Nine Wins, a Turned Pennant and an Eleven-Week Losing Streak at Trivia
Cleveland State28
UCF16
- Game
- 2025 Week 11
- Date
- 2025-11-22
- Site
- Home
- Result
- Win
- Record
- 9-2
Vikings 28, UCF 16, at home. Nine and two, my people!
Monday I went to Sal’s like I promised myself, and I sat in that chair, and I said nothing. Not a word. I let the clippers do the talking. Sal cut in silence for twenty minutes. Then, when he was done, he walked over to the mirror and turned his Bobcats pennant around to face the wall. He didn’t say a thing. He didn’t have to. Twenty-five years, folks, and that’s the first time that pennant’s faced the wall in my presence. I tipped him double.
Then our guys went out against a good UCF team and won by twelve, comfortable from start to finish, and that’s nine wins, which ties all of last season with two games still to play, which is the most pierogi I’ve eaten in a single November, according to my doctor.
Nine and two. One regular-season game left, then a bowl. Put it in the time capsule. Three pierogi, and a polka for Sal.
A twelve-point home win over UCF. Steady. Professional. Ninth win of the season. I’ve run out of skeptical adjectives and I’ve had to borrow some from the thesaurus at the office. “Unremarkably excellent” is the best I’ve got.
At the Lantern Room this week, Regression to the Mean finished last for the eleventh straight Tuesday, which Nadia announced is a “bar record.” There’s now a plaque. It’s small and wooden and says “Most Consistent Team.” She hung it over the dartboard. I’m not proud. I’m a little proud.
Here’s my take, and it’s sincere: this team has learned to win the games it should win, which is a different and harder skill than winning the games it shouldn’t. The Vikings did both this year.
The finale is at Kansas State, after Thanksgiving. K-State beat us at home last year. The Doom Model has flagged it with a little skull icon I didn’t know it could make.
“Lil,” because a reader asked very nicely: it was my grandmother’s crossword clue for me. “Four letters, small Ken.” It’s three letters. She was a terrible crossword player.
Back and forth
Sal turned the pennant, Kenny!
To face the wall? That’s the most important development of the season.
Nine and two!
And eleven straight last-place finishes. We’re both on historic runs.
Nine wins, a pennant facing the wall, a plaque for consistency, and a skull icon in a spreadsheet pointing straight at Manhattan, Kansas.
Split Decision is fiction. Mickey Bridges, Ken Hogmanes and The Lakefront Ledger are invented; the games and scores are not.