All the talk of BCS mess-up’s and playoffs and Texas this and Oklahoma that and Florida this and Alabama that came to a head this past weekend.
The first weekend in December is Championship Week in college football and more importantly is the week where everything is decided. All the remaining uncrowned conference champions were crowned and all the bowl games were announced. Going into the week the only two stories in the college football world centered on the Big-12 and SEC title games and for completely different reasons: Florida/Bama was talked about in a heated and anticipatory manner with game of the year hype, Oklahoma/Missouri had the “should Texas be here instead?” question cloud any pre-game hype for the game itself. And despite the fact that these were the two stories in the college football world, the week itself was full of stories because, like the last month or so, it was a week full of big games. USC and UCLA played a harder hitting game than usual with USC again spanking the Bruins, Navy shutout Army in devastating fashion, East Carolina narrowly beat Tulsa despite an insane amount of turnovers from Tulsa for the Conference USA title, and Notre Dame did make it to a bowl game. Oh and in the pro football world Plaxico Burress shot himself with that story unfolding throughout the week as well as the Cowboys blowing it against Pittsburgh and the Titans, Giants, and Cardinals all clinching their divisions. Again, despite the focus being otherwise, this was far more than a two-story week in football.
Tebow wills Gators to SEC title, national title berth
To many college football fans, myself included, this was the main-event this past weekend.
Tim Tebow provided another example of why he will go down as one of the great college football players of all time and possibly the best quarterback to ever play college football this past weekend. With Percy Harvin watching from the sidelines and gainst the top-ranked team in the country, Tebow helped the Florida Gators to their second BCS title game in the last three years with a 31-20 win over Alabama for the SEC title.
Tebow’s statistics portray another typical Tebow outing: 14/22 for 216 yards and three touchdowns passing, 17 carries for 57 yards rushing. But what made this performance stand out was the raw, unfiltered emotion that Tebow showed on the field Saturday. In front of a national T.V. audience with a conference title and national title berth on the line, Tebow was as raw as it got never wavering from his intensity until the final clock read zeros and the Gators were once again SEC champions. The image that I, and many like me, took away from this game was Tebow charging the kickoff team and pumping them up after Tebow had thrown the game-clinching touchdown. Why was Tebow still so intense with the game seemingly in the bag? There was still 2:50 left to play.
Despite Tebow shining the brightest once again, it was not as if this was another Florida slaughter. For three and a half quarters, John Parker Wilson went stride for stride with Tebow and kept Alabama in a game that they lead 10-7 at halftime. Parker finished 12/25 for 187 yards through the air, another decent Parker performance. Sadly, something more than decent was needed.
Glen Coffee’s power and ability at the running back position provided The Tide with their offensive spark throughout this game as Coffee’s 18-yard touchdown run let Florida know that it wasn’t going to be an easy day and Coffee coming through again and again on third down or any short yardage situation kept that notion fresh in the minds of the Gators.
Coffee finished with 112 yards on 21 carries.
Tide receiver Julio Jones had a breakthrough performance in front of a national audience as the freshman caught five passes (all of them big) for 124 yards on the day.
In the end, this was SEC football at its best: hard hitting, a good air and ground balance, and two big name high ranked teams providing a game that lived up to the hype. For around fifty-five minutes, this game was dead even with neither side giving up an inch as The Tide simply ran out of gas first. All of the Ali/Frazier metaphors made by announcers throughout the game were not only necessary, but also dead on.
Sooners erase all doubt with fifth straight 60-point performance and Big-12 title
It was no surprise that Oklahoma dominated or even scored sixty once again in clubbing Missouri for the Big-12 title.
In fact the only real surprise during this game was Bob Stoops maintaining the same attitude on the sidelines—that of a coach who apparently forced himself to believe that the game was 0-0 throughout—long after the game had been clinched.
The game didn’t take too long to be clinched as Sam Bradford may have clinched himself the Heisman Trophy with another spectacular outing. Bradford went 34/49 for 384 yards and two touchdowns through the air. And while this wasn’t the same performance that we have become accustomed to seeing out of Bradford—he didn’t account for four or five scores in this one—it’s because he didn’t need to have that kind of night.
When DeMarco Murray went down after the opening kickoff, Oklahoma lost a member of its one-two punch in the backfield. So what did they do? They went to the sidelines and got another man to fill in and make a new one-two punch.
Mossis Madu came off the bench and had the game of his life running for 114 yards on 15 carries and three touchdowns, two of them coming in the final quarter.
Chris Brown had another big night scoring three times as well while rushing for 122 yards on 27 carries.
