PYU Week 13: Don’t Mention The War

(DISCLAIMER: No one actually cares about the War on I-4. Also, this game is for entertainment purposes only. No actual money is being wagered.)

I suppose I should say something about the end of the War on I-4 rivalry series. But I said it all the year it started:

Neither school really wants a rivalry with the other. They want to be in a better conference, bigger, and more important than the other.

Jamie said it even better in 2010:

It’s a completely unhealthy, sometimes dangerous relationship, and I can’t believe how many Bulls fans get sucked into it... whatever grudge match exists between the two schools is more like a quicksand trap that both sides constantly sink into.

None of these things has changed.

I hoped the formalization of the rivalry in 2013, with a formal trophy and being in the same conference, would normalize things a bit. But it has the same petty, sniping, too-online tone it always did. Even the epic 2017 football game, which will someday consume a chapter of a future “greatest games in Florida football history” book, didn’t help. All it created was another dumb thing for the fan bases to bicker about.

And there’s just no reason for it. There have been no real on- or off-field incidents. It has no roots in long-ago fan conflicts, or one of their own students being killed in one, or bitterness about the creation and purpose of the institutions, or pre-Civil War raids. There was never even an FIU-Miami brawl. Or anything that happened in the 20th century!

There was the tackle that gruesomely injured McKenzie Milton in the 2018 game, but he and Mazzi Wilkins actually became friends over it. Milton had this to say, at a faith conference:

“It doesn’t need to be a thing anymore. It’s just cool to have a USF Bull here and a UCF Knight coming together and becoming friends. That’s the kind of stuff football can do.”

That’s... the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.

Not because of the noble idea that friendship should be more important than sports rivalry. It’s the implication that USF Bulls and UCF Knights should exist in some default state of being enemies. Imagine hearing that about Western Kentucky and Middle Tennessee, or Henderson State-Ouachita Baptist, or any other passionate but irrelevant local annual game.

If a guy who nearly lost a leg in the War on I-4 can publicly forgive and move past it, then whatever axe you have to grind with an opposing fan base probably isn’t worth the effort.

So I’m glad that the War On I-4 is going into timeout for at least a couple years. I’ll miss the games, but I won’t miss the “rivalry.” Maybe someday, when it’s about something other than who gets to be in what power conference, it’ll start to gain some actual meaning. And if Twitter is going to die like everyone says it is, that would be a big help.

Having said all that, let’s see how many spite bets were made on this game. I made one like I do every year, but I found a new target for it:

Results will be posted after the weekend. Most futures bets will be resolved at that time as well.

RESULTS

Let’s start with the big winning bets in Week 14:

Before we can get to the standings, we have to update the pre-season futures bets. All over/under won/lost bets can be resolved, because all teams have completed their regular season. (Four teams still have a regular season game left, but no one bet on them.) A complete list of bets is here, as always. Here is a list of the winning futures bets so far:

These winnings have been added to your bankroll. Unlike regular season bets, you also get your bet back. (It was deducted before the season.) So some of you are getting a windfall. If you lost a futures bet, you don’t lose any further money, because the bet was deducted from your starting bankroll before Week 1. Also, the Pending Futures Amount has been updated.

The following bets are still live:

Only two conference/national championship futures bets have already lost: ULhothot had bet on Oklahoma State for the Big XII championship and national championship. These have already been marked as losses.

Current money standings are:

BullsOnParade96 has busted open the race with two more big parlay wins. jrjs’ recent tactic of betting over/under and money line on the same game didn’t work this time, as Georgia hit the over without scoring enough points to cover against Georgia Tech. He also had the USF money line, but we all know how that ended. BullsOnParade96 had it too, so it wouldn’t have helped anyone make up much ground. It will take some huge wins - or losses - this late in the season.

Points won this week and overall points standings:

We’re down to the final 3 in the points race. ElliotMoore can finish no higher than third. Week 14 will be a “week” and bowl season will be a “week” in which points are awarded.

Coming up next is championship week; it runs from now until the Army-Navy game is played. It consists of the ten conference championship games, plus the rescheduled Akron-Buffalo regular season game, plus Army-Navy on December 10. So only 12 games total.