For the Year: 18-23-1 (.439) ($730) ATS 28-14 (.667) SU
What we learned last week:
We learned that Alabama can pass for 92 yards, turn the ball over 4 times, commit 10 penalties for 113 yards, get a defensive touchdown and it is classified as a “gritty” win and move up in the polls. Love your double standards, voters.
We learned that Georgia Tech can complete one pass all night and still win a football game over a team that was considered to be a national championship contender. Gotta love college football this year.
We learned that sometimes you have to steal lines from the Internet. “Charlie Weis now has 2 moral victories to 3 losses in his career to USC.”
We learned that Blaine Gabbert has turned into Cody Hawkins. Yes, he’s injured, but get out of the game if you can’t do any better than 5 interceptions in 5 quarters. Earl Thomas and Aaron Williams are licking their chops….
We learned that Texas Tech can get 259 yards of total offense and still beat Nebraska in Lincoln by 21 points. What the hell? Credit Tech’s improving rush defense for the win, they held Nebraska to 70 yards on 30 carries….
And finally, we learned that at this point Earl Thomas and Aaron Williams are closer to winning the Heisman Trophy than Colt McCoy, but the Longhorns are 6-0 with a win over Oklahoma and in control of their own destiny in the Big 12 and the national picture, and I’ll take that any season.
Anyhow…
It was September of 1963.
Donald Draper, a New York advertising executive, husband and father of three, had a wandering eye, and that eye had found his daughter’s teacher, Miss Farrell. One night in post-coital bliss, she tells Don about a question a student had asked her recently:
“How do I know if the color blue is the same blue that you see?”
I am of course speaking of the AMC television show Mad Men, a television drama about Draper, the ad man from New York, and his suburban family and their lives growing up in the transition from the conservative 1950’s to the care-free 1960’s.
What seemed to be a throwaway line from Miss Farrell raises a good point. What if the color blue that I see isn’t the color blue that you see? What if these Texas Longhorns aren’t the Texas Longhorns you see?
We heard ad nauseum this off-season about how this season compared to the 2005 team’s title run. They ended the previous season with a monumental win over a Big 10 power in a BCS bowl. The favorite that season was a seemingly unbeatable team led by the Heisman Trophy winner from the previous year. The 2010 National Championship game is held at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, the same site of the 2006 championship game. The favorite coming in beat Oklahoma in the prior national championship game. We had the same conference schedule this year that we had that year.
But what if the color blue is actually the 1963 national championship team?
In 1963, thousands of miles away from the fictional Don Draper, the Longhorns were led onto the field by a sophomore linebacker from San Antonio, Tommy Nobis. Nobis went on to be a two-time All-American, made the All-Conference team three times, won the Knute Rockne award, the Outland Trophy, the Maxwell Award and finished 7th in the Heisman Trophy balloting his senior year.
The hallmark of that 1963 team? Defense.
“We didn’t just kill anybody in 1963 if you look at the scores. We had a great defense and hadn’t shown much on offense,” said David McWilliams, an offensive lineman on that team, and the future head coach at Texas.
The 52.6 completion percentage in Saturday’s game against Oklahoma was Colt McCoy’s worst since October 2007, and the 16 points and 256 yards the Longhorns gained were the worst since 2006.
The Longhorns won that game with defense, led by the efforts of sophomore safety Earl Thomas, and by sophomore cornerback Aaron Williams, who might have had the best interception I have ever seen. The fruits of two years in a Will Muschamp system are beginning to pay off in a big way.
So who are these Longhorns. This is a game they lose in 2000. In 2001. 2002. 2003. 2004. 2007. Because those teams didn’t have the defensive swagger that this team has.
That 1963 team entered the season ranked fifth in the country and then beat Texas Tech early in the season. They then went on to beat Oklahoma 28-7, went on the road to beat Arkansas 17-13 and beat Texas A&M 15-13. They failed to score more than 17 points in 6 conference games and needed a miracle interception by Don Carlisle to beat Baylor.
But the defense that year was relentless. They only gave up 72 points in 11 games, holding Baylor and TCU scoreless late in the season. The most points they gave up that season? 13 points to Arkansas and A&M.
The Longhorns entered the Cotton Bowl having already secured the AP National Championship, which rewarded their national title before the bowl games, but the Longhorns still had national championship hopes to hold on to from other publications.
Their opponent? #2 Navy. Led by a young quarterback named Roger Staubach.
Heisman trophy winning Roger Staubach.
