All right! NFL owners voted today to give Houston Super Bowl LI in 2017. At their spring meeting at the Hyatt Harborside, the owners voted the coveted Super Bowl L to San Francisco over South Florida. South Florida took another one on the chin in the next vote, losing Super Bowl LI to Houston. The [...]
Posts Tagged ‘football’
Florida’s failure to be insane is our gain
Good news if you’re rooting for Houston to host Super Bowl LI. Houston’s bid for Super Bowl LI received a major boost Friday when Florida lawmakers ended a 60-day legislative session without approving a plan that would have provided a $350 million upgrade for Sun Life Stadium in Miami. Houston is bidding for the 2017 [...]
UIL moves to limit high school football practice time
They are doing it to limit the risk of concussion. Established in 2001, the University Interscholastic League’s Medical Advisory Committee has done its best to be proactive and stay ahead on issues. That’s been the case in requiring schools to have automated external defibrillators, dealing with concussions and establishing protocols. On Sunday, the committee did [...]
A STEM vision for the Astrodome
Tory Gattis has an idea for what to do with the Astrodome. Where can America’s kids go to be inspired toward careers in our country’s most crucial need: science, technology, engineering and math (aka STEM)? Something far beyond their little local science or children’s museum? Houston could be that city, building not only on our [...]
Feeling good about the Super Bowl bid
The city of Houston has submitted its bid to host Super Bowl LI in 2017, and they feel pretty good about their chances. Houston’s competition will be San Francisco or Miami – the city that fails to get the coveted Super Bowl L. League owners will vote on both Super Bowls on May 22 in [...]
RIP, Jack Pardee
A sad day for Houston sports. Jack Pardee, a legend of Texas football from the six-man playing fields of Christoval to the barren wasteland of Junction to the Astrodome in Houston, has died of cancer, his family disclosed today. Pardee, 76, was diagnosed with terminal gall bladder cancer in November. “My dad was committed to [...]
County disputes cheaper Dome demolition price tag
It’s on. Harris County officials on Thursday disputed an estimate released this week showing it would cost $29 million to implode the vacant Reliant Astrodome and build a 1,600-space parking lot in two and a half years. The figure, calculated by local firms Linbeck Construction and Walter P. Moore and Associates after a three-month study [...]
How cursed is Houston as a sports city?
So another Super Bowl is history, and as you might have noticed the Houston Texans were not be playing in the game. This continues an unbroken streak of Houston football teams not making it to the Super Bowl, some in particularly heartbreaking fashion. The Astros have never won a World Series, having only won one [...]
Boise bails on Big East
By my count, the Big East has now lost more members than it ever had. Boise State will remain a member of the Mountain West Conference and will not join the Big East in 2013. The Broncos’ decision, confirmed in news releases by the the school and Mountain West on Monday, is the latest crippling [...]
Reliant gets its new scoreboard
As expected, and in time for the next push to get a Super Bowl in Houston. The state-of-the-art digital scoreboards will be manufactured by Mitsubishi Electric’s Diamond Vision Systems Division and installed for the 2013 season in place of the current end-zone scoreboards. County and Houston officials, as well as Texans owner Bob McNair, believe [...]
The Big East is imploding
I never really believed that the reconstituted Big East was going to be viable in the long term, but I didn’t see its demise happening in this fashion, nor this quickly. The Big East is headed for another break up. This time, the seven prominent basketball schools that don’t play FBS football are planning to [...]
Maryland to join the Big Ten
The dominoes have resumed falling. Maryland is joining the Big Ten, leaving the Atlantic Coast Conference in a shocker of a move in the world of conference realignment that was driven by the school’s budget woes. The announcement came Monday at a news conference with school President Wallace D. Loh, Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany [...]
Will the Astrodome derail our Super Bowl bid?
Heaven forbid. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell told a crowd on Tuesday that by 2017, Reliant will be 15 years old and therefore in need of some upgrades like digital scoreboards. Texans owner Bob McNair says the city must look at all its venues when wooing the NFL, and on the top of that list is [...]
Maybe the fourth time will be the charm
The city of Houston is once again bidding for a Super Bowl. If everything goes according to an ambitious plan devised by city and county leaders, Houston will host its third Super Bowl in 2017. The NFL informed the Texans and the city on Tuesday that Houston will be one of two finalists for Super [...]
It’s all about the pensions
I didn’t stay up to see the end of the Monday Night Football debacle. Whether you endured it or not, perhaps you’re wondering what exactly this particular labor dispute is about. To be blunt, it’s about the NFL attacking the referees’ retirement plan. The referees’ union and NFL team owners remain at odds on several [...]
NFL will go with replacement refs in Week 1
Bad idea. NFL officials have been locked out since early June. In a memo sent to teams, obtained by USA TODAY Sports, NFL executive vice president Ray Anderson told clubs talks remained deadlocked, with the league remaining in contact with federal mediators. Anderson cited issues that include: •Pay increase rates. •The league’s desire to replace [...]
The bid is in for the NCAA Champions game
We are officially bidding on the new Champions Bowl, the 2014 replacement for the BCS Championship Bowl, for Reliant Stadium. We heard about this in July, and it makes sense that Houston was solicited for a bid and that we’d go through with it. Mostly I’m noting this because I was amused by the following [...]
