Bowl Blitz Invitational — Games versus Reality Final Standings

In December of 2011 and January of 2012, fans of college football and EA SPORTS NCAA Football 12 helped cover all 35 Bowl Games here at STAT BOX STORIES for the BOWL BLITZ INVITATIONAL.  This week, we’re taking a look at some of the statistics that came out of those 35 games.  Today marks the close of our time with the inaugural BOWL BLITZ INVITATIONAL, as we look at how the games played in NCAA Football 12 compared to the results of the real-life Bowl Games.

Bowl Blitz Invitational — Overall Team Statistics Breakdown

In December of 2011 and January of 2012, fans of college football and EA SPORTS NCAA Football 12 helped cover all 35 Bowl Games here at STAT BOX STORIES for the BOWL BLITZ INVITATIONAL.  This week, we’re taking a look at some of the statistics that came out of those 35 games.  In today’s final statistical installment, we look at overall team statistics and try to follow trends from the games that were played.

Bowl Blitz Invitational — Passing Statistics Breakdown

In December of 2011 and January of 2012, fans of college football and EA SPORTS NCAA Football 12 helped cover all 35 Bowl Games here at STAT BOX STORIES for the BOWL BLITZ INVITATIONAL.  This week, we’re taking a look at some of the statistics that came out of those 35 games.  In today’s installment, we look at individual player Passing statistics.

Bowl Blitz Invitational — Rushing Statistics Breakdown

In December of 2011 and January of 2012, fans of college football and EA SPORTS NCAA Football 12 helped cover all 35 Bowl Games here at STAT BOX STORIES for the BOWL BLITZ INVITATIONAL.  This week, we’re taking a look at some of the statistics that came out of those 35 games.  In today’s installment, we look at individual player Rushing statistics.

Bowl Blitz Invitational — Receiving Statistics Breakdown

In December of 2011 and January of 2012, fans of college football and EA SPORTS NCAA Football 12 helped cover all 35 Bowl Games here at STAT BOX STORIES for the BOWL BLITZ INVITATIONAL.  This week, we’re taking a look at some of the statistics that came out of those 35 games.  In today’s installment, we look at individual player statistics for Receivers.

Bowl Blitz Invitational — Defensive Statistics Breakdown

In December of 2011 and January of 2012, fans of college football and EA SPORTS NCAA Football 12 helped cover all 35 Bowl Games here at STAT BOX STORIES for the BOWL BLITZ INVITATIONAL.  This week, we’re taking a look at some of the statistics that came out of those 35 games.  In today’s installment, we look at individual player statistics for Defensive players.

Bowl Blitz Invitational — Special Teams Statistics Breakdown

In December of 2011 and January of 2012, fans of college football and EA SPORTS NCAA Football 12 helped cover all 35 Bowl Games here at STAT BOX STORIES for the BOWL BLITZ INVITATIONAL.  This week, we’re taking a look at some of the statistics that came out of those 35 games.  In today’s installment, we look at individual player statistics for Special Teams players.

Announcement: Stat Box Stories Bowl Blitz Invitational Statistical Rundown

For those of you who stuck around for the site and saw the last status update for the blog, I’m sure the passage of Super Bowl XLVI weekend without an associated STAT BOX STORIES playthrough of the “rematch” between the New York Giants and New England Patriots was cause for renewed concern about the future of this web project.  Indeed, it is to this end that I return to the site today to re-commit to STAT BOX STORIES as a “brand” going forward and to lay out the plan for content in the immediate future.

Moving into and working on projects on the house my wife and I recently purchased has literally eaten up every hour spent awake and outside of work at my day job since a few days after we closed on the home.  As much as I wanted to take my Patriots into battle in Madden NFL 12 in Super Bowl XLVI prior to the big game–and trust me, watching them lose to the Giants again only makes me wish more that I’d tried to take New England to victory on the virtual gridiron–my wife and I barely got back in front of a TV for kickoff of Super Bowl XLVI last weekend as it was due to house projects taking longer than we’d hoped.

