You're listening to the back home network presented by home
field apparel welcome back to Crimson Cask ale and klaviyo
here. It's Thursday.
The 22nd of September, it's officially fall.
I'm officially on the road to seasonal affective disorder as I
think I woke up and it was like maybe 52 outside it's going to
be like 43 tomorrow. This is not funny, Mike.
I don't need laughter here. This is a serious serious thing.
But yes, that we had our way like 95 degrees here in
Bloomington on Wednesday. And I think that might be the
last time we get above 80 until May perhaps so Not good.
But anyway, we're not here to talk about my problems with the
weather. We're here to talk about IU
football and we've got Mike Petrie joining us.
If you've been following the podcast for any length of time,
you've heard from Mike and Mike, it's good to see you and hear
you again. How are you doing?
I'm doing well. And yeah, I think we're not here
to talk about your problems with whether we're here to talk about
how you footballs problems of richest with the weather.
But over all of which there are are either many depending on who
you ask or none and we should just not like there's no
problems at all and everything is great.
So we'll see who's right on that as we move into this game here,
but before we do that quickly, just a reminder that we are part
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gear, some tremendously, awesome, vintage designs, Mike,
I don't know if you saw this. But home-field just debuted
their Wake Forest collection which you as a you know, as a
Xavier you know, proximal person from being in Cincinnati.
You've got some ties to Wake Forest through that and some
good designs out of that. I think some interesting stuff
that they've come up with excellent.
My brother went to Wake Forest so even better.
Yeah that that works out really well but if you fully proceeded
skip Prosser there. Well that's well.
I mean he was laying the Groundwork for skip Prosser.
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maybe while you're listening to the podcast, we can do multiple
things. Now we don't have to just focus
on one thing. Anyway, Mike as we just
mentioned - of Cincinnati, Mike and I go way back.
To the the student Radio Days here at IU and Mike leave.
It's interesting. I was thinking about this.
I remember when we were in school, I you in Cincinnati had
a series then and it seemed kind of out of place because, you
know, back then all anybody paid attention to were like the big
conferences and Cincinnati might as well have been like a
division 2 team for all. We knew at that point and even
cam Cameron's teams were able to handle.
Dole Cincinnati in both of the games that they played.
If my memory serves me correctly, this you battle.
So you've had a long history with the city, obviously, but
also with you see and, you know, it's interesting because I don't
think many people have much of a memory of you see, prior to Luke
fickle, doing what he's done over the last few years, most
people, fortunately miss the Tommy tuberville era, and most
of the previous eras before that what was your like, what was it
like kind of being around. Found the you see program, you
know kind of observing what they were doing and we do.
What were they like in for instance like the 80s early 90s?
Well it it was to put it bluntly a trash Heap, set on fire and
burning into the atmosphere in the 80s.
The the football program would compete and I use compete rather
rather liberally here. With 10th state to be the 107th
ranked team in division. One at the time there were 117 s
in division one. They went back-to-back years, I
saw, I was just looking through, kind of the House of Horrors
that was their athletic department back in the 80s.
They went back-to-back years. One year went one and ten and
one year went one night and one the only time Was against
Rutgers now which also shows how far they've come.
I guess. Yeah.
Maybe and, you know, and the basketball team I think that
people kind of have a feeling that anybody who's been a fan of
basketball, the last 30 years, like Cincinnati's pretty much
always been there, but the program that Bob Huggins picked
up in the late 80s again wasn't absolute.
Abject disaster. I look back.
There was a year. They went 3 and 25 and their
winds were two of the Winds. I don't think even counted
because one was Eastern Kentucky by two points and another one
was Northern Kentucky who was definitely a division to school
at that time. And then in a time that was
reminiscent or I guess much like Mike Davis, help is on the Way,
there was a very much. Ballyhooed freshman class that
everybody was very excited about in the program and it was going
to set the program back on the right side of the line and the
entire freshman class was declared ineligible.
