Thursday’s Den: Happy New Year, everyone……..

Happy New Year!!! Thanks for reading; hope 2026 is fun for all of us.

The one thing I’d really like to see this year is for everyone to be nicer to each other; just because we may disagree on some stuff, let’s be civil about it. 

— Duke 42, Arizona State 39
Duke scored game-winning TD with 2:10 left.
QB Mensah threw for 327 yards, four TD’s.
Arizona State QB Sims threw for 375 yards, 3 TD’s.
ASU gained 619 yards, but was minus-2 in turnovers.

— Iowa 34, Vanderbilt 27
Hawkeyes led 14-3 at halftime.
Vandy QB Pavia threw for 347 yards, 2 TD’s.
Big 18 teams are 7-3 SU/6-4 ATS in bowl games.
SEC teams are 3-6 SU/ATS in bowl games.

— Texas 41, Michigan 27
Game was tied 17-17 at halftime.
Texas in second half: 26 plays, 224 yards, 24 points.
Longhorns ran ball 33 times for 235 yards (7.1 yards/carry)
QB Manning threw for 221 yards, ran for 155 more.

— Utah 44, Nebraska 22
QB Dampier threw for 310 yards, two TD’s.
Nebraska’s first two drives: 20 plays, 157 yards, 14 points.
Nebraska rest of game: 45 plays, 186 yards, 8 points.
Utah ran ball 45 times for 225 yards (5 yards/carry).

— Miami 24, Ohio State 14
Hurricanes were a 7.5-point underdog.
Up 7-0, Miami scored on a 72-yard pick-6 to break game open.
Ohio State ran ball 24 times for only 45 yards.
Miami plays the Ole Miss-Georgia winner in the next round of the playoff.  

— Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz has had 94 players taken in the NFL Draft, the most of any current college head coach.

Famous birthdays, January 1st:
Frank Langella, 88
Bob Brudzinski, 70
LaMarr Hoyt, 70
Fernando Tatis Sr, 50
Tiago Splitter, 40

Dallas Keuchel, 37
Jason Pierre-Paul, 36
Trumaine Johnson, 35
Tyler Higbee, 32
LaMonte Wade, 31

College conferences’ bowl records SU/ATS:
AAC- 4-3/3-4
ACC- 6-4/4-6
Big X- 4-1/5-0

Big 18- 6-4/5-5
Conference USA- 4-3/4-3
MAC- 2-3/3-2

Mountain West- 2-5/3-4
SEC- 3-6/3-6
Sun Belt 3-6/4-5

Movie of the Day: 21 (2008)- Six MIT students form a card counting team and go to Las Vegas to win a lot of money. Kevin Spacey is the professor who trains the group; Laurence Fishburne is a casino employee who isn’t fond of card counters.

Jeffrey Ma, who the movie’s main character is based on, plays a blackjack dealer in some of the scenes. This movie was inspired by real people, real events.

— Virginia Tech 95, Virginia 85, 3OTs
Tech was 28-41 on the foul line, Virginia 11-15.
Ben Hammond scored 30 points for Tech; he didn’t start.
Cavaliers fall to 11-2; they were 10-45 on the arc.

— Villanova 71, DePaul 66
Villanova shot 28.6% inside arc, 10-23 outside arc.
Wildcats were 21-31 on foul line, Blue Demons 7-12.
DePaul is 0-3 in Big East, scoring 62 ppg.
Since 2007-08, DePaul is 56-276 in conference games.

— Clemson 64, Syracuse 61
Clemson shot 57.5% inside the arc.
Syracuse was 20-24 on foul line, Tigers 6-12.
Clemson is 11-3, 4-2 vs top 100 teams.

— Wichita State 75, UAB 70
Blazers led 40-24 late in the first half.
Shockers shot 9-20 on the arc, UAB 3-12.
Wichita is #14 team in country on offensive boards.

— VCU 89, St Bonaventure 82
Bonnies led by 7 with 8:10 left in the game.
Rams were 26-28 on foul line, St Bonaventure 14-15.
6-3 soph Hill scored 19 points in 26:00 off the bench.

— Creighton has a 6-4 guard, Austin Swartz, who is scoring 9.5 ppg in 18.4 minutes/game; what is unusual is that in his 239:00 on the floor, he’s only taken two foul shots. 29-74 on the arc, 18-33 inside the arc, 1-2 on the foul line. Very unusual. 

Author: Armadillo Sports

I've been involved in sports my whole life, now just write about them. I like to travel, mostly to Las Vegas- they have gambling there.

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