Miles to Michigan?
LSU’s triple-overtime loss to Arkansas means Michigan can go after its man a month earlier than if the Bayou Bengals had made the national championship game. Les Miles’ dream job is Michigan, and no one can blame him for bolting LSU for his alma mater. Miles couldn’t very well dance with Michigan during a national-championship race, but with LSU playing for lesser status goals — the SEC title, a Sugar Bowl berth — Miles might go ahead and take the Michigan job early.
The question is, what becomes of Bo Pelini, the LSU defensive coordinator who was Bob Stoops’ co-defensive coordinator in 2004 and long-time family friend from Youngstown? Pelini was a very popular d-coordinator at Nebraska in 2003 and is one of the popular picks to take over for Bill Callahan, who surely coached his last game Friday, a 65-51 loss at Colorado. Pelini might be a candidate to take over at LSU, too.
LSU is a better job than Nebraska these days, though Lincoln is a better place to live. The football culture of Nebraska is demanding but more civil. LSU has a better talent pool, but the Big 12 North is an easier landmine than the SEC West. If Pelini gets his choice, he ought to take Nebraska.
LSU’s loss also is one more reason for OU to kick itself for losing at Texas Tech. The only downside to making the national title game was a possible matchup with LSU in New Orleans. That was a miserable experience for anyone from Oklahoma — fans, players, coaches — independent of the game, because of LSU’s abrasive fans. But now, LSU will not be in New Orleans for the title game. If OU had won out, the Sooners would be playing Ohio State or West Virginia for the national championship.
Hardware up for grabs
Here’s another great thing about this college football season. It’s Thanksgiving Friday, and of the nine pennant races that matter most — Big Ten, Big East and Pac-10 titles; division crowns in the Big 12, SEC and ACC — only three have been decided.
Ohio State is the Big Ten champion, and that’s decided because the Big Ten has closed up shop until the bowls. LSU has won the SEC West. And Boston College has clinched the ACC Atlantic. But all the other first-place finishes are up for grabs:
* Big East: West Virginia and Connecticut play Saturday for the title.
* Pac-10: USC and Arizona State lead, with Oregon a half game behind. Oregon wins all the tiebreakers. The Ducks play UCLA on Saturday and Oregon State on Dec. 1. Also on Dec. 1, Arizona State plays Arizona and USC plays UCLA.
* ACC Coastal: Virginia plays Virginia Tech for the title Saturday.
* SEC East: Tennessee wins the East if it wins Saturday at Kentucky. Otherwise, Georgia wins the East.
* Big 12 South: I assume you know this, but OU wins with a victory over OSU on Saturday. Texas wins the South it beats Texas A&M and OU loses Bedlam. If both OU and Texas close, then the Sooners, Longhorns and OSU tie for the South, with the BCS standings breaking the tie. OU likely would advance.
* Big 12 North: Missouri and Kansas play for the title on Saturday.
That’s great drama going into the final primary Saturday of the regular season and also why any expanded playoff system should include only conference champions. Think of the drama if on the day after Thanksgiving, 17 teams remained in the hunt for the national title.
And that’s not even counting the mid-majors, where conference titles remain up for grabs. Brigham Young has won the Mountain West, but Hawaii and Boise State play tonight for the WAC title; Troy and Florida Atlantic play Dec. 1 for the title, unless the Howard Schnellenbergers lose Saturday to winless Florida International; either Tulsa or Houston will play Central Florida for the Conference USA title; and Central Michigan and Miami-Ohio play in the Mid-American Conference title game.
Count ‘em up. Establish an 11-team playoff, and here as we eat a turkey sandwich for lunch the day after Thanksgiving, 27 teams would remain in the title hunt. With lots of drama still to come before we get to the 11-team bracket.
Adventures in Lubbock
WILD TIMES IN LUBBOCK
Anyone who has read me for awhile knows how much I like Lubbock, Texas. Wide streets, good people, old-West feel. I like it. I like it a lot. You can’t find 10 people walking the earth who would take Lubbock over Austin, but I would. Austin has its good points; it also has a lot of fruitcakes and a lot of traffic, neither of which do much for me.
