Jan. 19, 2012
Quick Slant is an array of brief insights and occasionally opinionated overviews of collegiate athletics in general and the Vanderbilt Commodores in particular.
Our Auto Zone Liberty Bowl football game drew a television Nielsen rating of 1.88, better than Florida-Ohio State’s rating in the Gator Bowl. A rating point equals about 1.1 million televisions so our game attracted about two million televisions, no doubt viewed by more than one person per set. The top rated bowl game was, of course, the BCS title game with a 14.01 rating, followed by the Rose and Fiesta Bowls. Overall bowl viewership was down this year.
Baseball Coach Tim Corbin remains an active speaker during the off-season. His recent appearance at an event in Clarksville drew what has become a typical rave review.
When Missouri entered the Southeastern Conference there was chatter about how its presence would impact the league’s already difficult football race. Have you noticed that as of this writing the Tigers are 17-1 and rated No. 5 in men’s basketball? Missouri has a long tradition of extremely strong basketball and it will be anything but an easy opponent.
If I was King of College Basketball for one day, I would implement one change that would dramatically improve the fan experience. Raise your hand if you are tired of timeouts. There are way too many. Let’s count `em up:
There are four media timeouts per half (8 total) and each team is allowed five (10 more) of their own. That is 18 breaks in action, people! Eighteen during a 40 minute game!! I’ve watched some games and forgot who is playing after back-to-back commercial breaks. I caught the last 15 minutes of Seton Hall at Villanova, a game Nova had under control, yet it took 42 minutes of real time to play 10 minutes off the clock with the timeout calls, quick fouls and so forth. As the camera scanned the winning home crowd, most looked catatonic. Seton Hall’s chance to win that game? About the same chance one has to win Powerball.
The television timeouts come often enough that any coach should be able to exist on two or three for the game. We eliminate the annoying T.O.’s when a team can’t get the ball inbounded because of good defense or when there might be a jump ball. Coaches say they need to have five to work their magic. I say coach your team at practice and make use of the 10 or 12 breaks that would still exist. More than enough time to talk strategy.
Seriously, wouldn’t the game be so much more fun to watch?
