#like what if he won for this after all the snubbing for bcs?

[windy-apple]

[wrongcaitlyn]

Do you plan on making the talk ur talk universe a trilogy? If you do, then YAYYY MORE FAMOUS NICO, and if you don't, then YAYY I HAVE A NEW FAVORITE AUTHOR

this is HILARIOUS bc i was actually DEEPLY CONSIDERING IT. like. just a few weeks ago. see the thing was i made this playlist, and i was super into it, and i was like, well shit, i already have the rest of this outlined- would i be willing to go on further???

i'll give the gist of it here: basically a majority of the first fic was around the start of his career. this fic is centered around this one album that will come out in a long long time toward the end of the fic + the seven memoir.

the third fic WOULD (heavy emphasis on would bc i'm still not so sure abt it) be centered around the egot.

in case you don't know what that is, it's basically like this prestigious thing where you've won an emmy (tv shows), grammy (music), oscar (movie), tony (musical theatre)

i once responded to this comment on talk ur talk asking whether i was intending on nico ever achieving egot status and i said no, because i don't really see him straying too far from what he's doing rn - he writes music because he loves it, and for the art, not for the prestige, but that i could definitely see apollo getting an egot sometime in the future bc i had mentioned him already having an emmy, grammy, and oscar, so he would just have a tony left and lets be real he would slay on broadway

but then i got into this mini hyperfixation on - if nico were to ever receive egot status - how would he do that?? grammy's are a given, and i went down this rabbit hole for how he could win the others, sticking to the fact that he adamantly refuses to act

oscar would be easy, best original song - something like "no time to die" by billie eilish (which won the award) or "yellow flicker beat" by lorde are movie songs that i 100% think he could write

for the emmy's there's an award for like best documentary pop culture or something like that (i can't find the doc where i put all this in but trust that i did the research at some point) which he could def do, or something that like he collaborated with apollo for - a documentary of some sort

and here's where the mini hyperfixation came in - the tony. now here's the thing i don't actually know a lot abt musical theatre. i was in like two musicals in middle school and that's it. so i did a deep dive on all the musicals that have won tony's, listened to a few soundtracks, found out that the lightning thief got TOTALLY SNUBBED???

and then fell down the hadestown rabbithole

so i'll just leave this info right here - i gave so much detail bc i'm still not rlly sure if i ever want to go into this?? simply bc i *do* know quite a bit abt pop music/production from watching videos and documentaries and stuff, but i'm really not a musical theatre person. so.

we'll see if this ever actually becomes a thing, because i know that greatest of luxuries covers a huge timespan and i'll likely be working on this for *quite* a long time, and we'll see how much motivation i would have to continue it after this! if nothing else, i think i would def go back into the universe from time to time to write little oneshots just bc of how this au has become such a huge part of my lifesjdf

aside from that, THANK YOU SO SO MUCHSDKF <333 i definitely intend to continue writing more solangelo even after talk ur talk is over, i have *so* many other au ideas and wip's that maybe i'd finally get a chance to start once talk ur talk isn't consuming so much of my time!! (not in a bad way, i truly do love writing it) <3 thank you for the ask!!

oh also, bonus note: even if i do end up ending talk ur talk after greatest of luxuries, it most definitely won’t be the end of famous nico!! i love me some fame au’s and wouldn’t be able to be stopped from writing them even if i tried😭 id likely just try out a different form of a fame au at some point, like my actor!nico and country singer!will fic based on so american which i swear is still in progress im working on it it’ll get there !!!

[cazluvsu]

☕️end result of this season

assuming u mean the end of the celtics season so 😇😇

the narratives. Ouuhhh the narratives.

celtics are chokers!! they aren’t clutch!! jayson tatum can’t close!! jaylen has no left hand!! jrue is a playoff dropper!! the west is going to dominate the east!! celtics were never ‘battle tested’!!! celtics have no bench!! joe mazzulla can’t coach!! mavs in 5!! the jays don’t work together and they never will!!!!!!

all of them. ALL OF THEM!! GONE!!!!! WHAT THEY GONNA SAY NOW!!!!!!!! the whole team was doubted throughout the regular season and playoffs bc of these dumbass narratives when they were the most dominant team by nearly every metric for the entire. season.

but so many analysts said how they were never gonna get over the hump.. Embarrassing!!! (koc… nick WRONG… sas… KENDRICK PERKINS. etc etc…)

people kept basing these takes on past iterations of this celtics core when they were really a different team!!! jaylen took a huge jump defensively, kp added so much to their offense, dwhite had a career year starting consistently, jrue was an incredible fit with everyone Obviously l, and tatum took on a huge playmaking role throughout the season And throughout the playoffs especially!!