Anyway, our road trip to Lubbock was fun. Andy Hutchison, newly-installed president of the Texas Association of Builders, took us out to lunch. Andy is an Oklahoma Christian University graduate from
Oklahoma City who is an OU football fan. He took us to Spanky’s, a great burger joint adjacent to campus, then gave us an auto tour of Tech. A few things I learned:
1. Tech’s campus is huge. Andy says it’s the largest continuous campus in America. That’s one of the things I like about Lubbock; lots of land.
2. Tech’s architecture is big-time cool. The Spanish Renaissance look is affixed to most buildings (although not, ironically, the architecture building, a truly horrible structure that is a first cousin of OU’s Physical Science monstrosity).
3. It’s not just at OU and OSU where the university has leveled neighborhoods to expand campus. Jones Stadium is on the east side of campus; Tech bought out blocks of houses east of the stadium and has put up contemporary apartment buildings, with retail along the ground floor. A similar enterprise is being built in Norman, about a mile east of Owen Field, and don’t be surprised if David Boren doesn’t endorse something similar next to campus.
4. United Spirit Arena, Tech’s basketball arena, is the grandest exterior coliseum I’ve ever seen. I love the architecture, which fits in perfectly with most of campus. I don’t know what would be second on that; LA’s Staples Center, I suppose.
5. Lubbock not only has wide streets, its side streets are wide AND have alleys. Amazing.
TEN BIG LOSERS FROM WEEK 12
10. Jeff Tedford: The California coach once was a hot commodity and might still be. But since the night of Oct. 13, when the Bears seemed on the verge of ascending to No. 1, Cal is 1-5.
9. Mid-American Conference: The MAC’s apparent best team, Central Michigan blew a 10-point lead in the fourth quarter and lost at home 48-45 to lowly Eastern Michigan. With only one week left in the regular season, the MAC has no teams with more than six wins.
8. Todd Dodge: The rookie North Texas coach didn’t do much to alleviate fears of how a high school coach can fare in major-college football. UNT is 1-9 after blowing a 27-17 lead with six minutes left against Arkansas State and losing 31-27.
7. Louisiana media: The poor guys who cover LSU face six weeks of speculation about Les Miles taking the Michigan job.
6. Kirk Ferentz: The Iowa coach rallied his Hawkeyes after a slow start, only to stumble against Western Michigan, 28-19, which probably will cost Iowa a bowl bid.
5. Ohio State-Michigan: These old war-horse programs never looked less athletic than in the Buckeyes’ 14-3 victory. It was rainy and cold, but still, no way these teams are that slow. But that’s exactly how they looked.
4. Vanderbilt: The Commodores get few chances to beat in-state rival Tennessee. Especially in
Knoxville. Especially when doing so would cost the Volunteers the SEC East. But Vandy led 24-9 in the fourth quarter before falling 25-24.
3. Nick Saban: Losing to Louisiana-Monroe was bad enough. Then Saban compared Alabama’s need to rebound from a “catastrophic event” like America did from the 9/11 attacks and Pearl Harbor. Uh-oh.
2. Oklahoma: The Sooners fell from the national title hunt with a loss at Texas Tech, but at least OU didn’t lose a possible Heisman Trophy as well. Like…
1. Dennis Dixon: The Oregon quarterback was the Heisman front-runner, but when his knee buckled against Arizona, away went the Heisman hopes — and Oregon’s national championship dream.
GOOD EATS
As I said, Andy Hutchison took us to Spanky’s for lunch Saturday, and I had some sort of triple cheeseburger, which had a politically incorrect name that I won’t repeat. Easily one of the best 10 cheeseburgers I’ve ever had. Mayo, mustard and ketchup, with a bunch of meat and bunch of cheese and a bunch of fixin’s, mashed tight.
But it wasn’t the best meal of the trip. Friday night, we went to Cagle’s, a steakhouse that ranks as my favorite Big 12 eatery, if you throw out Kansas City. Cagle’s sits out west of town and is set up like an old West town. Specializes in rib-eyes, with a slaw-and-beans bar, and cobbler for dessert.
Let’s make a deal. I’ll take all the spots that have cobbler and cannolis for dessert; you can have the chocolate mousse and cheesecake places.
TEN BIG WINNERS FROM WEEK 12
10. George O’Leary: The once-shamed coach again has Central Florida in the Conference USA title game, thanks to a 49-20 rout of SMU.