Juaquin Iglesias had another (this is seeming like a repeating record isn’t it) big night with 125 yards on nine catches and caught both of Bradford’s touchdown passes. While Texas Tech’s Michael Crabtree will win receiver of the year honors and Dez Bryant has more highlight reel worthy grabs, I think it would be quite unfair to dismiss Iglesias’ terrific season and importance to the Sooner team with Bradford and Brown picking up the majority of the headlines.
And like all, but Colt McCoy that came before him, Chase Daniel fought a futile battle against the Oklahoma defense. Despite going 27/43 for 255 yards and three scores, his two interceptions (both of which turned into Oklahoma touchdowns) told more than anything else he could’ve done would.
With the 62 points, the Sooners became the first team in college football history to score sixty or more points in five consecutive games. They also passed Hawaii in 2006 for the highest scoring total for a regular season in college football history.
Buffalo ends Ball St.’s unbeaten season and takes MAC title
Turner Gill has coached himself into a bowl game.
The University of Buffalo was not known for much of anything outside of education before Gill came along as football coach and even then expectations were low at best. However, with an 8-5 record, a bowl berth, giving a previously unbeaten conference powerhouse their first loss, and now a conference title, Gill seems poised to win coach of the year honors after his Bulls shocked Ball St. 42-24 for the MAC title last Friday.
Five turnovers including four fumbles did in Ball St. on this night as their reliable and fruitful offense could never get into a groove long enough to do anything before another turnover would occur. More harmful to Ball St. was the fact that their five turnovers resulted in 28 points for Buffalo.
Two of Buffalo’s four touchdowns off of turnovers were on fumble returns in the third quarter that turned a close game into a blowout in progress. Mike Newton and Sherrod Lott returned Ball St. fumbles 92 and 74 yards respectively for touchdowns in the third quarter. The touchdowns came on consecutive Ball St. possessions, consecutive possessions that were in scoring range both times. Ball St. led 17-14 before the first fumble and wouldn’t score again until they were down 35-17 with less than five minutes to play in the game.
Virginia Tech uses defense to overpower Boston College for ACC Title
Same teams, same result. That was the story as Virginia Tech beat Boston College for the second year in a row in the ACC title game and like last year, they did it with their defense.
Orion Martin’s fumble return touchdown in the fourth quarter clinched the Hokies’ second straight trip to the Orange Bowl as the Hokies hit harder on defense and forced Boston College to commit more mistakes as the turnover battle was basically equal (4-3 with Boston College committing more). The Hokies forced B.C. to go only 3/15 on third down and 0/2 on fourth down during the game and stayed fresh as B.C. only held the ball for just over 24 minutes in the game.
Darren Evans helped the run and defense approach pay dividends on offense as he gave the Hokies momentum going into the fourth with a ten-yard touchdown run late in the third that made the score 24-7 Hokies.
Evans finished with 114 yards on 31 carries to go with his touchdown.
Despite out gaining the Hokies, B.C.’s offense simply never got going as they gained many yards, but never the big ones as their twelve missed third downs will attest to that fact as well as only scoring one touchdown on the game—a Rich Gunnell 16-yard touchdown grab before halftime.
The Eagles’ offense was one-dimensional with quarterback Dominique Davis going 17/43 passing for 263 yards, one touchdown, and two interceptions. Twenty-six incompletions explained the effects that the Hokie defense had on Davis and the rest of the B.C. offense in this one.
Boston College rushed for only 45 yards as a team.
FINAL THOUGHTS
I do believe that the bowl selection committees got things right this year, and that goes for the BCS as well. Florida/Oklahoma is simply the best national title game that could be made and would pit the teams that are most deserving of the top two rankings. Oklahoma put any doubts to rest with their manhandling of Missouri Saturday, as I do believe the Sooners would beat Texas if these two had met in November instead of October. Florida on the other hand showcased poise under pressure in a game—a big game one team favored and hyped overwhelming against another—that has seen upsets more regularly the last few years in college football than any other two-year period in its history. These two were destined for this meeting since the beginning of November and I couldn’t be happier that it has come to fruition. I have a giddiness and anticipation for this game that I haven’t felt for a national title game since the infamous Oklahoma/USC 2005 Orange Bowl. With the rest of the bowl games taken into consideration, this looks to be a better than normal year on paper with that being attributed to the fact that so many smaller schools in smaller conferences have had noteworthy seasons. Rice, BYU, TCU, East Carolina, Houston, Tulsa, Boise St. all have had extremely good seasons and the games that have come out of that carry with them expectations and anticipation that these bowl games don’t normally get. All in all, this is a bowl season that may reinvigorate my love for the entire bowl season as the last few years—while seeing their share of great games—have been spent almost in an apprehensive countdown mode to December 31st when things really kick off. Not this year, this year I’ll be on my couch for the long hall, I promise.