So I mean just no matter what you were trying to do at that
time, they couldn't do it. Right?
Nippert Stadium which is one of the great really cool venue and
I think they've done a lot of great things with that recently.
During the 80s. It was essentially condemned and
University of Cincinnati which couldn't draw enough to fill
that stadium was instead playing off campus at Riverfront
stadium. And when you can't sell a 10,000
seat Stadium, heard, you know, it 15 to 20,000 seat Stadium, it
doesn't look very good when you then go to a fifty thousand seat
stadium. So yeah.
I mean, Everything that could go wrong.
Did go wrong. And then from about the 90s,
they used the basketball program, kind of got that back
into a prominence and use that to move themselves up and
they've basically, been coming up against, you know, against
the odds, and against some stacked debts for the last 25 to
30 years. Yeah, it's interesting because,
you know, the Cincinnati program it's just kind of always around
at this. And, you know, I mean, I think
they deserve a great deal of credit for, you know, finally
breaking through and making the playoff as, you know, a group of
five team. But the fact that they're in the
group of five and say, Louisville for instance, is in
the ACC, it kind of makes you scratch your head a little bit
because those those things don't feel like they should
necessarily be that way. People forget Cincinnati was in
the Big East for a pretty long period of time.
You know what a decade I yes or close to it a little under a
decade and you know and they had some pretty good teams, you
know, Blaine Butch Jones had them.
Ranked Brian Kelly obviously was there and and had them in the
top 15 somewhat regularly. I think what they were even, you
know, top five at one point under Kelly but they, You know,
despite going to the Orange Bowl, going to the Sugar Bowl,
they weirdly they feel like on their outside looking in at this
point even even with all of that recent history, Yeah, I mean, I
think that they are probably not top of Mind in terms of non
power. Five Conference teams that are I
think even Boise State probably gets more attention as being the
nation's darling to a certain extent, you know, BYU and Notre.
Dame are other non power, five teams that Have more cash a I
guess and are just don't have the next deck stacked against
them you mentioned, the Big East that was a huge move for
Cincinnati. They really thought they had
arrived. They had become a power 5 team
and, you know, five years after that happened.
Oops. The ACC goes, the Raiden and
pulls out three of the, I guess, three of them.
Most Minute that the time, Big East schools and the Big East
says, oh well, we're just going to become a basketball
conference now and set the football playing members adrift
at that point. And yeah, even now they are
going to become a Power five Conference team again, I think
2024, 2025 whenever all that happens, I think I think they've
gotten out early now, so it'll be 20. 94.
But you know, as you talked about all summer, it's really
not the power 5 anymore. It's the Big Ten, the SEC and
kind of everybody else. Yeah, fending for themselves and
seeing if there's going to be some more consolidation.
So every time they've made a big step up.
Thank King. Okay, well, this this is it we
finally arrived kind of the floor drops out from under them
again. They do seem to be kind of an
interesting incubator of coaches, which I think is a
fascinating thing about the program.
We mentioned. Brabus e, Brian Kelly and Butch
Jones and Luke fickle seems like at some point.
He'll go to a bigger program at this.
I don't know you've gone 13 and one you've made the playoff.
I don't know exactly like what you do after that or what you're
waiting for, but it is a marked at Mark, dantonio was also the
head coach at you see it's And we're going to just forget the
Tommy tuberville exist. I think that's best for
everybody, but but it is it's fascinating that this has become
a big launching off point and that it doesn't.
I mean, you know, despite all of these kind of back-and-forth
sorts of things, like this program has not been down for
more than a couple of years in a row really since what Rick
Minter left and you know that was 20 years ago at this point.
Yeah. Well if you're looking for a
reason for Or that I think the best explanation I've come up
with, is that I decided I was going now.
I grew up, I was a big Cincinnati fan.
My parents raised me correctly. They were graduates in 61, and
64 and 1962. So, they were there.