9. Indiana: The Hoosiers not only beat arch-rival Purdue for their first Old Oaken Bucket win since 2001, they reached seven wins to likely qualify for a bowl and make for a storybook season in the wake of coach Terry Hoeppner’s death.
8. Troy Calhoun: The Air Force looks like a winner in succeeding long-time coach Fisher DeBerry. Calhoun coached the Falcons to a 9-3 record after a 55-23 rout of San Diego State.
7. Rutgers: The Scarlet Knights’ aren’t the national rags-to-riches story they were a year ago, but a 20-16 victory over Pitt lifted Rutgers to seven wins and shows that Greg Schiano’s program is on solid ground.
6. Illinois: The once-lowly Illini beat Northwestern 41-22 to finish 9-3 and secure second place in the Big Ten.
5. Big East: West Virginia won 28-23 at Cincinnati in a solid game that shows this league has some depth.
4. Utah State: The Aggies seemed headed for a winless season under ex-OSU Cowboy Brent Guy, but Utah State won 35-17 at New Mexico State.
3. Charlie Weatherbie: The ex-OSU quarterback, now the coach at Louisiana-Monroe, produced one of the great upsets of the season, a 21-14 victory over Alabama that had perhaps the greatest salary discrepancy among head coaches as any game in NCAA history. Nick Saban: $4 million a year. Weatherbie: $130,000.
2. Matt Ryan: The Boston College quarterback, once a Heisman contender, reminded America he’s still a force, and so is BC. The Eagles won 20-17 at Clemson to secure one of the ACC division titles; Ryan threw for 315 yards.
1. Arrowhead Stadium: The college game of the year matches Kansas and Missouri in Kansas City? Who could have guessed? KU routed Iowa State and Missouri beat Kansas State, setting up a match in which the winner could play for the national championship.
DRIVING WEST
Nothing better than driving west out of Oklahoma City. We went I-40 because it’s a little quicker and we heard there is severe construction in Wichita Falls. Either way is fine with me. I like I-44 to Wichita Falls, then west on Highway 82 to Lubbock. You’re on the frontier when you’re west of Wichita Falls. There’s an exotic animal farm somewhere the other side of Seymour, with camels — yes, camels — roaming the range. But I-40 is interesting, too, and here are the highlights.
1. It’s never a bad idea to stop off in Weatherford or Clinton or Elk City, three of my favorite
Oklahoma towns. Our man Jake Trotter needed to hook up to the Internet to ship a story back to the office, so we pulled into the Weatherford Best Western, where some nice ladies let us use their wireless connection in the lobby. You meet good people in western Oklahoma.
2. The huge cross in Groom, Texas, does not produce the intended results. The giant steel cross is billed as the second-largest cross in the Western Hemisphere. You can see it from miles away. But somehow, the building labeled “Gift Shop” sitting next to the cross ruins it for me. Drive past the cross on I-40, and you end thinking not about your soul, but about your pocketbook.
3. Amarillo is overrated. Literally. Lubbock is twice as big as Amarillo, Lubbock has Texas Tech and Lubbock has superb medical facilities, including a medical school. Yet Amarillo is more famous. Ask 100 Oklahomans or downstate Texans which is bigger, and 75 would say Amarillo. Why? Because of Interstate 40, America’s new Main Street.
4. KOMA still packs a punch. I know, I know, 1520-AM now is called KOKC, but every Baby Boomer from Oklahoma City to Bakersfield feels a kinship with KOMA, the mega-powered radio station that once flew top-40 hits to teenagers all across the western U.S. and now delivers OU football and basketball to anyone in need. We listened to the OU-Gardner Webb game on I-27, between Lubbock and Amarillo. We’re 350 miles from home and still picking up the Sooners.
Which reminds me of a 1995 trip to Wyoming for an OSU football game. Comrade Mac Bentley and myself drove to Centennial, Wyo., 30 miles west of Laramie, for dinner. On the way back to Laramie, we picked up KOMA and listened to a Moore-Putnam North football game. Strangest feeling in the world; driving by the Rockies, thinking how big is the world, and listening to J.D. Northcutt call the Moore Lions and thinking how small is the world.