but everyone on the team made sacrifices. and worked together. and rooted for each other. and were on the same page. everyone on the team was hungry for banner 18 and they fucking won it!! fuck all those analysts saying they’d never win!!!!!!!

but Also the positive narratives!!! jb’s come back after a devastating miami series last season, signing the richest contract in nba history, and proving to Everyone that he was worth every. fucking. penny. snubbed from all-nba (and all defense if we’re being fr) but he used it as motivation and used the hate to win ecf mvp AND finals mvp. iktr!!!!! my jersey is getting framed idc

JAYSON!!!!! fucking winning it!!!! putting the team on his back in some games!!!!! it genuinely makes me so happy to see

the jays. finally. they work. they always have, they’ve had so much success, but so many people were so quick to brush it off because they hadn’t yet won a title when they were 22, 23, 24 etc when in reality they’ve been one of the most successful duos over the past 7 years when jayson got drafted. now they finally have something real and proven to show for it. to show for all of those years of relentless work, TOGETHER, making each other better and growing as they players for a lucky long time in todays nba

AL. is an nba champion. ncaa And now nba. hofer?? i think YES!!!!

jrues second ring!!! the peoples princess oh i love him so much

and just everyone. forever in nba history. can’t take away the fact that they’re champions!!!! always will be!!!!!!!

i am just so unimaginably happy . like this is the best thing ever. i love life . i love the celtics. the team that got me into sports and will forever be my favorite team. ever. i can’t wait to watch this team grow and change even more for the rest of my life sports r 4ever!!!!!!

[ziracona]

T2 was okay and it could have been really good—had some real moments. But it needed more script iterations, and it was too goofy. Goofy is fine in general, but Terminator works best as a sci-fi action-drama-horror mesh. That’s the peak atmosphere. Also just, they gave their new Terminator scary powers to keep him relevant, but there’s just...no way to really make anyone on screen look like a threat to Arnold Schwarzenegger you know? And they never overcame that and it throws off the whole underdog atmosphere. He just. Wasn’t scary. Not when he was trying to kill heckin Arnold the brick house.

I’m not gonna talk about T3 bc I feel like I don’t need to and I think I have a lot of support for that in the fandom, and I’m not gonna talk any Genysis bc no one ever should, and I know I have support there.

Dark Fate was fine, but I felt like they really didn’t have to kill off their Kyle expy like at this point the surprising thing and interesting one would be /not/ to kill him. That role has died in /every/ other film. Like we get it. But plot rehashes are only good if you have some kind of spin. Mostly though I just...would have liked T800 man’s personality in another context but you couldn’t ever sell me on him after watching him gun down a 10 year old in the open. Like what, he found a soul by being...bored? If you want to convince me of fundamental change in a person, you /gotta/ motivate it better. Show me. Don’t tell me and expect me to take your word. And there just wasn’t enough meet in some spots. I wanted more firm lore and a little less action. Like I’m not even a science-heavy leaning sci-fi fan but it still wasn’t enough. I liked it more than most of the others but it just wasn’t quite...meaty enough. Sarah still a queen. But T800 man didn’t sell and that was a real weak spot, and so was expecting us and Sarah to just...like and forgive him bc he had accrued a family. But also like. I enjoyed having a new protag, but feeling like so much, no, /all/ of the work and suffering of everyone in other Terminator films was for nothing bc it’s not even Skynet anymore it’s some other robots?? It kind just...didn’t really work. It makes everything more hollow like it’s not even Terminator anymore there’s no more Terminators. They should have just had it be Skynet but a different rebel leader, or more. Sarah goes on to mentor Dani instead since John is dead, /something/ to make it more the same franchise and not so hollow. Or if it’s gonna be gutted, go all the way and let us feel that, don’t blip it as a plot point once and keep rolling. There’s decades of character attachment for fans; either make that matter, or make it mourned because it’s dead. Don’t skim it and make it cheap. Also on a meta level it was kind of weird how they handled time travel compared to the norm for the franchise but I’m not going into that.

