Bowen also had a Pitt connection. His father, Dick, was a running back at Pitt from 1955-57. Bowen was a Parade All-American, so he wasn't a slouch of a recruit, but he didn't pan out. It was Congemi who beat him out. He wasn't a bad qb, but he wasn't Kosar.
What Happens if Johnny Majors Stays at Pitt
- Thread starter csh2088
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Congemi was nowhere close to Kosar. John was originally from Youngstown before the family moved to Florida. Had the family stayed, Congemi and Kosar would’ve faced off twice when Mooney played Boardman.
The clip of Kosar at the 32-second mark throwing a pass downfield really makes you wonder why Earl Bruce and Sherrill, just to name a few, were so hesitant to offer Bernie.
The clip of Kosar at the 32-second mark throwing a pass downfield really makes you wonder why Earl Bruce and Sherrill, just to name a few, were so hesitant to offer Bernie.
He wasn't the most athletic looking QB around at that time and had kind of a strange delivery. But that Orange bowl against Nebraska started to change things in college football. It was a lot of wishbone, veers, options. Bernie tore Nebraska to shreds since they really hadn't played against something like that before.
No. It was 1993 and the very next year Penn State went undefeated. The first Big 10 team to go undefeated since Ohio State in 1968.
It always blew my mind that the Big 10 gave Ped State bye weeks before the Michigan and Ohio State games those first years, plus Michigan had to play them the week after their second biggest rival MSU.
The Big Ten was so down in 1994, too. Ohio State and Michigan lost four games apiece, Wisconsin had a losing record I believe and MSU was departing with Pearles.
That's right, he graduated with a Finance Degree in 3 years if I remember.
If PITT had kept Jackie, Joe would still be whining in his grave about losing recruits to PITT.
You mean when they beat Nebraska on a touchdown catch that was 2 yards out of the endzone!
the catch out of bounds on that drive on 4th down was even worse. Guman's dad just happened to be the ref that game
How far back do you have to go to find a Pitt coach with a winning (above .500) record against Penn State? None had a winning record against Paterno or Franklin.
Pitt chose basketball and 20 years later after joining the Big East was still playing in the same decrepit arena. That is Pitt in a nutshell. Too bad Gavitt didn’t insist when the invitation went out that a new arena needed to ready for play by 1990 at the latest.
Walter Milligan was 2-1 against the nitters. Before that Wesley Fesler (that sounds like a fake name) was 1-0. Clark Shaughnessy was 2-1.
Also, he did say above .500, but John Michelosen was 5-5-1 in 11 games against them in the 50s and 60s.
I knew it would be records like those. The last coach to have a meaningful winning record against Penn State was Jock Sutherland.
Your a Penn State troll. Go take a shower with Jerry.
From Sutherland to Jackie Sherrill the number of Pitt head coaches who was here for longer than four seasons is exactly one, and he was the guy who went .500 against the nitters, so yeah, of course it was going to be something like that. Simiarly, if you listed the coaches in that time with losing records against Penn State, most of them would look like that too.
If you bump it up to five (continuous) years, there was only one head coach here longer than that from Sutherland all the way up to Walt Harris.
That's a pretty sad record. Didn't realize it was that bad.
From a basketball perspective I always saw Pitt as being more of a Metro Conference school than a Big East school.
I think Joe Paterno's conference idea was a good idea but in the end he screwed himself because it was clear what his intentions were.
I’m not sure what Pitts overall record was vs the Nits but 87-88 were both Pitt wins with Gottfried… I’m not sure if Pitt and PSU hadn’t continually played Pitt wouldn’t have looked a bit more even… Paterno had some shit years there after Casey… in any event I’m not sure people realize how bizarre the on again off again bullshit is in the state of PA
This doesn’t happen anywhere else regardless of which side is the better team.
UGA/GT … every year
UofM/ MSU… every year
Florida/FSU… every year
Miami/FSU… every year
Colorado/Colorado State… every year…
And on and on it goes… only in PA for some bizarre reason is this considered “normal”…it f@cking weird… and it started because of a bitter old bastard
This doesn’t happen anywhere else regardless of which side is the better team.
UGA/GT … every year
UofM/ MSU… every year
Florida/FSU… every year
Miami/FSU… every year
Colorado/Colorado State… every year…
And on and on it goes… only in PA for some bizarre reason is this considered “normal”…it f@cking weird… and it started because of a bitter old bastard
Penn State would have still jumped to the Big 10 even if Paterno’s Conference happened, the tv money was to good to pass up.
was it really that much better in the early 90's when it all went down? Would it have been all that much more than the Eastern all sports conference?
