This was not my first big game, or even my first bowl game. Going to the Outback Bowl on New Year’s Day 2006 in Tampa is simply not on the same scale, but I had also been to a Super Bowl two years ago in the very same stadium.
I have to say it felt very different this time. Some of that was personal – I am an NFL guy, going to the Super Bowl had always been a dream (the one I went to was just two random teams). Conversely I never would have even thought about going to a BCS game if UF hadn’t been in it. I resent the BCS as a failed substitute for a playoff. Also while having your team in the game is exciting, unless it a sure beat down there are some nerves involved and that can detract from enjoying the spectacle of the game. Going into the game I could imagine anything happening. However it also true that the Super Bowl is just a bigger event. It takes over the whole city and there are events the week before the game. The BCS tries, but doesn’t have that buzz (at least not yet – Super Bowl I wasn’t a sellout). It may also be a reflection of the type of event. The Super Bowl is big glitz and glamour – stars come out, rich people come out.
The BCS is more of a fan’s event, student’s and those who follow the team. Because most college are small communities it just limits it. It’s a neat atmosphere, but it feels as though it is “a” big game rather than “the” big game. Of course all of this may have been influenced by the six hours plus of driving I did before the game. But really there is no comparison. I parked in spitting distance of the stadium and tailgated. There were parking spaces used for grills and families playing football. For the Super Bowl I parked at one of several satellite parking locations and was bussed in because the public was not allowed to the stadium. Security was also pretty basically by comparison -there were a few armed cops, but no metal detectors.
Generally speaking the Okies were nice enough – they seemed to embrace being seen as country and in the parking lot at least one of them had a CD of various songs redone to be OU songs. During half time I was standing up while their band played and they told me to sit down so they could see the band. They were serious – I know because I asked (I mean who really is that excited to see the band?). Speaking of their band, it was *shockingly* better than ours, but only they only had one cheerleader. Literally one. She ran around all over the place. They even introduced her by name. I could not make this up. Also their answer to the chomp seems to be just holding one finger in the air as though they are just going #1 – I didn’t get it.
As it turned out I had great seats. The student section (or at least one of them) was in the first tier. I had seats on the fourteenth row right behind the goalposts in the Florida endzone. As the game progressed those turned into even better seats. Here is a list of everything that happened right in front of me:
Their first TD
Tebow’s second pick
Both goaline stands
The blocked fieldgoal (sort of)
Our fieldgoal
Our last TD
Their last failed drive
Our clockkilling drive
The awards
At the other end:
Our first two TDs
Their second TD
Personal foul on punt block
The Black pick
Not bad right? That picture of the play is the start of Harvin’s big run in the third. Anyway, without further ado:
QB: The Savior was named the player of the game, but this is why you rely on Gator Knowledge for the real story. While he did indeed shake off two early picks, he did not have his best game. First off you can’t just shrug off two picks even if they did not kill us – especially when one was deep in our own end. The first was just a pass that needed to get there faster. The second was a zone blitz - when defensive linemen fall back into passing lanes as others passrush to confuse the quarterback, it worked here as Tebow’s pass hit the Sooner right in the chest. Tebow also missed blitzers off the corner that I clearly saw before the snap – at least one was a sack, and another an incomplete pass where the rusher affected the throw. He did complete 60% of his passes for 231 yards with 2 TDs, but several of those were shovel passes out of our version of the triple option and of course the last TD was the lobbed jump pass. He also had the weird slow pirouette where he kept his back to the defense after the play was several seconds old (meaning huge chance for a sack) when he was in the redzone – he makes plays that are unwise but he has gotten away with his athlete ability sometimes, but are still unwise. On the other hand he wisely threw it away at the end of that play, as he did the play before. Not forcing balls into coverage in the redzone when windows are tighter (see Bradford, Sam) is something I like to see in my QB. Those two smart plays gave us a field goal opportunity to move up 17-14. He also was our most consistent rusher, which was a key part of keeping the offense on the field to keep the defense fresh – we won time of possession by ten minutes. He did that even more by completing passes as we made a bunch of third and longs. And he does deserve credit for keeping his head in the game after his opening errors. The personal foul at the end did not really bother me – I feel he knew the game was over then. He is an intense guy, which clearly helps our team and I am willing to accept the downside. He has never hurt us before with it and doubt he would have done that early in the game. That said it was still stupid – although not as stupid as their safety doing it back, what did that mean? By the way that was not the guy who said Tebow was the fourth best QB in the Big 12, that was a corner, this was a safety who had the first pick (and made a mildly hard tackle on the play).