When they won two national championships in basketball,
over Ohio State, who refused to play them in anything for 30
years. But you know, so there I was as
big of you. If and as you can imagine and
then I decided to come to Indiana in 1996 and we've seen
how the fortunes of both schools have kind of diverged since
then. So if Indiana fans are looking
for a reason to someone to blame, that would probably be
nice. I mean, the number of people
that probably need to be blamed for IU, footballs fortunes
really long. I'm gonna put you kind of like
two-thirds of the way back in line, not over it out of it, but
I'll put you in there. R.
Let's talk about this current Cincinnati team, you know, they
stumble in their first game against Arkansas, it wasn't a
bad loss, by any means, you're on the road, an SEC opponent,
they only lose by seven. They didn't play particularly
well in the game, but they still manage to keep it relatively
close. And, you know, then they blow
out Kennesaw State and then they have kind of a weird game last
week at Miami of Ohio, they Trail early and they come back.
They went Road. Comfortably, but maybe not as
comfortably as people might have.
I know, I certainly bet on Cincinnati, and they did not
cover. So, that was, that was
disappointing to say the least. But, you know, obviously a
different team than last year. A lot of players from that team
are they're gone or there in the NFL or something like that.
So what does this vintage of Cincinnati football have going
for it? You know what is it?
What are the primary things are the primary people that you
would say I you fans would be looking for in this game.
I think that what they have more than anything is a culture and
the culture is that Luke fickle hasn't left the game against
Miami is always a weird one. You know that's that is Miami of
Ohio Super Bowl. They are playing for.
I think the victreebel is the oldest Trophy.
West of the Allegheny Mountains it is you know a very historic,
right? Re but obviously one, that's
become very much one-sided to the point where Cincinnati kind
of keeps talking about. Well, are we going to keep
playing this really do? We need to keep playing this
and, you know, they haven't they haven't said that out loud but
you know there's enough murmurs of like How often do we have to
win this game, by 40 points? You know, that it becomes that
much more of a Super Bowl for Miami, right?
So that result I think is a little bit, you can't kind of
throw that out. Ultimately I you know from a
Personnel standpoint, I think that in a lot of ways, this is
the team. As opposed to a mediocre or an
underperforming, Big Ten school. I think the next two weeks are
going to be really interesting for Indiana because the recruits
that that Cincinnati is getting our nut of the Vintage that
Indiana is going to get physically, dominated.
I think, even when you saw last year, Which was by far the best
Cincinnati team. You know, that had has been
around and at least, you know, at least 12 15 years and
probably longer than that, that was a team.
Indiana could play with ya in a year when Indiana was not at its
best. I think this year's Indiana team
is better. I think this year's Cincinnati
team is obviously not quite to that level. but, It's an
execution thing that is going to keep in the keep Cincinnati.
Well, ahead of Indiana at this point, they're not going to
physically dominate Indiana. But in some ways because of
that, in the end, I might be able to keep up with Cincinnati
more so than, you know, I think everybody kind of pins their
hopes to Nebraska Nebraska should honestly, just they've
got the caliber of athlete and a caliber of player that they
should be able to run Indiana off the off the field.
The fact that they don't is whether coach got fired, but,
you know it it's a game like this.
I think that Indiana will hang around.
A lot longer than people would expect.
Yeah, it's interesting because the, we know when the, when the
numbers came in on this game from a wagering perspective and
I do think there's some value in looking at that because it's a
lot of people think that numbers don't matter at all.
But it's a, it's normally a pretty good gauge of the
perceived quality level of both opponents.
And you know, it started off at like I think Cincinnati was at
eight and a half Point favorite in the blue and all the way to
18 and a half. It's and it's settled back down
now to wear it Cincinnati by 16 and a half points you know
that's you know it's I mean it's roughly equivalent I guess two
more or less where the game kind of ended up last year, was a
14-point game last year. So, you know, even with some of
the losses you could see the argument for Cincinnati, being
that good. But I think your point is well
taken. Like if you look at the grading
of Cincinnati players so far on the season, Like they really
struggled against the athleticism of Arkansas.
