Decade rankings 51-70: Football matters at KU, and that's no joke
Decade rankings: 71-90 | 91-110 | 111-120
As a lead-in to our preseason coverage, CBSSports.com continues to rank each Division I-A program over the next few weeks based on its performance this decade. We're calling it The Golden Decade.
The list continues with Nos. 51-70:
51. Kansas: There are enough Mark Mangino jokes around to fill a Letterman monologue.
At least there were.
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| Todd Reesing passed for 3,888 yards and 32 touchdowns last season. (US Presswire) |
Who would have ever thought that Kansas (or Missouri, for that matter) would be that close to playing for a national championship?
Missouri won the game but Kansas won the postseason. The Orange Bowl selected the Jayhawks for the program's first BCS bowl. The 12-1 season was the best in Jayhawks history. And to top it off, hoops cooperated. How does winning the Orange Bowl and a basketball national championship in the same year sound?
Mangino was named the Coach of the Year in 2007 by the Football Writers Association of America.
The point of all is that Mangino might not have been Lew Perkins' choice when the AD took over in 2004. The coach was 8-17 at that point in Lawrence and the thinking was Perkins wanted his own man. But the ball-busting AD tried continuity over cleaning house. In the past four seasons, Kansas has won 33 games and Mangino has delivered three consecutive bowl wins.
The coach has developed a gritty team that might not match other teams in talent but plays incredibly hard. Todd Reesing is an undersized Texan who was ignored by other schools but is developing into the best quarterback in school history. After that Orange Bowl win, Kansas is doing things in reverse, trying to win its first Big 12 title this year. It is picked by several experts to get to the Big 12 championship game this season.
The jokes continue to rain down. The tragedy of all this -- at least for Mangino -- is that he would be at a bigger, better program if he were more of the Pierce Brosnan type. The coach doesn't care. His career started at Youngstown State, where he was an assistant coach by day and a medical first-responder on the Pennsylvania Turnpike at night.
Tough losses don't seem to sink in as much when you're used to loading dead bodies.
52. Oklahoma State: The program was in good hands when Les Miles handed it over to Mike Gundy. The "I'm 40" guy has not bobbled the ball. The Cowboys have won nine twice this decade, which is more than UCLA and as many as Notre Dame. The problem for the Cowboys is playing in the rugged Big 12 South. Texas and Oklahoma are always better. That might change this season.
53. Colorado: Four division titles. A Big 12 title (2001). A recruiting and sex scandal. CU hasn't been the same since 2004, when Gary Barnett got up in front of reporters and dissed Katie Hnida .
54. Toledo: A gambling scandal tarnished the rep of the MAC school with the best record this decade (68-42). Tom Amstutz won conference titles in 2001 and 2004.
55. UCLA: Almost everything the Bruins have accomplished this decade has been overshadowed by USC.
56. South Carolina: Go ahead and call it the best South Carolina decade ever. Two coaching legends (Holtz and Spurrier) have produced three bowl wins.
57. Mississippi: Eli. David Cutcliffe. Houston Nutt. The Florida win. Everything else, Ole Miss wants to forget.
58. Bowling Green: Some guy named Urban Meyer won 17 games in two seasons. Whatever happened to him?
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| The Illini went from 2-10 in 2006 to 9-4 the next season under Ron Zook. (US Presswire) |
60. Navy: Paul Johnson proved the triple option could slay I-A Goliaths. The mission continues at Georgia Tech.
61. Troy: Does anyone realize Larry Blakeney has averaged almost eight wins in his 18 seasons? He goes for at least a share of his fourth consecutive Sun Belt title in 2009.
62. Tulsa: Should Steve Kragthorpe have left? Tulsa had it going when Krags left for Louisville two years ago. Since then, Todd Graham has won 21 games and played in two Conference USA title games.
63. Texas A&M: A decade of strife mostly. The Aggies have been 3-15 combined against Texas and Oklahoma. R.C. Slocum fell out of favor. Dennis Franchione left in shame. Mike Sherman has yet to prove himself.
64. Colorado State: Best program in Colorado, at least record wise (58-53 vs. CU's 55-58 in the 2000s). Steve Fairchild somehow got to a bowl in his first season after taking over for Sonny Lubick.
65. Michigan State: The 2008 Capital One Bowl season was only the Spartans' second with more than seven victories this decade. Former Ohio State assistant Mark Dantonio is solid.
66. Minnesota: New stadium, same old questions. Which way are the Gophers headed? Tim Brewster is 1-11 and 7-6 in his first two seasons.
67. Northwestern: Who can't root for Pat Fitzgerald? The Hall of Famer has won 19 games in three seasons since the tragic death of Randy Walker.
68. Memphis: Fifty-one victories, two bowl wins.
69. Iowa State: Dan McCarney should have never been fired. That Gene Chizik thing worked out well didn't it?
70. Washington: Started the decade winning the 2001 Rose Bowl. Ended it with the nation's longest losing streak (14 games).