The fate of private junior colleges
Fascinating story of Lon Morris College and its grand plan to save itself. Like so many other non-profit, two-year private campuses, Lon Morris has been seeking ways to survive as more than half the country’s private junior colleges have disappeared since the mid-1990s due in part to cheaper tuition at community colleges. Dozens have closed. [...]
On the NCAA hammering Penn State
I’ve been thinking about the punishment the NCAA meted out to Penn State earlier this week. The NCAA has hit Penn State with a $60 million sanction, a four-year football postseason ban and a vacation of all wins dating to 1998, the organization said Monday morning. The career record of Joe Paterno will reflect these [...]
Big East settles up with departers
Everyone who wants to leave the Big East is now free to do so. Well, maybe “free” isn’t exactly the right word. Pitt and the conference announced that the school will pay $7.5 million to join Syracuse in leaving the Big East for the Atlantic Coast Conference on July 1, 2013. The Big East reached [...]
Houston to compete for new college football championship game
Sure, why not? The city of Houston and Reliant Stadium plan to make a push to host college football’s new football championship game, the head of the Harris County-Houston Sports Authority said Tuesday night. “We decided we want to aggressively pursue this opportunity for Houston,” said Janis Schmees, the executive director of the Harris County-Houston [...]
Bye-bye, BCS
Some sort of playoff system is on its way. The expected became a reality Wednesday as college football’s leaders announced that they will move forward with a four-team seeded playoff to decide the sport’s champion starting in 2014. The decision effectively ends the controversial and polarizing Bowl Championship Series system, which began in 1998 as [...]
Texas State to the Sun Belt
The conference carousel is still spinning. The Sun Belt said Wednesday that Texas State will join the league in July 2013 and begin conference play for the 2013-14 academic year. Texas State is going into its first season at the Football Bowl Subdivision level in 2012, when coach Dennis Franchione will lead the Bobcats into [...]
UTSA to C-USA
According to reports. Speaking on condition of anonymity, the source confirmed that the Roadrunners would be among a group of schools joining C-USA. The same source said UTSA had also received invitations from the Mountain West and Sun Belt conferences. The Mountain West and C-USA are in the process of joining their 16 existing members [...]
“Bum Phillips: The Opera”
Would you like to see an opera based on the life of legendary former Houston Oilers head coach Bum Phillips? Of course you would. And you can make it happen. BUM PHILLIPS is a world premiere operatic work inspired by the life of retired National Football League coach, O.A. “Bum” Phillips, and produced by Monk [...]
The homecoming queen’s got a strong right leg
I love this story. [Mary Morlan] Isom, who is also LSU’s reigning homecoming queen, has been trying out this week for a spot on LSU’s football team as a placekicker. If she makes it, she would be the first woman football player in school history. However, Isom said she knows not everyone is keen on [...]
Why salary caps suck
In a sane world, the Houston Texans would not have to worry about whether they have or can free up the cap space to re-sign Mario Williams as well as whichever else of their free agents they would like to retain. They would be free to negotiate with him and try to work a deal [...]
C-USA and and MWC make merger plans official
We knew it was coming. With their respective leagues being picked apart by the month to fulfill others’ expansion plans, 16 presidents and chancellors from Conference USA and Mountain West Conference met Sunday in Dallas, knowing they needed to do something. The result is a new league with a wide scope that goes coast-to-coast and [...]
Memphis to Big East
It’s what they’ve always wanted. At long last, Memphis is part of the Big East. The Tigers officially accepted an invitation to be part of the conference’s next incarnation in 2013, the conference said Wednesday. Memphis is the seventh school, and fourth from Conference USA, to sign up for future membership in the Big East [...]
Navy to join Big East
Another new playmate for UH. Navy has accepted an invitation to play football in the Big East, starting in 2015. “Stability in the Big East was a very important aspect in our discussions with the commissioner,” Vice Admiral Michael Miller, superintendent of the U.S. Naval Academy, said during a teleconference. “What we see is a [...]
UH heads to the Big East
I wish them all the best. The Big East Conference officially announced the additions of the University of Houston, Boise State, Central Florida, San Diego State and SMU on Wednesday. UH, Central Florida and SMU are being added as all-sports members to the league while Boise State and San Diego State are joining as football-only [...]
From the “And I wish for a pony, too” department
Hey, you know that annual UT-A&M game that’s not going to be played again any time in the near future? Let’s bring it to Reliant Stadium! Why not have Texas and Texas A&M meet at Reliant Stadium every Thanksgiving? It would be a bigger draw than the bowl game played here each December. While many [...]
Division I wannabes are popping up all over
And they’re all interested in the same conference. The Southland Conference likely holds the key to Incarnate Word’s dreams of moving its athletic program into NCAA Division I. [...] UIW students participating in a survey would support by nearly a 2-1 margin the school’s planned transition to Division I, according to results published Wednesday afternoon. [...]
HBU adds football, joins Southland Conference
Add another Division I football program to the city. The holidays came early for Houston Baptist University and the Southland Conference as both crossed an item off their wish lists. HBU joined a conference offering nearby members and a home for all its sports except men’s soccer, and the Southland added its first Houston member [...]