BUT. The Terminator? A cinematic classic. It’s just...such a good film. The characters work is solid the whole movie, and Reese and Sarah are both truly excellent protagonists also given ample time to explore and exhibit that. There’s so much you get in moments that show tiny things about them. The way Sarah handles getting canceled on and goofing with Ginger, her having a pet iguana she loves to cuddle, talking to the statue at work? And she’s smart and normal (I mean normal in a very complimentary way). Kyle is introduced almost immediately running from the cops, but even in the middle of a chase scene, he’s stealing clothes in a mall while evading flashlights, and little things like hopping while he runs to check shoe sizes give you so much right away. He’s clearly out of his depth but he’s smart and methodical and he holes up in a car he hotwires and has a ptsd moment waking up from a dream because of some heavy construction machinery. You don’t have him say much about himself at all but you get him taking a second to be nice to the kids and guard dog on his way back before a T800 attacks. Even though if you’re watching it classic, you have no spoken goal for Reese and all you know is he’s armed and /also/ looking for Sarah, like the man who has killed three people already is, you kind of aren’t very scared of him by the time he’s creepily following her into a night club. That scene is iconic too damn. Anyway. Her reactions to everything are so great. Only film I ever saw where I 100% felt the person on screen was reacting like anyone would to almost being killed and then getting kidnap-saved by some other guy claiming to be from the future like I’d bite him too, but you know, I’d also be pretty happy he saved me and also decide he was crazy and not like, dangerous, and try to keep the cops from killing him. It’s so cute he thinks anyone is going to believe him like hang in there Kyle baby, king. Love as soon as the Terminator hits the police station, he breaks out and goes to find Sarah, and she’s immediately like ‘so fuck this actually’ and looking for him too. The deleted scene in the motel woods. The slow character build. Him falling in love with her because of the picture where she always looked a little sad and he wondered what she was thinking about and you don’t find out till the last scene it’s him she was thinking about in that picture. A family can be two complete trauma disasters making pipe bombs in a motel. The top 5 cinema shots moment where you think they won and they think they won and they’re both injured and stagger to each other and collapse laughing and crying and hugging and it holds for like ten seconds before that fucking thing gets up and you see the rubble in the fire shift and Kyle sees it first. And the hopelessness and despair. Sarah just screaming no in rage because it’s so unfair. The little scaffolding fight?? Kyle doing what he does? Sarah winning with a broken leg? The picture? The heartbreak? A work of art.

Also just. They’re both attractive but like, they are not remotely airbrushed Hollywood pretty. Kyle’s got that big scar on his lip and they’re both sweaty and bloody and dirty and gross the whole film??? God yeah.

Terminator Salvation? Also a classic. You have a film not about the core cast exactly, but it’s very ensemble. You get early days war. And it’s from the very open a solid narrative about second chances and what it means to be human and they really do explore that the whole runtime. Markus dies and comes back more confused than you are in the apocalypse. Baby Reese is absolutely perfect. You get formerly executed for murder Markus somehow adopting like 20 year old Reese and 13 year old kid Star and they’re amazing. Rebellion drama, lore reveals. Reese’s devout faith in the cause and how fast he looks up to Markus and starts learning and Markus is like :[ but then he’s like ... :] because he god assigned two family members now. The tag team fights—how incredibly talented Star is. Guilt trip on a look to dropping cars, she’s super effective. Tbh Markus is just O_O to >:-[ the whole movie as soon as Reese and Star are taken and I feel it. You’ve got a guy who was killed for straying too far from human, come back as a machine, but he doesn’t know it, wondering if he deserves another chance and if he can change, and it’s really neat the way it unfolds. Even after losing so many friends to Terminators that look human, Blair refuses to believe he isn’t a human even if he’s also a machine and risks her life to save him, when they barely know each other. Markus getting like, tortured by the rebels, and still choosing to help them and be who he has decided he wants to be this time, even towards John. Even with better alternatives. And you have Star never having a moment of doubt, or Reese, and him getting to save them both, and them trying to help the other humans in line for extermination before he arrives. The hand hold with Star when his hands just metal. And he decides to die for someone he doesn’t even /like/ and who has personally hurt him a lot of times, because he knows the rebels need him to win. Anyway death row to death row but completely different people in the same body facing that same death differently are amazing if done well (see TWDG I mean ow) and it was a very simple core theme to latch to and very enjoyable executed and it got snubbed by fans when it’s the best sequel Terminator ever had.

[insertbtsurl]

Grammys is the worst award show.. Every f year they play dirty. I'm not gonna talk about "yummy" being nominated bc it's just too much. The year that Adele won aoty against Beyoncé's Lemonade. Even she said that Beyoncé deserved that! Not nominating the Weeknd this year. Jay Z losing 8. Remember when they gave nomination to Mac Miller after he died and then had audacity not to award his work? And list goes on.. 1/?

Every year they are using and snubbing artist that have larger following. And usually the ones that deserves the award- lose. I get that everyone wants their face to win but let's be honest here. White artist always are more privileged and I don't know how far anyone has to be up their own ass not to see that. I used to think it was popularity show.. but over the years I see it's just another whitewashed and rasist show. I'm white and I have no idea how anyone doesn't see that./ 👻 2/2

Yeah, it's the same with most major award shows...every now and then they throw a bone to appease the mob. Only nominating Dynamite and only nominating BTS in a performance category was clearly a "pity" nomination on their part, but given the competition I think BTS really had a chance of winning (since it was a minor award), and it was clearly something they really wanted, which is why I feel disappointed.