They couldn't block, you know, they really couldn't tackle.
They really struggled in coverage against really Speedy
players. They played much better.
Obviously the last couple of weeks against more inferior
competition. If Indiana were to play well and
to the level of their talent, you know, I think you're right.
I think they could stick with them.
I do Wonder though how well we still don't know how this IU
team will travel this year like literally Figuratively.
And, you know, it's going up against in Cincinnati team that
beat them soundly last year, although didn't blow them out,
you know, Cincinnati's not going to be scared of playing a big 10
team at least not Indiana, maybe they'd be scared of playing
another Big Ten team, but but Indiana is not going to put a
lot of fear into them. And while Indiana certainly has
some SEC light type of talent, you know, whether that's players
out of Data that they've recruited or players that have
transferred in from SEC or ACC programs.
It is one of those situations where they're facing, you know,
against the Cincinnati team that that really does know how to
play well, and probably has recalibrated after that Arkansas
game. So, I don't know.
We'll have to see how that goes, as you know, the IU.
Certainly hasn't graded a particularly well, in any of
their games either. And I do think that, you know,
when you look at the way that Cincinnati's grades have gone.
At least they are trending upward where his Indiana is, we
still don't know. Indiana might be a good team
that just hasn't shown it yet or they might be a little bit of
Fools Gold just in terms of what they've been able to do against
the teams that they played. Which frankly hasn't been a
whole great deal thus far. So that's that's I think the
biggest question mark for me as we go into this game, is this
idea of you know how How does Indiana matchup against the team
that knows exactly what it's wanting to do and overall has
certainly been able to do it on a pretty consistent basis, Mike
the you know the Indiana certainly struggled, but one
against Illinois, they struggled.
But one against Western Kentucky, you know, the kind of
picking up on on that. If it's, you know, when you look
at this Indiana, team's resilience and that's been the
word that Of people have talked about Tom Allen's talked about
it quite a bit in his press conferences.
We do you think belief is enough coupled with the talent
Indiana's, got to really be able to make a game of this and
potentially even walk in and win?
Or do you see that not really being something that bothers
Cincinnati after what they've been through the last couple of
years, I don't think that that bothers Cincinnati so much, but
what I think what Indiana has going for it is that this game
is a bigger opportunity for Indiana than it is for
Cincinnati. Especially you know, coming off
of last year, last year they came into Indiana, they were
looking to prove something they were playing a Big Ten team on
the road. It was a big 10 team that had
been knocked down a pig Maybe by Iowa but was still, you know,
came in the year with very high expectations.
Now we are kind of just another game on Cincinnati schedule and
I think that that's one thing that Indiana has going for it
because this is an opportunity to kind of wake up everybody to
what to the fact that this year is different than last year.
And I think that some of that belief, some of that confidence,
you know, is something that can build within a game and you get
to the second half of the game. And you've certainly seen many
opportunities where, again, if you get to a second half of a
game against Ohio, State or Michigan, and you know,
Indiana's hanging around but in hanging around in a game that
they don't necessarily belong in This is the Cincinnati team that
doesn't have that extra physical level that, you know, that we're
when Cincinnati or where Indiana's hanging around late in
the game. They're not hanging on by their
fingernails against a physically superior team.
Yeah. And I think that that's the
biggest advantage that that Indiana has.
Yeah, it's going to be interesting.
I mean, I and I am curious as much as I'm curious about what
Cincinnati looks like in this kind of A game like you said,
where they're, they're not going to take Indiana as seriously as
probably the wrong word, but it's kind of the only word I can
think of that, like the way they took them last year.
