- I think Rich is finally gone, or at least irrelevant. Not having responsibility for the athletic budget, I don't even care about the $4 million. Let Jim Tressel and Ohio State extract the pain from him year after year. And, let Rich sell his view to anyone who will interview him, from now until his head coaching demise. I don't care. I also don't think he could have beaten Oklahoma. We'll never know, of course, but Rich's offense I call the "hammer spread" (he hammers and hammers until Pitt wins) doesn't have nearly the imagination of Bill Stewart's version. Bill knew he had to throw downfield to loosen up the run, so he put the ball in Pat White's hands and told him to wing it. By the second half, it worked, and the rest is history.
- I watched most of the Fiesta Bowl at the Charleston Civic Center, West Virginia's biggest tailgate party. When Owen Schmidt bounced off the tacklers and raced (I mean raced) down the sideline for his touchdown, the crowd hit such a sustained roar I thought the hall was coming down. Owen ranks in Mountaineer football folklore right up there with Sam Huff, Jeff Hostetler, Darryl Talley, and Major Harris. He displayed uncommon footspeed for a 250 pounder, and also showed he doesn't sacrifice girth for the afterburners with his ability to absolutely bury linebackers, as he did during both of Noel Devine's touchdowns. I was at a table with one guy who has seen a few WVU games. He called Owen's dash "a million dollar run," alluding to the fact that the National Football League stood up and took notice. I'm sure Mel Kiper, Jr. liked what he saw.
- Counter to the fervor, I ask: why was our kicking game so bad? When a foot hit the ball, I had no idea what was going to happen and was afraid to watch and find out. I mean, scary bad. If we would have been typically solid in our special teams, Jimmy Johnson would have had looked even more stupid than he is.
- Speaking of the kicking game, gambles look terrible when they don't work, but I still cannot figure out why Bob Stoops chose to try the onsides kick. West Virginia was stopping the Sooners, even in the red zone. I fail to see what he was going to gain by getting the ball back on his forty, yet risk giving Pat White a short field to work with.
- Speaking of gambles, and for all the indifference I have about Rich, I must say the fake punt in the 2006 Sugar Bowl was a gutsy call. However, he had no choice, considering Georgia's ability to score from anywhere at anytime at that stage of the ga...for God's sake, why am I even talking about Mr. Irrelevant?
- According to a friend at my table, West Virginia's defense transformed Oklahoma quarterback Sam Bradford into the redshirt freshman he is. Sam has an unusually strong arm but he played as if no one had ever hit him. He had "happy feet," taking off at the first hint of the nearly constant pressure. Only when his receivers started to get open in the third quarter did he seem to settle in, but after the failed, foolish onsides kick even his legendary status as a 20 year old wunderkind couldn't pull Stoops' Troops back into it.
- Just when the blocking schemes worked and worked well, Steve Slaton went down with a bum hamstring. That's the run of bad luck and challenges our number 10 has faced since 2006 Louisville. Possibly unfairly, I have concentrated on Steve's need for an efficiently operating line. You know, Pat and Noel need a sliver, Steve needs a door, and all that. Finally, I have accepted the fact that opponents are keying on Steve and letting Pat run. You can't stop them both, the defensive coaches say, so they stop the one who has done the most damage with 55 TDs and the Sugar Bowl rushing record. Therefore, I predict: Noel and Steve will work hard in the off-season and come back to run with a team that will pass to loosen things up. Now who do you key on?
- We know we are fast, but our speed looks incredible on the national stage. Pat Haden couldn't believe it, and that comes from a guy who had Anthony Davis in his Southern Cal backfield in 1972 through 1974. Terry Donahue coached against all those West Coast burners, and he was definitely impressed.
- Fox knows how to line up the experts, but their play-by-play kid left a lot to be desired. The network stalwarts haven't been the same since Kiran Chetry went to CNN, but that statement is not quite as irrelevant as Rich. One thing Fox does well in their bowl coverage: they give a lot of time to the marching bands, especially by allowing us in the Civic Center to see the Aaron Copeland "Appalachian Spring" pregame. Eyes were not dry.
- Other eyes that were not dry: Oklahoma defensive lineman and linebackers caught in Pat White's vortex. Buddy Ryan said that you can't play if you can't see through the tears. Pat led the toughest running game in the nation. When you consider Owen, the o-line, Noel, Steve while he was there, and the skinny Pat White laying it out every play, it does not get any better than that.