Also a bit of news that had escaped me. You may have heard Cam Newton got busted for stealing a laptop (GPD brilliantly got him with it, let him keep it in a room while he talked with his lawyer and then discovered it had disappeared – only to be found later behind his dorm) – apparently Meyer kicked him off the team and his is transferring to a juco in Texas. This means oft injured John Brantley is only other QB on the roster.
GRADE: B/B+
RB: We had two 100 yard rushers, but neither was a back. Moody (21), Demps (2), and Rainey (3) combined for 20 yards rushing – and 23 of that was Demps. Moody was barely on the field, and Moore (33) didn’t appear until late in the second quarter and was rarely seen again. Demps was forgettable. I still think Rainey is better (shiftier), he made a hell of a move to juke a guy out for a first down on the play he got hurt (THAT was the guy who said Tebow was the fourth best QB in the Big 12). My concern is he is even more fragile than Harvin (1) (ironic as he is a little bigger than Demps), he faded down the stretch because he was beat up (which only surfaced after the season).
GRADE C-
WR: Before we get to Harvin let’s look at the others. Riley Cooper (11), Louis Murphy (9), and David Nelson (83) combined for 6 catches for 105 yards and 2 TDs. Cooper blocked well, Murphy played through pain (his personal foul seemed dubious from what I could see) but most importantly all three made big plays on third downs. We complete over 70% of them (12 for 17) and a lot of those were long ones. We were able to constantly move the ball – our punter never stepped on the field until the third quarter (and only two more times after that). Even without Harvin that is an “A.” Harvin only had 5 catches for 49 yards in what I am sure will be his last game – but he was just as key converting those third downs. Of course it was his running that really did it, they were the only two big plays of the game.
GRADE: A+ no doubt
TE: Aaron Hernandez (81) was our leading receiver (5 catches for 57 yards) and he had a great game – those shovel passes killed the Sooners. You could see how frustrated they were giving them up. He and Tater Salad (#84 in your program, #1 in your heart) also both added solid blocking. This was Tater's last game – so long Tater, we’re gonna miss you.
GRADE: A
OL: The running backs never got uncorked, but we had 250 yards rushing – but it was not consistent, we got stoned on first down quite a bit. Tebow usually had time to throw, and when he didn’t they often were blitzes of the corner which may not have been their responsibility to pick up. Trautwein (75) jumped several times. Tratt (63) was rarely on the field. Too bad, his senior year was a waste, I wish he had medical redshirted.
GRADE: A-
DL: This was my worry going into the game. Even Charlie Strong said prior that if we let Bradford stand back there and pick us apart it would be a disaster. With three minutes to go in the second half – when they were moving one us – my cell phone rang (I know – I was surprised it was on too) and it turned out to be some crazy old redhead Irish woman who first words were “we can’t get a pass rush.” That’s never good. However they did get some pass rush, not much but just enough. Enough to draw a holding flag (on Lawrence Marsh (90)) to call back a big play. Enough to make Branford move occasionally. On Ahmed Black’s (35) big pick Carlos Dunlap (8) was pushing a lineman back into Bradford’s face so he could not step into the throw. Dunlap is a great natural athlete, but he has no passrushing moves, which limits his game. I know people will think we had serious breakdowns against the run, but if you take away those three big runs on what I like to call “The Disaster Drive” their main back only averaged 3.4 a carry. Our light DEs Justin Trattou (94) and Jermaine Cunningham (49) struggled to hold point at the end of the line. But the real truth is they could only run when were not expecting it. When they lined up for short yardage and our DL knew it was coming we stuffed them. Not just the goalline stand (horrible decision on their part to go for it on 4th down by the way), we stopped them on at least one other third and one run I can remember. They got one (maybe two), but for the most part when they needed a run they could not get it. That, more than anything else, is the mark of a good DL. Also Trattou had a pass defensed in the third quarter running out parallel to the line to undercut a pass to a back that would have gone for good yards. Instead it set up a third and long they could not convert. So props to him.
GRADE: A-
LB: Brandon Hicks (40) had a sack (on one of TWO plays Oklahoma had Branford bootleg out to the SAME side they had sent a back out on. Needless to say that worked well the other time too, I have no idea what the concept behind that play was). Ryan Stamper (41) was one of the guys helping that pick bounce at the end of the first half. Dustin Doe (32) pulled someone (Stamper?) away from jawing with a Sooner to prevent a flag. A.J. Jones (16) got mildly beat on a pass. I was happy to see Brandon Spikes (51) lined up at DE sometimes. He and Stamper had some effective blitzes if not sacks. But overall the strength of our defense was not overly noticeable.
