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.
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.
Good job, Inspector Holmes
I have been arguing all year that too much is made of OU’s offensive line woes and pass defense breakdowns. And Lendy Holmes just showed why, on the latter. After Tech opened the game with short pass completions of 8, 7, 7 and 7 yards, quarterback Graham Harrell overthrew flanker Danny Amendola — who wasn’t looking anyway — and free safety Lendy Holmes made an easy interception. Then he dashed 63 yards to a touchdown with a nifty nose for running.
That’s a by-product of Mike Leach’s offense. You can move the ball. You can pile up yardage. You can make big plays. You also give the defense the chance to do the same.
