HOUSTON – On Friday night, the de facto start of the 2024 college football championship weekend, technicians at the Houston media hotel were wrestling with a series of television monitors. The screens were supposed to display various sports channels and fancy CFP digital logos, but instead, while the room’s engineers tested the monitors, they plugged them into the internal cable. What appeared on the video wall was a Star Wars movie, “The Phantom Menace.”
What was shown were duels between Jedi and Sith lords. What could easily have been presented, without requiring any title change, were the portraits of two college football pariahs, obscure figures who have been seen sparsely in public over the past two months, but who even in those fleeting moments managed to project some images . form clouds over the achievements of the teams they were there to support.
“You can’t go to a football game like this, the biggest game of your life, and be looking over your shoulder,” Washington Huskies head coach Kalen DeBoer said. “The first reason is that if your head is not where your feet are, then you are not in a state of preparation for what is coming or you do not appreciate what you are experiencing.”
The 49-year-old, in just his second season as head coach at the University of Washington, laughed before continuing, adding: “And the second reason is you might not want to see who’s back there over your shoulder! “
The first of our CFP Houston chasers is Connor Stalions, the former Michigan staffer who left midseason after evidence showed he had spearheaded an elaborate sign-stealing scheme to help the Wolverines. He became famous in mid-October when it was revealed that the military man turned UM football analyst had allegedly built a network of Michigan henchmen to attend the games of future and potential opponents to decipher and deliver those play signs. teams to Ann. Arbor.
The Stalions resigned in early November and disappeared into the late-season ether when their former boss Jim Harbaugh was suspended for three games; However, Michigan won all three to earn a spot in the Big Ten title game. Then, like a stroke of Go Blue, the Stalions were spotted in Indianapolis, sitting in the stands not far from the Wolverines’ bench, even catching the attention of a handful of players, who smiled and waved. That appearance went practically unnoticed (but was verified through photographs obtained by ESPN). However, when the Stalions were spotted at the Rose Bowl on New Year’s Day, the college football social media world went up in flames. A photo posted by former Michigan linebacker Chase Winovich showed Stalions wearing a Michigan hoodie and roses around his neck.
I can confirm that Connor Stalions was indeed at the Rose Bowl, according to multiple sources.
Former Michigan LB Chase Winovich also posted this on his IG story yesterday: pic.twitter.com/Sx2T7LI3FJ
— Nicole Auerbach (@NicoleAuerbach) January 2, 2024
No hat. No sunglasses. Without crossed arms and stoic face. It was a stark contrast to the Stalions image most people know, when he was caught on the Central Michigan sideline with the Chippewas team on Sept. 1 scouting Michigan State.
The smile on his face, standing two rows behind the Michigan bench in Pasadena, seemed a contrast to his statement to The Athletic’s Nicole Auerbach a day later that “I don’t want to be a distraction.”
Just two days before the national semifinal against Alabama, at Rose Bowl media day in Pasadena, it was difficult to categorize the continuing specter of the Stalions as anything more than a distraction. Every Michigan player and coach who had a chance at a podium faced at least one question about the scandal. A week later, they were peppered with the same questions, only this time they were framed with: “Well, he was at the Rose Bowl, so do you expect him to be behind the bench in Houston, too?”
From the parking lot tents in Pasadena to the convention center in downtown Houston, the response of every person dressed in maize and blue, whether a reserve, an All-American or a millionaire coach surrounded by cameras and microphones, was essentially the itself: a polite deflection with a tinge of continued irritation.
Running backs coach Mike Hart: “We had so many fans in Pasadena, from all over the country. It was great. Thank you.”
Offensive coordinator Sherrone Moore: “No matter what was said, no matter what was said, we are the best team in college football and that’s what we want to show everyone.”
A group of reserves returned to the bus after an hour without asking questions: “The only guy I saw in the stands last week was my dad. So that was cool.”
The CFP’s second phantom threat is George Kliavkoff, the future Pac-12 commissioner who spent his fall enduring the implosion of his conference. He arrived in Houston on Saturday afternoon, preparing for what could be an awkward big finish, standing on stage with Washington. The Huskies would be celebrating the league’s first CFP championship and first non-vacant natty of any kind since 2003, all while already having two legs in the door for the Big Ten. An exit driven by the perception that Kliavkoff failed to secure a rich enough media rights deal.
Since his poorly received introduction to Pac-12 members in August and the defection of most of those members in the days that followed, Kliavkoff has been seen in public only twice in the span of nearly six months. Both visits took place on one stage, to help present Washington with its trophies for winning last week’s conference championship game and CFP semifinal in the Sugar Bowl. In New Orleans, he found himself surrounded by members of the media he had managed to avoid all fall.
“It’s surreal,” he confessed. “It’s worrying that some of our schools haven’t been more patient because if they had seen what we were building it would have been worth it… Happy for the kids. [at Washington]. They don’t deserve all the nonsense that happens around them. We were focused on rebuilding football. He took 2 and a half years. “I wish it had happened faster.”
Depending on who you ask, Kliavkoff will be in charge of whatever remains to be managed in the Washington State-Oregon State “2Pac” conference until the end of the academic calendar, or he will be out of a job before January. The calendar reaches double-digit days.
But again, like Stalions, his presence… or lack thereof… or some sort of lack thereof… or whatever… looms over this weekend’s festivities like a uncomfortable reminder of the constant machinations and uncertainty of this new age in college athletics. And again, the mention of He Who Shall Not Be Named elicited a polite “Come on, are we still talking about this?” Exchanges at CFP press day.
DeBoer: “There are things we can control and things we can’t. Just trust your leadership to do what’s best for your university and your team.”
Washington quarterback Michael Penix Jr.: “I really don’t care who hands us those trophies, as long as that means there’s someone handing us those trophies.”
Another group of reserves, this time dressed in purple and white, also addressed the bus without questions and answers: “Who? Did you say George Costanza?”
Once the big game begins on Monday night (7:30 ET, ESPN), the focus will be on the two teams on the field fighting for a title, as it should be. But television cameras and smartphones will no doubt scan the seats at NRG Stadium for Connor Stalions. A group of NCAA investigators (remember that the case is still ongoing) could even go looking for him. And if Washington wins, George Kliavkoff will reappear for an awkward handshake with Washington administrators. If the Huskies lose, he’ll go out the back door back to the Bay Area, probably only for a limited time.
Whatever happens, they won’t be the biggest story of the night. They shouldn’t be. But they will be a story. They should be. No matter how irritating that truth and its presence may be.