5. The Texas Panhandle is BIG. I’ve driven from Amarillo to Dalhart, and from Amarillo to
Lubbock, and you’re talking about some serious real estate. Think of it this way; western Oklahoma, from Oklahoma City to the Texas Panhandle and from the Kansas line to the Red River, is 34,000 square miles, not counting the Oklahoma Panhandle. The Texas Panhandle alone is 25,823 square miles. It’s one big place.
BOWL PROJECTIONS
The bowl lineup is a long way from completion but is a little more focused each week. My predictions:
Jan. 7 Big Bowl: LSU vs. Missouri
Jan. 6 GMAC: Tulsa vs. Bowling Green
Jan. 5 International: Cincinnati vs. Ball State
Jan. 3 Orange: Virginia Tech vs. West Virginia
Jan. 2 Fiesta: Kansas vs. Arizona State
Jan. 1 Rose: Ohio State vs. USC
Jan. 1 Sugar: Georgia vs. Hawaii
Jan. 1 Outback: Auburn vs. Wisconsin
Jan. 1 Cotton: Oklahoma vs. Tennessee
Jan. 1 Gator: Texas Tech vs. Virginia
Jan. 1 Capital One: Florida vs. Illinois
Dec. 31 Armed Forces: Air Force vs. Purdue
Dec. 31 Sun: California vs. South Florida
Dec. 31 Humanitarian: North Carolina State vs. Boise State
Dec. 31 Music City: Arkansas vs. Florida State
Dec. 31 Chick-fil-A: Kentucky vs. Boston College
Dec. 31 Insight: Colorado vs. Indiana
Dec. 30 Independence: Kansas State vs. Mississippi State
Dec. 29 Meineke Car Care: Wake Forest vs. Connecticut
Dec. 29 Liberty: Central Florida vs. Alabama
Dec. 29 Alamo: Oklahoma State vs. Penn State
Dec. 28 Texas: Texas A&M vs. Houston
Dec. 28 Champs Sports: Clemson vs. Michigan
Dec. 28 Emerald: Georgia Tech vs. Oregon State
Dec. 27 Holiday: Texas vs. Oregon
Dec. 26 Motor City: Michigan State vs. Central Michigan
Dec. 23 Hawaii: Southern Miss vs. Fresno State
Dec. 22 Papajohns.com: Rutgers vs. Memphis
Dec. 22 New Mexico: New Mexico vs. South Carolina
Dec. 22 Las Vegas: Oregon vs. BYU
Dec. 21 New Orleans: Troy vs. East Carolina
Dec. 20 Poinsettia: Utah vs. Navy
Remembering Youngstown
Last week, on the 25th anniversary of the death of Korean boxer Deuk-Koo Kim, ESPN aired a documentary on the life and boxing career of Ray “Boom Boom” Mancini, the fighter whose blows in the ring led to Kim’s death four days later. Mancini’s career never was the same after that tragedy.
Mancini grew up in Youngstown, Ohio. On Detroit Avenue. On the same block as all the kids of Ron and Dee Stoops. Boom Boom Mancini was a 1979 graduate of Cardinal Mooney High School, one year behind Bob Stoops, one year ahead of Mike Stoops.
The mention of Mancini on Tuesday released a flood of memories for Bob Stoops. They played Pop Warner football together. High school baseball. They roamed the streets of Youngstown. All the boys around the neighborhood would congregate in someone’s basement, and they would rope off a ring and have bouts. “I didn’t box him, though; no one fought Ray,” Stoops said. “You kiddin’ me?”
The more Stoops talked about Mancini, the more he talked about Youngstown. The DeBartolo family, which would go on to own the San Francisco 49ers, and Carmen Policy, who would run the 49ers during their Joe Montana heyday. Patriarch Edward DeBartolo Sr. flew the Stoops family to the Rose Bowl when Bob and Mike were Iowa defensive backs in the early 1980s. Jerry Angelo, the Chicago Bulls general manager. Bernie Kosar, the Cleveland Browns and Miami U. quarterback who is a couple of years younger than Mike Stoops. The Pelini family, including Bo, the LSU defensive coordinator and 2004 co-defensive coordinator for OU.
The Stoopses had six kids, the Pelinis seven. “All of us graduated together,” Bob Stoops said, meaning both families had kids about the same age. Vince Pelini was a co-captain with Stoops on the Cardinal Mooney High School basketball team.
