Stat watch: 5/50 Club

Photo Attribution: USATSI

The 5/50 Club is not a new Hova business venture.

I REPEAT: THE 5/50 CLUB IS NOT A NEW HOVA BUSINESS VENTURE.

One of my favorite parts of this blog (blogs in general, really) is the ability to consume bite-size pieces of material. Sometimes you want longform stuff, I guess (go read a book?) but often I think you want nothing more than a morsel here or there with which you can impress your friends at the bar or show off to your girlfriend discuss with your dad.

I try to do that but the summer is zzzzzzzzzzz so I haven’t been as good lately. Today marks our first in a LOOONG series of preseason football posts though. You’ll be getting a lot of small pieces like this, some longer stuff, predictions, I’m sure OKC Dave and Amilian will re-appear, and I might even dust off the old podcast mic. YOU NEVER KNOW!

Anyway, today I wanted to take a look at what I think we have to consider the golden age of OSU football — the last five years (2008-2012). We know OSU has been great compared to OSU standards and mostly compared to Big 12 standards, but what about to national standards.

Here are the schools with 50 or more wins in the last five years:

Where is OSU…well, we just missed:

Those are the only 17 teams that have won 47+ games in the last five years. Obviously all have arrived to the list in different paths (Alabama by sheer oppression, Cincy because of a bad schedule, Texas I don’t know wtf) but all have been good and, at times great.

Some thoughts:

— Boise! Five losses! I know their schedule is atrocious but that’s so impressive.

— Guessing TCU won’t be on this list much longer.

— How much does it sting that the Iowa State game (2011), the Bedlam game (2012), or the Houston game (2009) could have all put us on the 5/50 list? Answer: a lot.

— Most of the teams grouped with OSU have played in more games because of conference championships (weird that OSU has never played a conference championship btw). Worth noting.

All in all just another look at what has been a spectacular run.

Check out the full 2013 OSU football preview here.