The end of the world is nigh

Best Seat in the House column by Chris Graham

I got myself in trouble this summer for daring to suggest that Virginia football coach Al Groh was on the hot seat heading into the 2007 season.
But hey, I’m more than willing to admit when I’m wrong.
Yes, that’s right. You guys were right, I was wrong.
Al Groh isn’t on any hot seat.

So Virginia was outgained 474 yards to 108 yards today in a not-as-close-as-the-score-would-indicate 23-3 loss at Wyoming.

Didn’t Groh say something before the season about how he was having to play the 2007 season with the 2008 Virginia football team?

Um … OK, maybe he was saying last year that he had to play the 2006 season with the 2007 Virginia football team. Whatever. Give the guy a break.

I mean, he says all the time that if you’re going to ask somebody to cook dinner, you can’t hold them responsible for how it turns out unless you let them buy the groceries.

I don’t know what that is supposed to mean, but he’s only been able to buy groceries for, like, six years now.

Give the man some time to get things in working order, people.

And in the meantime … we’re talking about the University of Virginia.

We don’t want to be known as a football school. We’re Public Ivy. We’re smarter than everybody else. You can’t expect us to be good at football, too.

And yes, I know George Welsh had things purring for a while – but that was an aberration.

(And yes, there can be 19-year aberrations.)

So anyway … I’m sure Groh has said at some point in the recent past that he was going to return Virginia football to what it was traditionally.

And we’re there now, folks.

Remember back in the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s when we got so excited about scoring late in the game down 52-0 after the other team took everybody from its two-deep out that we would spontaneously break out in the old alma mater?

Well, we’ve got Duke next week, and then we’ve got 10 more of those type games on the schedule to finish up ’07.

Football is back to where it was before Welsh came along and screwed everything up – an excuse to get some sun on Saturday afternoons while waiting for basketball season to get going.

(T-minus 72 days and counting until the opener at home against Vermont on Nov. 11.)

Chris Graham is the executive editor of The SportsDominion.