Tuesday, a few minutes after Stoops left his press conference, he called my cell phone because he remembered yet another boyhood pal from Youngstown who went on to the sporting spotlight. Jackie Loew, a football teammate of Stoops at Cardinal Mooney, is the trainer for the new middleweight champion of the world, Kelly Pavlik, who beat Jermain Taylor on Sept. 30. Loew remains a close friend of Stoops; Loew was in Norman on Nov. 3 to attend the OU-A&M game as Stoops’ guest.
Stoops smiled as he talked about those Youngstown days. In the basement, a kid would hit a pole, “ding!”, to signify the bell, “and there you’d go. You didn’t want to fall down on the cement floor. One of your buddies would be your corner man.”
Stoops recalled Mancini. They played Pop Warner football on the Little Redmen team. “People don’t realize what a really good athlete he was,” Stoops said. “He was a scatback in football. In basketball, the point guard. In baseball, he played infield or pitched.”
Ron Stoops Sr. was a long-time football coach but baseball had been his best sport, and he was the Cardinal Mooney baseball coach. When Mancini got into high school, his boxing career took off. The Golden Gloves was big in Ohio; “back home, that arena would be full,” Stoops said. Mancini let the other sports go. But Ron Stoops told Mancini he could come out for the baseball team and miss whenever he needed to, for boxing. So Mancini would play a game or two for Mooney, “then he’d be gone for the next two weeks,” Bob Stoops said.
Mancini and Stoops remain friends. They talked a half hour or so a couple of weeks ago, Stoops said. Mancini hasn’t been to an OU home game yet, but he was at the USC Orange Bowl. Mancini lives in southern California and was scheduled to come visit the Sooners during their Rose Bowl trip, but his mother died that day. “His mom used to drive us around to all the basketball game,” Stoops said, remembering Youngstown days.
The loss to Texas Tech was only three days removed, and the Bedlam showdown only four days away, but for a few moments, it wasn’t 2007. Stoops took us all back to the 1970s, and Youngstown, Ohio.
Questions you want answered
Two OU fans separately emailed me a list of questions concerning the Sooners’ loss at Texas Tech. I thought I would share the questions, provide my take and try to remember to ask Bob Stoops on Tuesday:
1. Why didn’t OU throw to the tight ends with a back-up QB
Makes perfect sense to me. I know you can’t trash the whole game plan when a quarterback goes down, but it sure seems that short passes to big targets is sound strategy for a new quarterback.
2. Why didn’t OU run the ball?
Well, the Sooner tailbacks ended up with 30 carries, which isn’t horribly low in a game in which you’re playing from behind. But the point is well made. The Sooners seemed to abandon the run quickly. After Tech took a 20-7 lead, OU came out with three straight Joey Halzle passes; two incompletions and a sack. On the opening drive of the third quarter, trailing 27-7, three more straight passes, followed by a 4th-and-1 fake punt. Soon enough, it was 34-10, and the running game was moot.
3. Why the fade routes in the end zone with a back-up quarterback?
I have no idea. I hate the fade, unless you’ve got 6-foot-8 Harold Carmichael on your team or you’re throwing to Rashaun Woods against SMU. To me, the fade is an admission that you’re out of ideas.
4. Why do the players that make the same mistakes game in game out continue to play without getting pulled, i.e. Patrick, Loadholt?
Well, I have no idea how Loadholt is playing. But how much more pulled can Patrick get? He got only one more carry after fumbling on OU’s first play of the game.
5. Where is the pass rush?
In street clothes. Injuries to Auston English and John Williams have decimated the OU ends. Alonzo Dotson has been around forever and is one of my favorite players, but he’s not a big-time pass rusher. Plus Alan Davis, who played well early against Tech, got hurt, too.
6. Why has this secondary been torched almost every game for the last 4-5 seasons?
That’s an easy one. Every secondary in America is getting torched the last four or five years. That’s why I hold offense responsible for OU’s two losses this season. The Sooner offense did nothing against Colorado or Tech.
7. Why kick a field goal from the 2-yard line at the end of the first half?
I don’t know. Bad decision. Trailing Tech by 20 points, you’re not going catch up by kicking field goals.
8. Murray in and out. What is Cale Gundy doing with his tailback rotation?
I don’t know, and with Murray’s injury that will stop, but it was downright goofy. In recent weeks, it became clear Murray was OU’s best tailback, and Saturday night he was OU’s only weapon. Yet with 4:12 left in the first half, Murray had three carries. Chris Brown had seven. That kind of nonsense is why you can’t blame all this defeat on Sam Bradford’s injury.