What was the initial plan for the conference?
North: Pitt, PSU, WVU, Syracuse, BC, Rutgers
South: Louisville, Cincinnati, South Carolina, Florida State, Miami, Tulane
That is so much better than the B10 in 1993.
The Big 10 schools got a big bump in money in the deal with ABC when Penn State joined, especially compared to the CFA schools (ACC, Big 8, SEC, SWC, WAC and Independents), that Big 10 ABC deal is what caused the SEC and Notre Dame to break away from the CFA a few years later and do their own tv deals.
Initially it would have been Penn State, Pitt, WVU, Syracuse, BC, Temple, Rutgers and hopes that Maryland would jump from the ACC. A reminder that both Cincy and Louisville were borderline 1AA teams pretty much worse than Temple & Rutgers in the early 80's, they weren't even on the radar when the conference was proposed. The biggie is if the Paterno Conference could have gotten Florida State or Miami to join later in the 80's, it's doubtful FSU would have joined since they were/are a southern school that wanted to be in a southern conference. Miami initially joined the Big East to improve their basketball, would they have joined what would basically be a mid-major basketball conference, which is what the Paterno Conference would have been.
The key would have been Pitt remaining committed like they were 1976-1982. If so, Pitt-PSU would have been bigger than Michigan-OSU in the early 90's and the Eastern conference would have been just as strong if not stronger than the Big 10. Also remember the Big 10 was always the Big 2 , Little 8 until Alvarez and Frye breathed some life in Iowa and Wisconsin in the early 90's. So there wouldn't have been that much difference between the conferences had Pitt held up their end of the bargain (which probably wouldn't have happened).
Dude's been dead for over a decade, and is pretty much persona non grata over there. If the people in power now wanted it to happen, it would. Whatever is going on today has nothing to do with Paterno.
ND always wanted their own TV deal. In fact in the 50’s ND and had their own deals set until the NCAA told both schools that they would be ousted from the NCAA. It took until Georgia and if I remember correctly Oklahoma in the mid 80’s sued the NCAA over the TV rights at the time. At the same time ESPN was coming into existence when the influx of more games being televised. The NCAA had no power to stop conferences to start making TV deals with ESPN ABC and NBC negotiated the deal with ND. Also USA network made a deal with the SWC to cover their games and TBS had a contract with the SEC.
The main reason for the legal challenges was the contract with ABC was a schools were limited on how many times they could have their games either shown nationally or regionally. There was a thought back then if schools were on TV too much it would hurt attendance at the games. This thinking started in the 50’s. TV actually helped increase attendance in all of the major conferences in the 80’s when there were 2 games on television to how many games you can watch today.
In regards to Paterno and a eastern conference was concerned he wanted in the Big East basketball conference and when the conference turned down PSU and took Pitt that’s when he went to the Big Ten to get them into that conference. Essentially Paterno stabbed all of the eastern teams in the back.
Not to defend Paterno, but he tried to get the Eastern teams together, and he failed. PSU tried to get into the Big East, and were denied. So why did Paterno stab the eastern teams in the back if he was already rejected twice? What choice did he really have? PSU would have been nuts to turn down the Big Ten.
As I recall, Gavitt said when PSU was turned down that the conference would rue the day it happened. He was right.
PSU getting into the Big Ten turned out to be an enormous boon for them as we all know, and they helped the conference as well. It is an interesting thought experiment of how different it all could have been if there had been an eastern football conference. PSU was always going to be OK, but other eastern schools would probably have been better off.
The only one who's ever told the Gavitt "rue the day" line was the incompetent slime ball Mike Tranghese, so it's doubtful Gavitt ever said it. Also, Paterno's attempt at an Eastern Conference was basically a panic move after the Big East voted them down, had the Eastern schools actually come together and worked on an equal deal for everyone the conference might have happened. Paterno wanting to keep all their football money to themselves but equally split basketball money is why BC and Cuse pushed for Pitt's invite to the Big East.
Well, whatever truly happened, it worked out for them, and the rest of Eastern football is on the deathbed. We'd all be better off if they had gotten into the Big East.
A 10-team conference of Pitt, PSU, WVU, Syracuse, BC, Rutgers, Maryland, South Carolina, Miami and Louisville would have been pretty interesting. Louisville was awful in football in the early 80s but is needed for basketball. Miami needed money in the worst way for its football program despite building a future champion without the resources that other schools had.
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