The Longhorns were a big underdog that day.
“The papers said we were up there,” McWilliams said, “but there was no way we could keep up with Staubach.”
Before the game, the usually quiet Darrell Royal entered the locker room and offered up one simple phrase…
“We’re ready.”
Were they ever. The Longhorn defense pummeled Staubach that day and the Longhorns were up 21-0 before the half. Staubach was held to -47 yards rushing and the Longhorns cruised to their first national title, 28-6.
Later in that episode of Mad Men, Don Draper is recognized as a leader in the advertising industry, receiving an award during the time that the company is for sale, his wife is unhappy with his philandering ways (and the fact that she found out this episode that he was married before…long story) and his mistress appears to be on the verge of going from casual fling to crazed stalker.
You get the impression that the writers want you to see Draper at the apex before the world comes crashing down around him, in his work life, in his home life, and with the John F. Kennedy assassination looming, the nation crumbling around him as well.
The Longhorns have nearly reached the height of the apex they reached last year before everything came tumbling down. They need to get better on offense, for sure, but this defense is good enough to win a national title, and any offense that they can get is an added bonus.
And on Thanksgiving night, the Longhorns hope to step onto the field in College Station to end the regular season, needing a victory to preserve their first undefeated regular season since 2005, with an opportunity to win the Big 12 and the national title in the coming weeks.
But that night will be special in more than one way.
The Longhorns will honor longtime head coach Darrell Royal by wearing replica uniforms from the 1963 National Championship team.
Enjoy the world as it is. They change it, and they never give you a reason. – Mad Men
FACEBOOK NEWS FEED
Bennett Salvatore[b] has joined the group [b]SEC Football Officials.
The Wild Horn Sam Bradford coming back to OU and The Balloon Boy have joined the group Worst Ideas of the 21st Century.
The Texas Offense and Opportunism are no longer in a relationship.
Iowa can’t wait to get their ass beat by USC in the Rose Bowl.
Mike Sherman is worried about his upcoming job evaluation.
Jim Tressell needs some 50 Cent on his iPod, apparently.
On to the games...
Tennessee @ Alabama -14.5:
Tennessee was off last week, coming off a very satisfying 45-19 thumping of Georgia, while Alabama had a dogfight in Tuscaloosa with South Carolina before pulling away late.
The Volunteers should be well rested, but will it matter? Alabama has won two straight in this series by a sizable margin, and held the Volunteers to just 173 total yards last year.
Tennessee’s defense will keep them in this game for a while, especially with Alabama quarterback Greg McElroy struggling lately (he has looked very pedestrian against Virginia Tech, Kentucky, Mississippi and South Carolina, all ranked in the Top 17 in pass defense), but the Alabama defense is better, and McElroy won’t kill your team like Tennessee QB Jonathan Crompton.
Alabama 27 Tennessee 17
ATS – Tennessee
SU – Alabama
TCU -2.5 @ BYU:
ESPN’s Gameday is in Provo for this one, and it is legit. #8 TCU against #16 BYU, with a Mountain West conference title on the line and a BCS Bowl opportunity on the line for the Horned Frogs. How do they handle being the hunted instead of the hunter?
TCU beat BYU 32-7 last year, ending BYU’s 16 game winning streak, and they did it with the running game, outrushing the Cougars 240-23 yards. BYU QB Max Hall had an underwhelming performance, barely completing half of his passes and throwing 2 interceptions.
This one is in Provo, but give me the Horned Frogs. Andy Dalton has been outstanding at quarterback, and BYU simply does not pressure the quarterback. Dalton will have time to exploit it, quiet the crowd, and the TCU defense will hold their own.
TCU 28 BYU 24
ATS – TCU
SU – TCU
Florida -23 @ Mississippi State:
Somehow, Florida hasn’t won in Starkville since 1985, with 4 straight losses in that time. The Gators have struggled in recent weeks, while Mississippi State has lost 3 out of 4.
The only way that Mississippi State has a chance in this game is if they can run the ball, something they have had success with this year. They ran for 209 yards against Georgia Tech, 151 yards on LSU and 167 yards on Auburn earlier this year.
Something else that the Bulldogs have going for them? New head coach Dan Mullen was the Florida offensive coordinator for the past 4 years and was with Urban Meyer at Utah and Bowling Green as well. He knows Meyer, and he knows Tim Tebow. After a rough, physical game last week, and with rival Georgia on deck, this looks like another trap game.