You know Cincinnati coming in ranked fourth but probably still
feeling like they needed to prove something on the national
stage. Indiana, everybody thought was
still good at that point last year, how right how quickly that
turned around? But that is going to be an
interesting Factor. You know, you've watched this
Your team through three games so far.
What has stuck out to you? Good or bad about the way that
they've played and the way that they've been in these games, I
think it's been that a lot of what has gone wrong is is
fixable, I think that's the only optimistic take you.
Can you can have from the three games and I think that when
you're talking about the bare minimum of level of success, For
a team, like Indiana in the Big Ten, which is the bare minimum
is get six wins. There's a path to that.
And I think they're going to have to steal a game or two that
they don't really deserve to win, but I think that that's
possible. You know, they've gotten lucky
certainly to win the games that they've to win all the games
that they won, they've certainly gotten themselves up to the
Cliff's Edge. Far more often than we'd like.
But I think that that does that winning those games, does it
gives you a certain sense of invincibility?
And I think that that is why especially this game, you know,
if you get to it, close to it to where it's closed at the end,
you've got a shot because You can tell yourself whether it's
right or wrong. We've been here before we, you
know, if we're down 14 points at the start of the fourth quarter,
we've done that and it's a better opponent obviously and
they'll have to execute much more sharply and they'll have to
play better to only be down, 14 points at the beginning of the
fourth quarter, but all of those things are things that they are
capable of doing. Yeah, now it's true.
I mean, it feels weird think about.
I you as, you know, underachieving or maybe just
not, not not not taking advantage of opportunities.
But it's like, you don't, if you can come back and win at the
end, against Western, Kentucky or against Illinois.
Clearly, like there's something there that you can take
advantage of and maybe elevate your game in something like
this. It's just weird to me, maybe.
Well, weirds the wrong word, but it is kind of its peculiar in a
way that I use to keep He woken up in the fourth quarter and
then that does concern me a bit because I think you can, you do
somewhat get away with that in a home game against a mid-level
competition. But even with what they've lost
I think, you know, and the and even you can point to some of
the talent disparity and and, you know, Cincinnati not having
like perhaps better Talent necessarily from a ratings
perspective than I you. But that's it's a real concern.
If you're going on the road and facing a team that knows what
they're doing, When you're an Indiana team, that at least for
half of the game so far or half of each of the games, maybe has
shown that. It doesn't quite know what it's
doing. Yeah, there's a professionalism
that Luke fickle has brought to the, you see Team.
I think that the experience that Indiana has an incoming bag.
I think is is counterbalanced by the experience that you see has
in plain teams that it should be and, you know, it I guess if
there's anything that the AAC has been good for for Cincinnati
is that it's given them, a lot of experience on.
Here's what, here's how you put away in fear, you're sitting
here, you know, and here's what happens.
When here's what you do. When you're in a game that, you
know, with the team that you should be beating pretty
handily. And I think they probably feel
like they should beat Indiana handily.
But You know, there's the professionalism, that that Luke
fickle has brought, they're not going to take since take Indiana
lightly, right? But it's not the level of
motivation they had. For, for the, for the IU fans,
that are heading down to nippert for this game.
What advice would you give them anything?
They need to be? Keeping an eye out for or
anything. You would advise them to to get
into. Um, you know, the nippert
stadium is a really cool place to watch a game.
I think that they've refurbished it and it is, you know, just a
really cool old stadium. I think it's been open since
since the 20s to be honest. And just, you know, to take in
the whole experience, they've made a much better experience
out of the whole game day around around.
The Bearcats as pretty much everybody has over the last 20
years. It's become much more of a
production, but it used to be again, going back to the bad old
days. Even when they got themselves
back into Nipper, it was get yourself to the, get yourself
into the stadium, get yourself out.
And hope that your car still has four tires on it.
When you're leaving, you know, the area around nippert Stadium.
Is much better in terms of just an overall overall experience
got it? Yeah.