GRADE: B+ Hey it was a great overall defensive team effort, they were a part of it - filling running lanes and playing well in passing zones. But OU’s TE had a big game.
DB: I saw Janoris Jenkins (29) miss a tackle for the first time ever. Otherwise the only time I noticed him was when I was bitching that he was not lined up against their best WR (Juaquin Iglesias (9)) – which was usually the case. That means he had a good game. I don’t know why he doesn’t always get locked up on their best WR. It is not a case of CBs never switching sides. The big Vikingesque guy you see if a few of my photos says Joe Haden (5) is taller, but not noticeably if he is, and Mr. Internet says they are the same height (which it also says about OU’s WRs). Is it because he is a freshman? At least one time they outschemed us, putting their #1 WR in the slot so freshman safety Will Hill (10) was on him. Then they moved the outside WR in motion across the formation isolating Hill man to man. I shouted about it (doubt I was heard by anyone) and sure enough they got a first down out of it. Why not just have Jenkins follow their best guy all over the field? Haden was beat on their first TD – although I don’t think it was his man, he was just the closest guy, there was a linebacker vaguely there (he is over half a foot shorter than that monster TE). He also batted up the key first pick – and even having seen highlights later I have no idea how he got there. Major Wright (21) had a big hit (which he might have been flagged on) and was the guy who came down with the goalline pick. Black had a huge play too. Most important as whole: OU just never had any big plays. Sure they complete some passes, they are good team, they are doing to do that. But think about the game – do any passes they had stick out in your memory? There were no big catches, and coverage was good enough they barely even tried any.
GRADE: A
Defense: The defense as a whole was greater than the sum of it parts. We won because of our defense. We put up 24 points, our lowest total of the season – but OU put up their lowest total of the season too. While I gave good grades to our offense, but they faced the easier task. Our defense clamped down – and I mean more than just those two huge goalline stands. They moved the ball some in the first half, but were struggling much more in the second. Branford went from 17 of 23 to 9 of 18 after halftime. There wasn’t much need for more goalline stops.
ST: You know Brandon James (25) has been quiet over the last half of the season. He was again. We did block a fieldgoal – but it was a long one that was very low over the line. We also kept a drive alive with a roughing the kicker. They had a few returns which for a moment made my throat catch even if they went no where at the end.
GRADE: B-
Coaching: Usually I talk about Meyer in the coaching section, but the offense was not that great – although the triple option was a nice new wrinkle. And special teams was quiet. Honestly I can’t honestly say I thought about any decision he made at all during the game. That’s not a knock, there just was not a moment for a crucial in game decision this time. I do want to take a moment to talk about Charlie Strong (he’s our defensive coordinator – the one who is no leaving, but more on that in a sec). I’d never seen a no-huddle team in person before – it is easy to see how it can work, you get distracted for a second and its over. Yes, we had five weeks to prepare and didn’t handle it perfectly in the first half, but we never got snookered by it. That is a credit to Strong. And, as I said, the right adjustments were made at half. This whole season he made a great defense without any natural pass rushers. Thankfully he will be back, because he is black and that kills his chances of getting a job in the SEC (the conference that would know the most about him and be the most likely to hire him) – especially since he evidently has a white wife. It’s ugly, but true.
GRADE: A
Football 101: On an option play the quarterback runs one side of the field and a runningback runs along side him. As the defense closes in he decides if he should run the ball or toss it to the runningback so he can run depending on what the defenders do. Almost every college team runs this play occasionally, some use it as one of their staples. On a “triple option” there is someone underneath (closer to the defense) the quarterback so he has two options. Georgia Tech’s new coach uses this as his specialty (he established his rep with it at Navy). It works pretty well, but even more so if the defense is not ready. Our version used Meyer’s favorite play – the shovel pass (when the QB tosses the ball a short distance underhanded), which he finally found a worthwhile use for. OU was not expecting it.
Football 101 #2 (end of the season bonus): After every play all the players on offense get together in a group (“the huddle”) and discuss what they are going to do on the next play. But sometimes, usually if time is running out at the end of the half, teams won’t huddle and will just run to their spots, have the QB shout out the play (in code), and start the next play. Other times a team does it just to shake the game up if their offense has not been going well – it is tough on a defense because they can’t change out their players and may tire out (defensive players tire out quicker than offensive ones, probably because defenders are reacting, while offensive guys know where they are going). This is called going “no huddle.” Some times, including the Sooners, do this most of the time to put pressure on defenses.