Otherwise yeah I stopped giving credit to what the Grammys think when Beyoncé didn't get album of the year...I like Beyoncé but wouldn't necessarily call myself a fan but that was...a choice on the Academy's part. (And again, they tried to soften the blow by giving her best urban album or whatever that was called which...does not work).

I honestly just hope they can carry on with their lives and their music as usual and not try to pander to this industry that so clearly doesn't want them. These guys definitely do not need a Grammy. I don't think anyone who has that much recognition from fans, peers, critics, etc needs the validation of the members of the Recording Academy, who are probably all male, white, straight, and unaware that languages other than English exist.

The Grammys are a US-centric show and a problematic one at that. I don't know why artists from other countries should feel the need to be validated by the Recording Academy.

[tslasvegas]

Episode 12: “I’ve been awakened.” - Xavier

Well that vote went exactly how I had hoped it would... and then the super idol came out! I'm glad that it's out of the game now once and for all, but I guarantee that Liv is going to find something else along the way. It's so hard for me to summarize everything that I'm doing around here because I feel like I'm doing a lot. Maybe that's going to come bite me in the ass this coming vote but idk, I'm not mad about it. I definitely limited myself a lot by really not going for the money shot and convincing Jeff to use his vote steal on Joey to get Joey the hell out of here, but maybe in some weird way it works. Because now I have John's 8 chips and I'm going to need as many as I can get to somehow beat Livingston. I definitely think that snubbing this vote is going to be my biggest detriment only bc it provides the opportunity for Livingston to ascend higher as a threat, but also avoid getting voted out at our next convenience. I still really want Kailyn to go, but I think the goal for everyone else is to get rid of Livingston or myself (maybe Joey) at the next tribal council. Ugh. Heh... I never would've thought that I could pull off that kind of a move and have it not fully work out in my favor. It was a cool feeling regardless and I'm not crushed if it means I played myself out of the game. I give myself credit where it's due, I'm going to continue fighting as always and hopefully I come out on top :~)

Last Luxor standing 

Whelp, there goes the Super Idol. Jaiden is a snakey little snake snake. Pat and Jeff are naïve as all hell. I'm not 100% sure I believe Jaiden now, but apparently Joey's plan was to cut me at like final 6 or something. And people are so convinced that Livingston and I are a duo. I mean we are, but like maybe if anyone would ACTUALLY FUCKING TALK TO ME AND TRY TO WORK WITH ME, we wouldn't be??? Like don't whine and bitch that Livingston and I are a duo who are going to stick together and not turn against each other if you can't even be bothered to respond to a single fucking message of mine. I have no issues voting out whoever is necessary for me to get farther in the game. But when only a limited number of people express in interest in going farther with me? You better fucking bet I'm working with those people. Anyways, can't wait to vote out Jaiden, Kailyn and Xavier. xoxo Gossip Girl 

Waiting on Immunity Results, but whatever happens the 5 of us need to vote together, and be smart about it! We know that liv, Keegan and Joey will vote together. Probably for me next. So Jeff Pat need to stick with us. We need to split the votes 3-2, and use a vote steal, cancel or extra to get it to 3-3 just in case of idols. We need to be smart about this. Going all out and proposing this once results are in. I am going to the Jury next anyway, go out guns blazing.

...five seconds later

OMG I WON IMMUNITY! Finally something good! I figured most people gave their correct numbers, and if not, just chose a number close to theirs. OR they didn't coordinate so well, so some gave a higher number and others gave a lower one, so it cancelled out. Also helps that I knew Liv and Pat's numbers with the advantage. Pat gave mine accidentally so I knew his was in the 40s as well. Phew. Now to figure out whether to use the Steal a Vote now or not.

I came so close to winning immunity but it was rudely snatched away from me by Xavier. On the plus side, Livingston found the hidden immunity idol on the idol board! Heck yeah! As long as there isn’t a full blindside we should be good now! 

(originally written 11/23, night after super idol) Anyways what rly bugs me is that Jeff is actually mad at me now for the fact that he wasted his vote on Joey and I tried to get rid of Livingston instead... and I think I put myself into a spot where I need to apologize to him and make him feel good about me again. Tbh no I don’t. Jeff said to me that he’s got to play his own game first and mine second. So why am I playing some other people’s games first? Because it benefits me to play everyone’s hand for them, yes, but also I’ve been caught trying to run the entire table a little too early. So maybe now it’s time for me to do something a little different - play my game first. It’s now fully Jeff’s fault that Joey didn’t leave. I told Jeff precisely what he needed to do to ensure Joey went home. He needed to play the vote steal and send Joey on packing... and he didn’t. So now when Pat and I finally talk tomorrow and he tells me what’s up, I’m not gonna hold back. I’m going to throw Jeff under that bus so fucking hard his head will spin. Pat doesn’t know about the vote steal and I think I’ll hold that piece of information over Jeff’s head a little bit longer - I know something no one else knows about you, keep me safe or it’s coming out and everyone’s going to come after you. So tomorrow I will blame Jeff to Pat. Sure I was the person who made the move, but it’s my game and I’m playing it now. If Pat doesn’t like my apology, then kiss my ass and take eighth place. Bye!