Florida 28 Mississippi State 14
ATS – Mississippi State
SU – Florida
Texas A&M @ Texas Tech -21.5:
Don’t you love a good rivalry game? Texas A&M fans have quieted on the notion that they aren’t rivals with Tech, and with good reason as Tech has won 8 of the last 10 in this series, including 4 in a row.
Roe vs. Wade allowed what happened in Manhattan last week, as the Aggies simply gave up and lost to a very mediocre to bad Kansas State team by 48 points, oh yeah, the same Kansas State team that Tech beat by 52 the week before.
A night game in Lubbock, where Tech is looking for momentum going into the second half of the season, where the students are hungry for a win over a big rival and where one of the teams has obviously given up.
Recipe for disaster. I only wish it were on TV.
Texas Tech 51 Texas A&M 21
ATS – Texas Tech
SU – Texas Tech
Oklahoma -7.5 @ Kansas:
The question here is whether or not the Kansas offense score some points on a very good Oklahoma defense. Yes, KU lost to Colorado last week, but Todd Reesing still threw for 401 yards, they just weren’t able to run the ball (at all) and gave Colorado a short field too many times. Their offensive production is up from this point last year, but they have yet to face a defense anywhere near the caliber of Oklahoma’s.
Kansas was able to put up 491 yards on Oklahoma last year, but this OU defense appears to be better, and Kansas hasn’t played anyone near the caliber of what they will face on Saturday.
Oklahoma 28 Kansas 17
ATS – Oklahoma
SU – Oklahoma
Texas -13.5 @ Missouri:
We all remember the game last year, where Texas jumped out to a 35-3 halftime lead in which Mack Brown this week called the most dominating half of football he’s had here. The Longhorns racked up 591 total yards of offense that night, completed 30/33 passes and converted 10 of 12 third down conversions.
Missouri’s scoring average is down to 29.3 ppg this year, down from 42.2 last year. Last year at this time they were 42nd in the nation in rushing offense, 3rd in passing offense, 3rd in total offense and 3rd in scoring offense. This year they are 91st, 14th, 40th and 45th in those respective categories.
Their defense is improved, however. Last year at this time they ranked 82nd in the country in total defense and 113th in pass defense. This year they rank 45th and 48th. They held an Oklahoma State team averaging 413 yards per game to 351 total yards. They held a Nebraska team averaging 384 yards per game to 263 yards. They held a Nevada team that is averaging 479 yards per game to 364 yards. So don’t expect the same ol’ Missouri that scores a bunch of points but gives up plenty as well.
Missouri quarterback Blaine Gabbert has an ongoing ankle issue. He might be in trouble Saturday night against a Texas defense that A.) isn’t allowing anyone to run on them this season; B.) is forcing teams into 3rd and longs; and C.) can bring the house when a team is in third and long. Bad Ankle + Team knowing you have to pass = bad news
Missouri started with what was thought to be at the time an impressive 37-9 win over Illinois, but unfortunately Illinois has collapsed faster than Jim Zorn’s approval rating in Washington. They have only scored 29 points total in their last two games after scoring less than 29 points in only two games last year (against Oklahoma State and Oklahoma).
But the Longhorns are different, too. Brandon Collins and Quan Cosby are not on this team, and they combined for 13 catches for 150 yards against this team last year. It is time for another receiver (or two) to step up into that void. It appeared that Dan Buckner was going to be that guy earlier in the year, but he fell off, and John Chiles and James Kirkendoll are simply not getting the job done. Malcolm Williams and Marquise Goodwin get their first start of the year in an effort to jumpstart a surprisingly inefficient offense.
But the Texas defense has been ridiculous this year. Texas opponents are averaging .3 yards per carry over the last four games. Go read that again and think about how ridiculous that is. .3 yards. One foot. The length from your wrist to your elbow, Texas is giving that up per carry over four games against Texas Tech, UTEP, Colorado and Oklahoma. Will Muschamp’s defense has now given up only 32 rushing yards to Oklahoma in two years, at a clip of .667 yards per carry.
Texas needs to withstand the initial rush of excitement in Columbia. A night game in what is essentially their bowl game makes for a hostile environment, but come out early and hit them in the mouth and the crowd shuts up quickly.
Call me an idiot, but Texas has to cover sometime, right?
Texas 34 Missouri 17
ATS – Texas
SU – Texas
Random Hot Dallas Chick
For entertainment purposes only. Save your money for your Sam Bradford as Balloon Boy Halloween costume.
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