The Cincinnati Zoo is nearby. I notice that's that's I don't
know if that's it. The William Howard Taft.
National Historic Site is nearby.
I'm not sure if these are things.
People should be going to. But with your, if you're going,
where are you stopping to eat or drink before the game, where are
you Get yourself some Skyline Chili.
Oh my God, it's really funny. Actually and and I remember I
sent you a kind of a thing for the getae which is also another
Cincinnati. Yes, kind of delicacy and the
recipe says it's not much to look at but trust me.
It tastes really good and I thought is there any Cincinnati
food specialty, that doesn't begin with that disclaimer it?
Look very good, but trust me, maybe maybe the beer which
probably doesn't count as a food item.
But, yeah, that's wow. That's quite a, that's quite an
advertised it. Well, you know, it should be an
interesting game to say the least and I'm quite curious to
see how this plays out. I tend to think I kind of I'm
kind of in the same boat as you. I get the feeling I you is going
to stick around a bit. They might even have an early
lead. It does kind of feel like it's
got the Hallmarks of the game that I you could eventually get
kind of get ground down in, as Cincinnati, kind of figures out
what they need to do throughout the course of the game.
But nothing would surprise me in this one, you know, I mean, I
could see, I could see how you getting blown out by 30.
I could also see them sticking around and, you know, having a
shot to win it at the end. It's, it's one of those.
It's a weird game to because a win in this game, kind of
completely transforms. Indiana.
See, And as you mentioned your kind of alluded to earlier
because at that point it's like why you gosh it's now you got
you got you know, Nebraska Marilyn Rutgers and Purdue and
you only need two wins out of that those four to get to bowl
eligibility. Whereas if you lose the game,
you need three wins out of that group.
And and, you know, with a couple of those games being on the
road, it seems somewhat less likely given how Indiana
normally plays on the road? But yeah, I mean, it clearly
Cincinnati not going back to the playoffs this year.
So I am interested to see how they perform, since they don't
have the, I mean they came in what rank fourth last year?
I think in that game, clearly, they knew they were playing for
something big. Maybe they don't feel like
they're playing for stepping quite as big because quite
frankly, they're not well, well, yeah, not only, is there not the
reward at the end? They are, you know, they're
there is no way they look at what it at playing Indiana, you
know in this As they did last year, you know, it's the way
that the decks again kind of going back to the same theme, I
am really glad that Cincinnati was able to make the playoff
plus here but it really would have been fitting if the fact
that's that Indiana tanks the way they did was the reason that
Cincinnati did not get ya get into the playoff that really
would have kind of cemented Cincinnati's.
Well Well, earned gripe against the whole college football
establishment. I mean, hey, if you can't
schedule properly seven years in advance and what are you even
doing right? Well, yeah, exactly.
Well Mike, anything else you'd like to touch on before we wrap
up? No, I think that covers it.
Everybody should check out my Twitter thread on on here.
Cincinnati though that I haven't gotten blocked by nearly enough
people. So obviously not enough people
have read that. We definitely need to get Mike
blocked by as many of you as possible.
Sybil Mike, your Twitter account is, I am th e, MD P, I'm the mdp
and yes, he has a 13 tweet thread going about Cincinnati's
fight song that I highly highly recommend, and I think if you
get through all of that tweet at Mike, he might record himself
singing the song and you can listen to that before you block
him. And then Everybody will be
happy. Well, right if you get me
singing, I will definitely get Block.
There you go. That tape that that will and I
will deserve it Mike Mike Petrie once again joining us here in
Crimson cast. Mike always great to talk with
you. Good luck to you and thanks to
all you folks for listening in IU takes on Cincinnati on
National Television, 3:30 on ESPN2, we'll keep an eye out for
that and be watching that and probably have some commentary
during the game and Definitely have come Terry coming up on
Sunday morning so be sure to tune back in for that.
Catch you folks on the flip side, bring back the Bison.
So long everybody.