...five seconds later

I'm pessimistic as FUCK so I'm fully expecting to go home tonight and I'm writing this confessional against better judgment because I need to rly focus on letting my mental state get back to normal rather than Survivor mode before I get voted out lmfao. Anyways, tonight is FINALLY the night where I'm making my last move against Joey, one way or another. This is the decision that will either determine oops sorry as I was writing that, I just realized something else... this is ME making yet another move that makes Jeff think I'm controlling the whole entire game I love that for me hehe. Should I convince the entire tribe to vote out Jeff instead??? Let's go fully with the chaos mode. DRAW ROCKS BITCHES!!!! Jk Jk Back to my original point - this is the vote that determines whether I was worth being brought back for this game or not. I'm not trying to be this like crazy strategist who has all these cracked plans to take out Joey but that's where we're at rn. One side of me like, trusts Jeff but the other side of me doesn't. So I told Jeff about Joey's legacy advantage and now it's like, getting Jeff to want to turn on Joey. Even though Joey told me he wanted to get rid of Jeff it seems like Jeff is not as stressed about it. I'm pretty sure Jeff turned votes against me instead, it is what it is. It's the game. However, Jeff would be really stupid to not vote out Joey now while he has the chance... it's probably going to come down to Jeff winning this whole entire thing if he makes the correct move tonight because I'm certainly not going to turn my back on him if he follows through. But, crazy things have happened tonight. And it's about to get a whole lot crazier. :) Although I'm like, CERTAIN I'm going home tonight or at least getting votes. OK IM TRYING SO HARD TO WRITE THIS CONFESSIONAL BUT SO MUCH IS HAPPENING AHHHH IM STRESSING OUT BUT I KNOW THERES A GOOD PLAN OUT THERE FOR ME TO MAKE AND HOPEFULLY IM NOT SCREWING MYSELF OVER 

...five seconds later

OKAY I think I'm gonna be ok but I'm taking a HUGE risk rn!!! Basically putting my vote onto Liv with Joey and hoping Joey 1) doesnt have an idol and 2) gets the rest of the votes. But my logic for voting Liv is simple. If Joey actually has an idol he's been hiding, he plays it and reveals I voted for him again if I don't do it. It also prevents me/Kailyn from going home 2-1-0 since Keegan and Liv seem to be locked in on one of us (likely me). If somehow Jeff/Pat are lying and are part of split, it'll go 2-2-2-2 which is not only insane but it also gives me a PERFECT platform to light people up, namely Jeff and his vote steal advantage. But we'll see! I'm predicting to go home tonight :) But at least I made a move when I could. Good luck to me <3

[hoochy-coo]

I think Abel and his team wasn't happy with the way Grammy didn't even consider Starboy for most of categories. He winned one Grammy at 2016(or 17?) Grammy award for Starboy but i feel like he wished for big 4 wins bc his team applied for almost all Grammy categories. This album kind of changed his image and gives him a "mainstream artist" title but well, grammies literally ignored album. This is why he trying so hard for a big 4 wins this year with After Hours

But Starboy won ‘Urban Contemporary album’ of the year? Imo that’s not really a small category. Which if you think about it is a big feat since he won the same award two years prior with his major label debut (or what most critics and gp would consider to be his actual debut). If you take that into account, he’s gotten a Grammy for both of his only two albums. I feel like that was fair because yes, Starboy is partly a pop album but in its very core, it’s an RnB album that had radio friendly singles/deep cuts. Plus, competition was fierce that year. Bruno Mars was bound to win big since he ruled that whole year with 24K Magic and if Kendrick didn’t sweep that year with ‘Damn’ after they snubbed him for TPAB, people would have riot lol

AH, as a project, tick way more boxes than Starboy to actually win in the major categories, like AOTY or ROTY. He’s got 4 smash hits on that album with Heartless, In Your Eyes, After Hours and Blinding Lights. Blinding Lights alone has barely budged off the top spot on the chart since its release (like months ago) and it’s broken numerous records. The Grammy’s are likely to take those kinds of accolades into account.

[junker-town]

UCF’s scheduling plan ignores history, but maybe it’s right idea?

The Knights want to be treated like a sudden power, but college football’s never worked like that. Yet.

The Playoff committee should’ve ranked UCF higher in the last two years, but it didn’t. It would be nice if top Power 5 teams wanted to give the Knights chances to prove themselves, but they don’t. Throughout history, it would’ve been great if every unbeaten team had gotten a shot, but heaping piles didn’t.