Momentum: The game started out quiet, both teams feeling the other out. Tebow’s first pick was bad, but nothing we could not bounce back from – and it went nowhere. We finally scored and that is always a good sign to score first, but then they ran all over use and tied it 7-7 and there was a ton of alarm because that had been way too easy. There was the feeling we had awoke a sleeping giant by scoring. The second pick was absolute disaster. You know the Gators are a good team and can come back from being down, but you don’t want to test it. The goalline stand was huge, but when they came down again before the half there you had to start to wonder how many times the defense would be able to answer the bell. You have to remember their offense had looked better than ours at this point. I remember commenting how bad it would be to give up a score right at the end of the half, when it didn’t happen there was relief and the feeling of dodging a bullet – not the confidence after the first one. They had gotten deep into our end three times in the second quarter, you can only hold a team off so many times… We scored, but that didn’t seem that momentous at the time, neither did blocking their fieldgoal, because you knew it was a long one they were not likely to make. You could just tell both teams were not done. And that feeling carried through their next TD. We had scored twice and they and answered twice, but they were always having to catch up to us. We came down, moving the ball well, but stalled out deep and had to take three when we had been so close to seven. It was a bit of a buzz kill, even as I complimented Tebow for throwing the ball away rather than forcing it on second and third down and intellectually knew in a tight game three points was something. Then they started moving the ball, but there was less worry, we had been moving the ball this half, even if they scored I was confident we could be able to come back down and get another chance. The Black interception was just what the doctor ordered – literally, I had just said what we really needed was a turnover, and I am not the type to say that all the time. The previous time we got a pick we had no chance to do anything with it. Then we drove for a score and the game was over.
You maybe hadn’t noticed, but you could feel that their offense was not good enough tonight to do it. And they quickly fizzled out. You just watched Tebow run out the clock to make sure nothing stupid happened and then relief. Overall it was very much a three hour heartattack.
Player of game: No contest, Percy Harvin. He had the only two big plays of the game. Maybe he is better as a RB than a WR (his routes and hands are not the best), but in this game he was the guy. Even his TD run was impressive as he punched it in.
Play of game: The interception. No, not Black’s – the Haden-Markie Anderson (14)-Black-Stamper-Wright interception. That absolutely took points away from Oklahoma in a tight game and robbed them of what could have been a major momentum boost to end the half. If they even get three there it might have ended up a very different game. Plus it was just one of those plays you were expecting to not happen, the ball always bounces around and hits the ground, our guys were the keystone cops (5 guys there and they barely came up with it remember) so when it happened it was sweet. Black’s pick was big too – turnovers late in big games always are - but by that point it was clear our offense could move the ball on them. I’m not sure that even bigger than then first goalline stand. At that is not because of where I was sitting.
Fans: We were a pretty subdued bunch. The big Vikingesque guy said it was because it was a Thursday and people had to work during the day, but I think the majority of folks there were from elsewhere. I think it was because both sides were a little nervous. These are two big name, storied franchises you don’t want to be shown up on national TV. And you had a sense the other team was legit. I was feeling good after Ole Miss handled Texas Tech and Texas limped past Ohio State (Ohio State!!), but you never know… We had them outnumbered, but more so in the stadium that without. There were lots of people looking for tickets, but I only saw 1-2 guys selling. We had at least two-thirds inside the stadium, probably more. Afterwards it was a big lovefest, they played hard and we acknowledged it and they were complimentary in return. We weren’t our usual smack talking selves (too bad as I had some great smack talk planned: “Texas would have given us a better game” and if we were blowing them out “What is this? For all the money I paid for this ticket you better make this a better game” – instead I told the Sooner fan in front of me that they played hard. He did not seem that upset. Maybe he was drunk, he did not seem it. But I would not have been as devastated to lose that game as I would have thought I would before the game – someone has to lose the good games. And this was a good game, if not an epic).
Refs: These were ACC refs and I guess they felt the need to be as bad as their conference. Maybe I am too harsh, but I am not someone who usually blasts the refs – I accept they are humans and make mistakes the same as the players do – but come on!! They botched the clock three times in the first half. You shouldn’t need to replay a pass that clearly fell five yards away from Louis Murphy.
GRADE: F-
