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The original was posted on /r/cfb by /u/Pollaski on 2024-07-24 14:53:43+00:00.
The Tank Job of the Week is an award for the FBS team that did the best job of humiliating itself over the weekend. Whether they blew a large lead, choked away a spot in the limelight, lost a game they had absolutely no right losing, or completely screwed everything on a last second blunder, the TJOTW winner sets the gold standard in college football misery. Over the next seven weeks, we are counting down my 100 greatest tank jobs over the last 20 years. WARNING: You will be hurt.
(video links and a link to the entire list in comments)
74: LSU TIGERS (lost to Ole Miss 25-23) [2009]
Obviously his reputation has been ruined by more… unsavory reveals, but there was a time when Les Miles was the certified mad genius of college football. A freewheeling dice roller who would eat grass on the sideline, the Mad Hatter was capable of pulling out some of the most insane endings- both good and bad for the Tigers- in college football history. The fake field goal against Florida, the literal last second touchdown against Auburn, somehow managing 10+ wins in eight of his eleven full seasons in Baton Rouge. Heck, even his losses sometimes turn into wins- who else but Miles could have survived two triple overtime losses in the same season and still won a national title?
But there was always a cost to Miles’ insanity. LSU was plagued by suspect quarterback play for much of Miles tenure, but his real flaw was time management. For all his experience and knowledge of the game, Les Miles never seemed to be able to grasp the concept that in order to pull off your game winning miracle, you actually have to do it before the triple zero’s appear.
LSU rolled into Oxford on November 21 with an 8-2 record and a #8 ranking in the BCS, their only losses having come against Alabama and Florida, two of the best teams in the nation. Ole Miss, for their part, sat just outside the top 25 at 7-3. LSU got off to a strong start, netting two touchdowns against two Rebel field goals to take a 14-3 lead in the first, but the Rebels closed things up in the second quarter and trailed just 17-16 at the half. Ole Miss took the lead to start the fourth, then after an LSU three and out, embarked on a massive eight and a half minute drive, culminating with a field goal to put the Rebels up 8 with just 3:42 left. LSU worked their way back down the field and scored with 77 seconds remaining, but quarterback Jordan Jefferson couldn’t connect on the extra point, leaving it 25-23, with LSU having just two timeouts left.
But star Ole Miss running back Dexter McCluster misplayed the onside kick, and LSU went into business and quickly moved to the Ole Miss 32- inside kicker Josh Jasper’s range for a game winner. But Jefferson was sacked on second down, forcing LSU to burn one timeout. On third down, Jefferson threw a flat route that was completely blown up for another seven yard loss. What had once been 1st and 10 on the 32 had turned into 4th and 26 on the 48. Inexplicably, LSU waited nearly twenty seconds to call their final timeout, leaving just nine seconds left on the clock and the Tigers needing a miracle.
They got it- as Jefferson’s pass came down, a mass of arms reached up for it and it was cradled by Terrance Tolliver at the Ole Miss 6, with one second remaining, and the clock stopped just to reset the chains. A palpable panic began to set in on the Ole Miss faithful.
“GET YOUR FIELD GOAL TEAM ON!” screamed CBS analyst Gary Danielsen as LSU rushed to set up a spike. “YOU DON’T HAVE TIME TO GROUND THE BALL”
“WHAT ARE THEY DOING!?” bellowed play-by-play Verne Lundquist, clearly horrified by what he was witnessing. Ole Miss fans were understandably less than horrified, and a buzz was building as they realized LSU was just about to let them off the hook.
Snap. Spike, Triple Zeroes. Ole Miss wins.
After the game, CBS sideline reporter Tracy Wolfson defied usual protocol and went straight for the losing coach to demand to know what had just happened. Miles, almost nonchalantly, explained they simply couldn’t get the field goal team on, because they were ‘down-’ and just trailed off. Okay. Oddly, nobody asked why Miles had elected to run 20 seconds off the clock as well, making the literal last second snap even necessary.
LSU would beat Arkansas in an overtime thriller the next week, but fall to Penn State in the Citrus Bowl to finish 9-4 and ranked 17th. Ole Miss would also finish 9-4 and ranked 20th after being upset by Mississippi State in the Egg Bowl, but rebounding to take out Oklahoma State in the Cotton.