Following the committee’s poor decision to not pair UCF and Florida in the Peach Bowl, Knights AD Danny White sent an email to Florida’s Scott Stricklin, surely with knowledge that their exchange would be public record. White wanted UCF games against Florida — with a stipulation.

White fairly wanted an even exchange of home games, rather than a deal like the one USF just took: two UF home games for one return game.

“UF isn’t in the market for home-and-home or a neutral site games against non-Autonomy 5 opponents,” Stricklin wrote, also fairly.

“Requiring non-autonomy 5 schools to have to settle for inequitable scheduling seems like an unfair business practice and something we should all address at a high level,” White responded.

It’s true that we are now in the era of a Playoff that only gives half of FBS teams a realistic path. So White’s political theater is justified.

But unless there’s a secondary motive here (scroll down), to expect blue bloods to suddenly treat certain mid-majors as equals would be to ignore how those in power act until usurpers spend years and years — as in, more than two or three — hammering down walls.

1. Notre Dame’s first move toward becoming Notre Dame was a long road trip with no return visit in sight.

Before 1913, the Irish beat up Kirksville Osteopath, the Illinois Cycling Club, Chicago Dental Infirmary, and various high schools. This was normal for the era.

But as Notre Dame tells it:

The first item on [new head coach and AD Jesse Harper’s] docket was upgrading the football schedule -- provided it came with sound business practice to complement it.

Because it was getting blackballed by the other Midwest powers, the Notre Dame football schedules become extremely unattractive and, hence, unprofitable.

One of Harper’s first moves was to write to the United States Military Academy in West Point, NY., for a game. Army originally offered Notre Dame $600 for travel expenses, but Harper was able to haggle for $1,000.

With penny-pinching practices such as taking 14 cleats for the 18-man Notre Dame team on the railroad trip, plus packing their own meals from the student-dining hall, the trip ended up costing $917 -- an $83 profit.

It might be peanuts in 2013, or at least the cost of a Notre Dame home game ticket, but it was striking gold in 1913.

In a span of 27 days in November, Notre Dame pulled watershed road upsets against Army (35-13), Penn State (14-7), Christian Brothers in St. Louis (20-7) and Texas in Austin (on Thanksgiving Day) for a remarkable 7-0-debut campaign. As a coach, Harper proved to be an innovator with a passing attack at Army that awed the eastern media and aided Notre Dame’s place on the football map.

The primary coup: swooping in to replace Yale on Army’s schedule, long among the toughest in football. The Irish won after a 24-hour railroad trip.

Notre Dame-Army was played at West Point until 1923, when it finally moved ... about 50 miles from Army’s campus. The Cadets wouldn’t travel to South Bend until the 34th meeting.

By that time the Irish had claimed five titles and — full circle — become the team the up-and-comers dreamed of scheduling.

2. Florida State, even after proving itself: “anybody, any time, anywhere.”

That’s a cliche about how Bobby Bowden built a young program into a national champ. But there’s plenty of truth to it.

If you look only at games played between 1980 — the year after the Noles established themselves as truly legit by going 11-1 — and 1988 — when they began as preseason No. 1 — you see a team willing to constantly hit the road in order to beat big names. In that span, the Noles:

Played Tom Osborne’s Nebraska in four regular season games, all in Lincoln. The Huskers have never visited Tallahassee.

Visited Baton Rouge in four straight seasons. The Noles would also visit LSU right before and after ‘80-’88. LSU wouldn’t go to Tallahassee until 1990.

Made two straight trips to Ohio State, with no return visits.

Made a one-shot trip to South Bend (see above) in 1981. The two would meet a few more times, but not in FSU’s stadium for another 21 years.

Took a one-game deal with Michigan in 1986, then another in 1991. The Wolverines have never been to Tallahassee.

Before this, you also had series like FSU’s with Auburn, with seven Seminole trips in eight meetings. The Noles took three trips to Alabama to play the Tide, with no return yet. Only two of FSU’s first 16 games against Miami were in Tallahassee. Its first six against Florida were in Gainesville.

The Noles wouldn’t welcome Georgia Tech until their ninth meeting, when they were both in the ACC, by which point nobody wanted to play the Noles anywhere.

3. One of UCF’s most recent predecessors was on the road for years, despite having long established itself.

The debate about non-powers has revolved around UCF for a couple years now, but the BCS era often had multiple snubbed non-powers at once, with road warrior Boise State often in that group.

Since 2000, when the Broncos had their first FBS 10-win season, they’ve played 19 regular season games away from home against power conference teams.

At home against power conference opponents in that span: eight, mostly unimpressive Oregon State or Washington State teams.

Even Boise’s neutral site games weren’t neutral, like the time they beat Georgia in the Georgia Dome or Virginia Tech in Basically Virginia.

