The Washington Post reports:
“I mean, coming to Howard, it’s not a football school right now,” Caylin Newton said last month. “It will be.”
The undersized freshman quarterback — whose brother happens to be a former NFL MVP, guy named Cam — wasn’t trying to make headlines. He was speaking matter-of-factly, in a cramped office, before an early-season practice. He hadn’t even been named the school’s starter yet, although he was confident that moment would arrive. But Newton seemed absurdly certain that his new school — which he selected after not getting offers from any Power-5 programs — was ready to take off, and soon.
Newton later became the starter, and his first game went far beyond any rational preseason rhetoric. The Bison, 40-some point underdogs at UNLV, pulled off one of the biggest upsets in the history of the sport late Saturday night, a 43-40 road win in Coach Mike London’s first game that will completely upend all expectations at the D.C. school.
Longtime Vegas analyst RJ Bell said Howard’s win was the biggest upset in college football history, noting that a $100 bet on the Bison to win outright would have paid out an astounding $55,000. The Associated Press confirmed that it was indeed the largest upset in college football history based on point spreads, topping Stanford’s win over USC as a 40-point underdog in 2007. And Howard was actually paid $600,000 for the honor of beating UNLV, according to USA Today, which reported that “Howard had to arrange for its band and cheerleaders to arrive in Las Vegas by noon the day before the game to participate in various events” to receive the full guarantee.”
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Read the complete report at the link. Nice story!
Oh, yeah, after a sluggish start that saw them down 10-0 to four touchdown underdog Utah State in the second quarter, the #9 Wisconsin Badgers reeled off 59 consecutive points en route to a 59-10 thrashing of the Aggies in their opener at Camp Randall Stadium in Madison, WI. Go Badgers!
PWS
09-03-17