9. Why did OU not accept a holding penalty in the first quarter, which would have made it 3rd-and-20 instead of 4th-and-10? Tech kicked a 51-yard field goal on the next play.
I thought it was a good call by Stoops. Any time you’re playing Tech, and you’ve got a chance to get your defense off the field, take it. Alex Trlica is a good kicker, but 51-yard field goals are no sure thing in college football.
10. OU continues not to have a backup quarterback ready to play and that was a big key. This is a coaching gaffe and finally caught up with them.
The only problem I’ve got with the reluctance not to insert the backup is the danger factor. Get your quarterback hurt in the fourth quarter of a rout, and that would be disastrous. But to say Joey Halzle could have picked up valuable experience playing the second half against Utah State, well, I don’t buy it. Playing when you don’t have to perform, and the game is over, is not experience.
11. Questionable play calling by Kevin Wilson. Wilson has not really shown much. Check it out; most offensive coordinators are not offensive line coaches.
I don’t know. I thought this Tech game was a bad play-calling night, but I’ve heard it long before that game. Fans’ favorite pastime is to bash the offensive coordinator. I think Wilson is a fine offensive coordinator. I think he had a poor game. And Les Miles was an offensive line coach who was a heck of a coordinator.
12. The fake punt was a horrible attempt. If you want to go for it, line up and go.
Well, yes, and I don’t see how any could argue otherwise. In fact, it will be interesting to see if Stoops tries to defend that one. Goofy, goofy call. I mean, you’ve got 330-pound linemen, blocking for DeMarco Murray, against a soft defensive front. If you can’t make a yard, you have no business beating Tech anyway.
Will Leach have compassion?
Will Mike Leach show mercy on his old boss? That question actually was asked in the Jones Stadium pressbox, after Texas Tech took a stunning 27-7 lead on Oklahoma. With OU’s defense suddenly incapable of stopping Tech, and OU’s offense going nowhere with backup QB Joey Halzle, the question was legit.
The answer is obvious. Heck no, Leach won’t show compassion. He’ll take any Sooner trophy he can stick on the end of his sword and parade it all over the stadium. Not in reality, of course, but on the scoreboard. Leach takes no prisoners. He’ll not even spare his old boss.
Getting out of hand
This is getting out of hand. Tech leads 20-7, and the early defensive success has withered, and OU’s offense has done nothing. With 12:18 left in the second quarter, Tech has outgained OU 201-38 in total yards. Joey Halzle has looked shaky in his two series; his stumble on a 3rd-and-1 play, trying to hand off the ball, was a bad sign. Can it be long before we see Kid Nichol?
Murray the answer
If Sam Bradford is through, then OU’s options on winning this game decrease mightily. Without Bradford, no way the Sooners win a shootout with Texas Tech. Without Bradford, here’s how OU can win: play tough defense — tough, tough defense — and hold Tech to a reasonable amount of points. Twenty-seven or so. Then you run the ball on offense. Hand the ball to DeMarco Murray and hammer Tech. Most teams have run like crazy on Tech. OU should too.
Trouble in Hub City
Uh-oh. OU quarterback Sam Bradford is on the sidelines, perhaps being checked for a concussion. OU’s drive with backup Joey Halzle started promisingly, with a 9-yard run by DeMarco Murray, but Duke Robinson’s personal-foul penalty sent the Sooners back. Then Halzle threw incomplete deep, then was sacked.
Could this be another Oregon? The Ducks disintegrated when quarterback Dennis Dixon went down early against Arizona on Thursday night. Of course, one difference. Oregon looked before Dixon went down. OU’s offense didn’t do squat in its first two possessions.
Solid pass rush so far
Midway through the first quarter, OU’s Auston Englishless pass rush is performing quite well. No sacks, but plenty of hurries. Texas Tech quarterback Graham Harrell is 8 of 18 passing, with one interception. English’s sub, Alan Davis, has knocked down two passes. Also pressuring Harrell has been D.J. Wolfe and Lewis Baker on blitzes, and DeMarcus Granger and Gerald McCoy from the middle. OU’s defense is playing well. OU’s offense has not done much.