- And finally...those conducting job interviews sometime submit their recruits to role play scenerios to get a feel for how the recruits will conduct themselves. Based on that, consider Bill Stewart hired. Ignore the attitude of the guy from the Arizona Diamondbacks. West Virginia football has had several great victories; '82 Oklahoma, '84 Boston College, '93 Miami, '06 Georgia, but, with due regard to everything important to a team - honor and respect - '08 Oklahoma is the most significant, and Bill Stewart showed the way.
Thursday, January 3, 2008
The Exorcism of Rich Rodriguez, The Canonization of Owen Schmidt, and Other Year-End Notes
Any 20-point West Virginia win over a heavily-favored iconic college football team in the pressure cooker of a BCS bowl game makes me think happy thoughts:
Monday, December 31, 2007
West Virginia Will Take the Fiesta Bowl Down To the Wire
I have constructed a scenario through which the Mountaineers will force Oklahoma to go for the win on the final play of the game. Interestingly, the major player in the surprise of the bowl season will be Rich Rodriguez himself. Strange, but it has a good chance of being true.
Those who have watched Coach Rod run the games on the sidelines have seen a man who needs to attend a few anger management seminars. I have heard from reliable sources, i.e. friends and acquaintances who know major boosters, that those boosters have questioned Rich's verbal abuse of his players and called him out on it. It is rumored that one key assistant early in Rod's tenure left the team to take a head coaching position in part because he could no longer listen to the constant badgering and foul language Rod issued during practices and games.
I understand that football at the college level is an abusive sport with few if any standard rules of etiquette. In the sense of toughness, the coaches must prepare the players for all aspects of the game, including steeling themselves from being intimidated. As well, throughout their careers the typical coach has often done little to keep his emotions in check. One prime example is Joe Paterno and his infamous rants. However, he in his fortysome years as the Penn State head man has earned the right to do as he pleases. In comparison, Rich, with regard to his mere fortysome years of life, should possibly quell any urges to act out in an explosive manner.
I believe Coach Rod's sideline antics are counterproductive in the sense that he is tearing down the players who, when times get tough, look to him for guidance and support. Evident to me was the fact that in our two losses this year and in the near major upset against Louisville, the Mountaineers played as if they were deer in the headlights, probably due to the unhealthy fear created by Rich and his 'in your face' tactics. This could be supported by the recent comment of Noel Devine in which he stated that Ol' Coach Rod won't be around to yell at them any more. That statement from someone on the front lines says much more than he said.
Interim head coach Bill Stewart reportedly deals with the players in a much more positive fashion. The veritable pall surrounding the vituperation of Rich Rodriguez has left for Ann Arbor. A weight has been lifted from the shoulders of the players, the ultratalented players who now only have to fight Oklahoma and not the twelfth man ironically in the form of their head coach.
The Mountaineers will be able to freely think and react, and they're going to need to. The word is out on the West Virginia spread. South Florida showed how WVU can be pinched in, taking away its speed by placing the game squarely in the middle of the field. Pittsburgh dictated the West Virginia play calling by shifting their defense around frentically. Oklahoma has seen the tapes of these two losses, and had success of their own with the two victories against Missouri's form of the spread.
Despite these challenges, the overriding factor football pundits are not considering is the maniacal emotional state of the Mountaineers and their ability to sustain it by everyone truly holding the rope, not out of fear of castigation but through genuinely positive reinforcement. I don't' know if we will win, but Oklahoma will be forced to go for it on the final play. I suggest you prepare to stay up after midnight.
Those who have watched Coach Rod run the games on the sidelines have seen a man who needs to attend a few anger management seminars. I have heard from reliable sources, i.e. friends and acquaintances who know major boosters, that those boosters have questioned Rich's verbal abuse of his players and called him out on it. It is rumored that one key assistant early in Rod's tenure left the team to take a head coaching position in part because he could no longer listen to the constant badgering and foul language Rod issued during practices and games.
I understand that football at the college level is an abusive sport with few if any standard rules of etiquette. In the sense of toughness, the coaches must prepare the players for all aspects of the game, including steeling themselves from being intimidated. As well, throughout their careers the typical coach has often done little to keep his emotions in check. One prime example is Joe Paterno and his infamous rants. However, he in his fortysome years as the Penn State head man has earned the right to do as he pleases. In comparison, Rich, with regard to his mere fortysome years of life, should possibly quell any urges to act out in an explosive manner.
I believe Coach Rod's sideline antics are counterproductive in the sense that he is tearing down the players who, when times get tough, look to him for guidance and support. Evident to me was the fact that in our two losses this year and in the near major upset against Louisville, the Mountaineers played as if they were deer in the headlights, probably due to the unhealthy fear created by Rich and his 'in your face' tactics. This could be supported by the recent comment of Noel Devine in which he stated that Ol' Coach Rod won't be around to yell at them any more. That statement from someone on the front lines says much more than he said.
