Sean Stazen shares what happened during his brawl with Rufus
It’s been 15 years since Rufus took his famous shot at Brutus Buckeye in Ohio Stadium. Sean Stazen, the man inside the Brutus suit, is ready to talk.
With college football’s conference championships approaching, fans of Ohio University and Toledo are wondering why their teams did not receive a MAC championship bid over Miami.
Sitting alone atop the league standings with a 7-1 conference record, Western Michigan will play 6-2 Miami in the MAC Championship at noon Dec. 6. The RedHawks finished tied for second and had the same league record as Ohio and Toledo. Miami got the nod thanks to the MAC’s tiebreakers, even though both Toledo and Ohio beat Miami in the regular season.
The RedHawks won their final regular-season game against Ball State in a 49-25 victory that punched their ticket into the conference final.
Find out why Ohio and Toledo were left out of the 2025 MAC Championship game below.
What are the MAC Championship tiebreaker rules?
These are the MAC Championship tiebreakers for three or more teams with the same conference record:
- Combined head-to-head win percentage among the tied teams if all tied teams are common opponents.
- If all the tied teams are not common opponents, the tied team that defeated each of the other tied teams advances.
- Win percentage versus all common opponents.
- The team with the higher ranking by the Team Rating Score metric provided by SportSource Analytics following the conclusion of regular season games.
- Win percentage versus common opponents based upon their order of finish (overall conference win percentage, with ties broken) and proceeding through other common opponents based upon their order of finish.
- Combined conference win percentage of conference opponents.
- The representative shall be chosen by a draw as administered by the Commissioner or the Commissioner’s designee.
Why did Miami football make the 2025 MAC Championship game over Ohio and Toledo?
Miami advanced according to tiebreaker rule No. 3. The RedHawks have a better win percentage than Ohio and Toledo vs. all common opponents, going 3-0 against the three common opponents the tied teams faced (Ball State, Northern Illinois and Western Michigan).
Toledo lost to Western Michigan, while Ohio lost to both Western Michigan and Ball State.
The first two MAC tiebreaker rules were skipped because all three teams did not play each other, and no team defeated both of the others.
When is the 2025 MAC Championship game?
The 2025 MAC Championship game between Miami and Western Michigan is at noon Dec. 6 and will be broadcast on ESPN.
This story was updated to include additional information.