Going forward, they’ll host Oregon again, part of a two-for-one deal like the one UCF’s turned down. They’ve landed a home-and-home with Michigan State after a trip to East Lansing in 2012.

But they’ll also get a straight up return visit from Oklahoma State. And Boise State will host Florida State in 2020 after going to Jacksonville, a big risk for the Anybody Anywhere team of the ‘80s against the Anybody Anywhere team of the ‘00s.

So 17 years after the Broncos’ first of many one-loss seasons, they’re finally thought of as an established peer by some top powers (for comparison, UCF’s first one-loss season was only six years ago — with a winless season since then).

4. UCF is in the same predicament, but with a twist, because it’s quite possible the Playoff starts including mid-majors at some point soon.

I think the Knights should do what their predecessors have done: take Florida’s deal. It’s true UCF already gets home-and-homes from middling ACC teams and other teams that just want to recruit the Sunshine State, but this would be a step up in profile and three chances to beat very talented SEC teams.

But maybe White is right.

“If this type of scheduling is what is required for teams like UCF to make the final 4 of the CFP, we must consider expansion of the playoff to include non-autonomy 5 schools,” he also wrote to Stricklin.

Maybe insisting on a narrative, a “Power 6” brand, and intentionally public appeals to the kindness of elites will continue to contribute to the debate on expanding the Playoff. If that eventually includes an automatic Group of 5 bid, UCF can then play whoever it wants, wherever it wants.

Why didn’t 1913 Kirksville Osteopath just think of that?

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How the Mountain West is trying to fix its basketball problem

Fresno State received the Mountain West’s lone NCAA bid last March after winning the league tournament. (AP)

When San Diego State became the Mountain West’s first outright regular-season champion to miss the NCAA tournament last March, the snub was difficult for the Aztecs to stomach.

They went 16-2 in league play and finished three games ahead of any other team, yet a five-point loss in the Mountain West title game doomed their hopes. The selection committee felt dominating an unusually weak Mountain West wasn’t enough of an accomplishment to atone for a couple of head-scratching non-league losses.

“We were very disappointed,” San Diego State coach Steve Fisher said. “We felt that with our huge separation, three games ahead of everyone else, that should have been enough. We shot ourselves in the foot a little bit in non-league play, but I do still believe that we had a résumé worthy of being in.”

Another Mountain West champion experiencing the same disappointment this March is no longer just a chilling possibility for the league. A second straight one-bid NCAA tournament is now likely given the Mountain West’s non-conference struggles this season.

Teams in the Mountain West went 2-18 against KenPom top 50 opponents, 4-25 against the top 100 and 27-42 against the top 200. The two most impressive results teams from the Mountain West achieved during non-league play are Boise State’s victory over American Athletic Conference contender SMU and San Diego State’s win over potential NCAA tournament contender Cal.

The outlook is just as bleak if the metric of choice is the RPI, where the Mountain West went 1-16 against the top 50, 6-26 against the top 100 and 27-39 against the top 200. Of the 11 teams in the Mountain West, only Nevada (40) and Boise State (56) are currently in the RPI top 100.

Mountain West coaches acknowledge their teams must perform better in non-conference play, yet they hold out hope the selection committee will take into account other factors should this year’s league champion run through the league the way San Diego State did last season. To win on the road in the league, a team must endure high-altitude games, crowds larger than many power-conference programs draw and the challenges of traveling to remote Mountain West cities in winter weather.

“I’ve coached in the SEC and the Pac-12, and the venues and the travel in the Mountain West are so underrated,” Nevada coach Eric Musselman said. “To win at New Mexico, to win at San Diego State, to win at Wyoming, that’s really hard. You have to be an awfully good team to win at those places.”

That the Mountain West has to plead for an at-large bid is surprising considering the league’s rich basketball history.

It was only four years ago that the Mountain West finished the season No. 1 in RPI and sent five teams to the NCAA tournament. Just before that, the league boasted a stronger top tier than the Pac-12 when Kawhi Leonard starred at San Diego State and Jimmer Fredette was raining down 3-pointers at BYU.

One reason for the league’s sharp decline is that the league lost Utah and BYU and replaced them with programs that needed time to become competitive at a higher level. It also hasn’t helped that two of the league’s remaining name-brand programs regressed at the same time, New Mexico failing to sustain the sustained national relevance of the Steve Alford era and UNLV squandering gobs of talent under Dave Rice before beginning a massive rebuild this season.

To assess why the league has regressed, the Mountain West last spring formed a sub-committee consisting of basketball coaches, administrators and conference officials. They studied all sorts of analytic data and concluded that the league’s scheduling practices were holding it back.