Instead of trying to guess when I’ll be able to resume “regularly-scheduled” operations here at STAT BOX STORIES, here’s my short-term plan: the BOWL BLITZ INVITATIONAL that so many of you contributed to ended without its deserved fanfare.  Since my PlayStation 3 is seeing use as little more than a glorified Netflix player at this point in time, I’m going to dig into the statistics from all of the Bowl Games played in December and January and start posting some numbers on which games (and players) had the best and worst performances across the course of those 35 games played in NCAA Football 12.  As statistics are broken down, I will post “quick hit” stories to STAT BOX STORIES leading up to the final breakdown of which game results came closest to the actual real-life result (no spoilers, loyal readers of the thread at The Gaming Tailgate!).

In the meantime, I encourage any fans of the site who wish to submit guest entries to get in touch with me by email if you’re interested in contributing content while I wait for my schedule to become more pliable in terms of playing games and putting together what has come to be expected from STAT BOX STORIES.  With exciting titles hitting store shelves in the weeks to come–I’m personally looking forward to SSX, MLB 12 The Show, and Tiger Woods PGA TOUR 13 in the February/March release window–the hope is to get back to a regular schedule with the release of those games.

Though, as I’m learning, no guarantees can be made this far out when the process of moving into a house is involved!

Thank you to everyone who continues to wait for STAT BOX STORIES to make a triumphant return,

Brian

#43: 2012 BCS National Championship Game — Alabama @ LSU in NCAA Football 12

Thirty-four Bowl Games have now been chronicled for the BOWL BLITZ INVITATIONAL here at STAT BOX STORIES; the seasons of both the Alabama Crimson Tide and the LSU Tigers have been re-enacted in EA SPORTS NCAA Football 12, and their showdown in the 2012 Allstate BCS National Championship Game is the only game left to be played.  To all of those people who contributed work to this project–Eric Veneziano, Jeremy Etters, Quantrell Toval, Owen Good, Jeremy Bennett, David Searles, Jason Burt, Chris Jacobs, Tommy Gscwhend, and Matthew Lee–I am indebted to you all for the time and effort you have given towards the success of this project.

It makes sense, in a way, that it should come down to a rematch between the Crimson Tide and the Tigers; the very first entry here at STAT BOX STORIES previewed their regular season match-up.  In that game, I played as LSU and took home a victory, 28-10.  For this season-ending game, I have decided to take control of Alabama at the end of the season described in Eric Veneziano’s season write-ups from yesterday (Alabama here, LSU here) to decide which of these SEC powerhouses will taste victory in the Superdome tonight.

Since that season allowed for injuries, rosters will not exactly match the players who will be playing on the field tonight.  This will also be my first time playing the game using Matthew Lee’s–steelerfan–slider set, as those were the sliders set up for the season.  Finally, the quarter lengths were set to 6 minutes–instead of the customary 7 minute quarters I’ve been using–but it didn’t seem to have much of an effect on the action overall.

Roll Tide! Geaux Tigers!  It all comes down to one game…

Bowl Blitz Invitational Special: LSU’s Road to the BCS National Championship

One of the more rewarding things about starting up STAT BOX STORIES and the BOWL BLITZ INVITATIONAL has been the incredible response from guest contributors who had no true motivation–outside of playing the games and donating time to the cause–to participate.  Eric Veneziano has taken this dedication to a whole new level, not only contributing the most guest entries of any outside contributor, but also setting up an Online Dynasty running through the 2011-2012 college football season to see if he could find a way to set up the Alabama Crimson Tide and LSU Tigers in the BCS National Championship game; even though the SEC rivals would find it extra difficult to end up in the title game.  Believe it or not, they did.  Here’s the first part of how that ended up being so, chronicling the season of LSU:

LSU started off the season at #4 and high hopes of a National Championship.  With maybe one of the toughest schedules in college football history, if the Tigers could take care of business they should be able to land in the title game.