The Drop, Week 6: Who Would You Rather Be?

 

If you had to pick between being one of these two teams, which one would you pick?

• Team A is a traditional power fallen on hard times. It began it season with a 5-0 run against teams it frankly should have beaten, then hosted a Top Ten team this past Saturday. Team A dominated its visitor through the first three quarters, setting it up nicely to open the gap and send a message. But instead it squandered an eleven-point lead and wound up losing by a field goal in front of a fired-up home crowd.
• Team B is also, technically, a traditional power, only its heyday was so long ago that no one actually remembers it. It lost to an up-and-coming SEC team at home in Week 2, but followed that up with a gritty road win against a team most expected to be pretty good this season, then a victory at home against a conference foe it rarely, rarely beats. Which made this past weekend all the most surprising when it got mashed into goo by a team that not even its own fans take all that seriously.

I don't know why I'm being cryptic here. Team A is Nebraska, Team B is Minnesota, and honestly, you wouldn't want to be either of them right now, given how all that early promise vanished into dust in the span or a few hours (Minnesota) or fifteen minutes of game time (Nebraska).

Then again, you could be an Illinois fan, breathing a sigh of relief that your team won by a single point in overtime on the road in East Lansing, because we all know what a snakepit that place is.