73: BOISE STATE BRONCOS (lost to Nevada 34-31) [2010]
Unless you’re a Fresno State or Oklahoma fan, the rise of Boise State to national prominence was easily one of the best stories of the early 21st century. A junior college until 1968, Boise made the jump to Division 1-A (FBS) in 1996, and won their first Big West championship and made their first bowl game in 1999. They had their first end of season ranking in 2002, and broke into the top 10 in 2004 when they went undefeated in the regular season, only to lose in a 44-40 thriller of a Liberty Bowl to fellow mid-major Louisville. Boise’s true breakout came in 2006 when the Broncos again finished undefeated, went to the Fiesta Bowl, and survived a late Oklahoma comeback with a trio of playground-style trick plays to win one of the greatest games in college football history. Boise finished undefeated again in 2009, earning another Fiesta Bowl trip, this time against TCU in a controversial move that was seen as a cop-out by the BCS committee in denying both teams a shot to knock off a major opponent. Boise would win another exciting game, finishing fourth- their highest end of season ranking to date. Even better, it would set them up as an actual national championship threat in 2010.
9.9 million people watched Boise’s opening game against Virginia Tech, finishing only behind the Iron Bowl as the most watched regular-season broadcast of the year. Boise delivered in a thrilling victory, and then tore through their schedule, winning their next nine games by a whopping average of 40 points. For their penultimate game, the 10-0, third ranked Broncos headed to Reno to face the 19th ranked Nevada. The Wolf Pack were 9-1, their only loss coming to Hawai’i. It was a highly anticipated contest, with the quarterback duel between Boise’s Kellen Moore and Nevada’s Colin Kaepernick taking center stage.
And boy, did the game deliver. The two teams combined for over 1,000 yards and nearly fifty first downs. Boise scored the first seventeen points, and took a 24-7 lead into the half. Finally, late in the third quarter, Kaepernick and the Wolf Pack began their comeback. Unlike Moore’s Broncos, who relied on explosive plays, Kaepernick methodically picked his way down the field, and across three drives totalling 12:32 of gametime, Nevada came back to tie the game with just 5:14 remaining. Boise State responded by going all 79 yards in their first play, going up 31-24. Nevada again went to work, going 79 yards in 14 plays to tie the score up with just thirteen seconds remaining. The game looked headed for overtime.
Moore had other ideas, and he launched a 54-yard rocket right into the arms of Titus Young to set Boise up at the Nevada 9 with one second remaining. Kyle Brotzman came on to win it- and missed the 26-yarder. The game was headed into overtime after all. Brotzman would be called on again in the extra period, this time for a 29-yarder, and he would miss again. Nevada inched forward as much as Boise’s defense would allow in three plays, and then Anthony Martinez nailed the game winner for one of the biggest victories in Nevada’s history.
Make no mistake- this was a fantastic game. But it also was a true tank job- Boise had held a three possession lead with just sixteen minutes to go, and the normally reliable Brotzman had missed two short, critical field goals. You could also even argue that by going 79 yards in a single play, the Broncos had given the more methodical Kaepernick way too much time to work with. So how badly did the loss cost the Broncos? Not the national championship to be sure- they would have needed either Oregon or Auburn to lose, and possibly TCU as well, to make it. Had the four-team playoff existed at the time, the loss truly would have been much more devastating. It did cost them the outright WAC Championship- they ended up going 7-1, along with Nevada and Hawai’I, with each team having one win and one loss over the others. And it cost them their 24-game winning streak.
Where it truly cost the Broncos, however, was a second-straight BCS berth. The Broncos finished tenth in the BCS standings- normally high enough to get an automatic berth, but TCU finished ahead of them and received the coveted non-AQ spot. Without that Boise State was two spots out from an at-large berth, and were relegated to the Las Vegas Bowl, where they crushed Utah 26-3.
TOMORROW: An… Insight to the destruction of a college football program. And history repeats for what might arguably be the most tortured college football/NFL fandom duo.