In all honesty, I was hoping for a sinkhole to appear at the 50-yard line and swallow both sidelines whole, rendering the results of the New York Jets-Pittsburgh Steelers AFC Championship game moot.
Unfortunately, that did not transpire, and we are left with a Super Bowl featuring the Green Bay Packers -- as Marcus Hartman of Buckeye Sports Bulletin tweeted, “Baaaaa-dump-ba-dump-bump-bump GO PACK GO” -- and the Heinz Hilljacks.
When it comes to the players that will comprise the rosters of the two Super Bowl participants, though, there is a very big surprise amongst the powerhouse collegiate football programs. According to a press release fired off within minutes of the end of the AFC title game, there are four Div. 1-A schools that will have four players each on the active rosters of the respective teams that will square off amidst and around the commercials for the right to hoist the Lombardi.
Three of those programs are to be expected -- LSU, Ohio State and Tennessee. The fourth? The mighty Chippewas of Central Michigan.
Yep, venerable CMU will have four former players on the active rosters representing the Chips when the Packers and Steelers take the field at Jerry’s World -- Cullen Jenkins, Frank Zombo and Josh Gordy are with the NFC champions, while Antonio Brown is in his rookie season with the AFC champions.
Of course, this post does not come without a bit of controversy.
Shortly after posting portions of CMU’s release on CFT’s Twitter feed, the whining commenced. Specifically, the whining about Ryan Mundy‘s rightful collegiate slot commenced in earnest. The Pittsburgh defensive back graduated from Michigan, but finished his collegiate football career at West Virginia. Some Twits were arguing for his inclusion as a Wolverine, which would give the Ann Arbor school four former players in the Super Bowl.
And there were also a couple of tweets from Tennessee fans declaring that there were actually five ex-Vols that are members of the two teams participating in the Super Bowl.
Frankly, we don’t care enough about this to cross-check the work of the CMU sports information department.
We find it astonishing enough that CMU is actually in the discussion for “most players from one Div. 1-A football program in the 2011 Super Bowl”. And that was the whole point of this endeavor.