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