“Some of our programs got a little lazy in non-conference scheduling and played an easier schedule than they probably should have,” said Mountain West senior associate commissioner Dan Butterly, the league’s primary administrator for men’s basketball. “If you’re not winning quality non-conference games, your league isn’t going to be very strong. Even if you’re winning in league, you’re not going to improve your RPI.”

The sub-committee drafted a list of eight scheduling directives last offseason and distributed them to each league member. Among the recommendations:

• Every team must participate in an exempt event guaranteeing them the chance to play against multiple teams in the top 100. Such neutral-court holiday tournaments are vital for Mountain West programs who typically struggle to persuade power-conference foes to agree to play home-and-home.

• Every team must play a certain number of non-league home games each season. That could mean getting more creative seeking out potential home-and-home series or spending more annually to buy home games against lower-tier competition. Buy games typically cost between $90,000 and $110,000 apiece, about double the average price 10 years ago.

• Every team must scrounge up a few hundred thousand dollars to spend on buy games each season. San Diego State, New Mexico and UNLV already exceed the minimum threshold the league set, but others haven’t increased their scheduling budget in years. One program in the league didn’t even have a budget for buy games as recently as last season.

• Every team must limit the number of games it plays against opponents rated 250 and below. Those games may be automatic wins, but they’re also RPI and strength of schedule albatrosses. Fresno State played six such games this season. UNLV and New Mexico both had five apiece.

• Every team must try to play one or two games per year in the Eastern or Central time zones. League officials believe playing teams outside the West will increase the league’s credibility and visibility if it can win some of those games.

Coaches across the Mountain West are in favor of most of the sub-committee’s recommendations, yet implementing them is easier said than done.

Some cash-strapped athletic departments don’t have the surplus of cash to spend $300,000 per year to buy a few extra home games. Other programs struggle to persuade quality opponents to come to their gym because they’re too tough to beat at home yet lack the pedigree to make a loss acceptable.

Wyoming has an especially tough time scheduling home-and-home series because of its remote location and 52-12 record in Laramie since the 2013-14 season. The summer before the Cowboys won 25 games and reached the 2015 NCAA tournament, their coaching staff couldn’t find a single marquee team willing to play in Laramie.

“We called every single BCS program in the country, and nobody would do it,” assistant coach Jeremy Shyatt said. “They’re not lining up to come to Laramie. They’re thinking, ‘If we go to Wyoming, what do we have to gain?'”

To combat that problem, Wyoming annually participates in exempt tournaments that allow them to face strong competition at a neutral site. The Cowboys also recently landed a two-for-one deal with South Carolina in which they’ll play the Gamecocks twice in Columbia in return for one game in Laramie.

One way the Mountain West has tried to help Wyoming, Boise State and other programs find quality home games is by organizing an annual league-wide challenge against the Missouri Valley Conference. Officials from both leagues work together every two years to arrange the most compelling possible matchups with every team guaranteed one home game and one road game.

The problem with the event is that it’s detrimental to some of the Mountain West’s more prestigious programs who have less trouble setting up strong home-and-home series every year. Those schools often get stuck with games they wouldn’t dream of scheduling on their own, especially since the Mountain West and Missouri Valley arrange the matchups so far in advance.

Instead of facing a top-tier Missouri Valley opponent that could have boosted its strength of schedule, Nevada got shipped to Bradley on Dec. 3 because the Wolf Pack were coming off a 22-loss season when the matchup was put together. Preseason Mountain West favorite San Diego State drew a road game with no upside at Loyola (Chicago) and suffered a damaging 65-59 loss, an outcome that only further solidified Fisher’s opposition to the event.

“I don’t want to go against the grain and act like I have all the answers, but it’s well documented I was an opponent to reestablishing the Missouri Valley-Mountain West Challenge,” Fisher said. “San Diego State doesn’t need it. Let us do our own scheduling, and we will get a schedule that’s representative of what the conference wants.”

Ultimately, improved scheduling alone won’t get the Mountain West back to its former level. The league has to start winning some of the big non-conference games it has let slip away the past two years.

Hope for the future lies in some of the young talent flourishing in the Mountain West this season.

With most of its rotation due back next year and NC State transfers Cody and Caleb Martin set to become eligible, Nevada appears poised to continue its ascendance. Boise State’s two leading scorers both have eligibility remaining, as do Wyoming standouts Justin James and Hayden Dalton. And don’t count out a return to form from San Diego State, which is teeming with talented sophomores and juniors.

Could the Mountain West be a year away from emerging its recent tailspin and getting back to sending three or four teams to the NCAA tournament? Fisher is optimistic, but he knows there’s only one path to a resurgence.

“If we’re going to be what we want to be and to some measure think we are, we have to win non-conference games against good teams,” Fisher said. “We haven’t done enough of that lately. Our league is better than the perception, but we have to prove it.”

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Jeff Eisenberg is the editor of The Dagger on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at daggerblog@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!

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