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Notre Dame capped off a 12-0 season with a 22-13 victory vs. Southern Cal on Saturday night (Nov. 24) at the Los Angeles Coliseum. The Irish earned a trip to Miami for the BCS championship game. It’s likely that Las Vegas will set the over/under at 43 — that would be the number of people in the continental United States who would not be rooting for or against the Irish. Notre Dame does elicit emotional reactions and incredible interest. Meaning television ratings and ticket prices could provide record numbers.
Around here, Jaime Edmondson always will have a place to go — college or pro.
* Ohio State capped off a 12-0 season with a 26-21 victory vs. Michigan in Columbus, Ohio. Because of NCAA sanctions, the Buckeyes will be going nowhere. Too bad there isn’t a bowl game for ineligible teams. Ohio State-USC would be more interesting than a lot of forthcoming bowl matchups.
* Northwestern capped off a 9-3 season with a 50-14 victory vs. Illinois in Evanston, Ill. The Wildcats will be going to a bowl game. NU athletic director Jim Phillips might want to revisit that “Chicago’s Big Ten Team” marketing theme and expand it to “State of Illinois’ Big Ten Team.”
* Now that first-year Illinois coach Tim Beckman has set the bar at a winless Big Ten season, there’s no place to go but up — although some Illini fans are hoping it’s more like away.
* As effective as Notre Dame’s defense was against USC (including an incredible goal-line stand), nobody did a better job than Trojans coach Lane Kiffin whose timeout call negated a touchdown pass for his team. Anyone for Kiffin to coach the Illini? OK, other than coaches of teams scheduled to play Illinois.
Chicago Bears quarterback Jay Cutler, who suffered a concussion on Nov. 11 — is expected to start vs. the Minnesota Vikings on Sunday at Soldier Field. Wonder what the odds are that he will finish as well.
From the NFL department of information/publicity/whatever it’s called:
* Cincinnati Bengals receiver A.J. Green has at least one touchdown catch in nine consecutive games this season. With a TD catch Sunday against Oakland, he would tie for the fourth-longest streak in NFL history. Jerry Rice holds the record of 13 (San Francisco, 1986-87), followed by Elroy “Crazylegs” Hirsch (1950-51 Los Angeles Rams and Buddy Dial (Pittsburgh, 1959-60) at 11, and Carl Pickens (Cincinnati 1994-95) and Randy Moss (Minnesota, 2003-04) with 10.
* Tampa Bay rookie running back Doug Martin leads all NFL players with 1,319 scrimmage yards. If he finishes the season as the leader in the category, Martin would join Pro Football Hall of Famers Marcus Allen (1982) and Eric Dickerson (1983) as the only rookies since 1970 to lead the NFL in scrimmage yards.
* San Francisco linebacker Aldon Smith, who leads the NFL with 15 sacks this season, has 29 sacks in 26 career games. With at least one sack against New Orleans, Smith would reach the 30-sack mark faster than any player who began his career since sacks became an official statistic in 1982. The players who began their careers since 1982 who reached 30 sacks in the fewest games:
Reggie White, Philadelphia (28 games)
Derrick Thomas, Kansas City (31)
Shawne Merriman, San Diego (31)
Anthony Smith, Los Angeles Raiders (35)
Leslie O’Neal, San Diego (39)
Jevon Kearse, Tennessee (39)
Dwight Freeney, Indianapolis (39)
If things go according to plan (and occasionally they actually do around here), we will be posting Playboy Playmate Jaime Edmondson’s NFL Week 12 picks and picks. Jaime also posts her selections with photos on Twitter at @jaimeedmondson.
UPDATE: As of kickoff of the early NFL games, Jaime had not posted any picks/pics. If she does, we will update all this. If not, we will sit back and enjoy an afternoon of football, etc.
Always room for videos, gratuitous and otherwise (not that anything around here ever is gratuitous):
Speaking of Gangnam Style, here is a video directed at Simeon star basketball player Jabari Parker and hoping to have him attend BYU (where he would figure to last a season before heading to the NBA):
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