Interim head coach Bill Stewart reportedly deals with the players in a much more positive fashion. The veritable pall surrounding the vituperation of Rich Rodriguez has left for Ann Arbor. A weight has been lifted from the shoulders of the players, the ultratalented players who now only have to fight Oklahoma and not the twelfth man ironically in the form of their head coach.
The Mountaineers will be able to freely think and react, and they're going to need to. The word is out on the West Virginia spread. South Florida showed how WVU can be pinched in, taking away its speed by placing the game squarely in the middle of the field. Pittsburgh dictated the West Virginia play calling by shifting their defense around frentically. Oklahoma has seen the tapes of these two losses, and had success of their own with the two victories against Missouri's form of the spread.
Despite these challenges, the overriding factor football pundits are not considering is the maniacal emotional state of the Mountaineers and their ability to sustain it by everyone truly holding the rope, not out of fear of castigation but through genuinely positive reinforcement. I don't' know if we will win, but Oklahoma will be forced to go for it on the final play. I suggest you prepare to stay up after midnight.
Monday, December 3, 2007
We Didn't Respect The Rivalry
At the risk of sounding as if I'm trying to pull off an after-the-fact Nostradamus, I had a bad feeling about the Pitt game as early as last Sunday when the line came out at 26 points and almost immediately shot up to 28. Now, I know what a line truly is; half the Vegas players looked at the Connecticut game a week before and liked the four touchdown spot. The Vegas players did not care that the game was the 100th edition of the Backyard Brawl. The problem is, too many of us Mountaineer fans also did not care.
Foremost, we should have respected the rivalry. That includes all of us: coaches, players, media, and fans. The collective We. The collective We had a psyche problem. We didn't respect the rivalry, and for that We had our heads handed to Us.
Pitt was merely a rung on the ladder to the Crystal Football, We thought. A rung. How rude can We possibly be? After all the decades of scorn, you'd think The University of Pittsburgh should have earned a spot in the contemptuous side of Our souls, not condemned to the indifference We displayed. True, this wasn't just any game. It was the national championship semi-finals, albeit in a secondary sense. Most importantly, it was a game against our arch enemy Pitt. However, We played to go to New Orleans, without concern as to who was on the other side of the ball.
Among all the French Quarter-bead-laden fans at the game, where were the Pitt Sucks shirts? There weren't many, fewer than the past when the game was just your normal, seismic Backyard Brawl. In a convoluted manner, the absence of Beat Pitt caparison is disrespectful. We treated Pitt as if they were Cincinnati. So, by the end of the third quarter, by the time We had figured out We had better beat Pitt, it was too late. We allowed them to hang around for so long, they thought...no, they knew...they could win. And, the rest is history, leaving Us wondering how this happened.
We didn't respect the rivalry. That's how it happened.
* * * * *
Q: How could the Mountaineers put up 66 on Connecticut and be held to 7 by Pitt?
A: It's Pitt.
* * * * *
Contrary to the opinions of those of us who right now feel frustrated and angry, I think Rich Rodriguez is the man who will someday take us to the championship game. However, he was completely outcoached by Pittsburgh's Dave Wannstadt. Coach Wannstadt, a man whose job may still be in jeopardy, knew his one chance to win was to keep our 66 point offense off the field. He bled the clock every play, breaking our hearts in the third quarter by holding the ball for almost fourteen minutes. That gave the Pitt offensive line an opportunity to believe, to really believe that they could push us back every time. On that strip of turf, three yards wide and six or seven really large men broad, it was a Panther butt-whippin'.
The Pitt offensive momentum spread to its defense. At times with only seven in the box, Pitt plugged up our vaunted, formerly unstoppable running game. Steve Slaton was held to seven carries; Noel Devine, nine. Pat White had no where to go, and Jerrod Brown did only a little better. Where was Owen Schmidt? Blocking. The line couldn't do the job themselves.
Butt-whippin'.
* * * * *
Where was Owen Schmidt? More relevant, where was Steve Slaton? Still more relevant, where has Steve Slaton been this season? He's hailed as a team player by the media with his disregard for personal stats, but what does that truly mean? To me, it means he's not getting the blocking he had in the Sugar Bowl against Georgia when he romped for over two hundred yards, breaking Pitt Panther Tony Dorsett's game rushing record. In a pure straight ahead race, Steve Slaton beats Pat White and Noel Devine. However, whereas White and Devine need but a sliver of a hole to break it, Slaton requires a door, at times a garage door. Steve cannot shake and bake like Pat, and he doesn't have the feet and balance of Noel. Slaton needs a lot of help.
* * * * *
I'm extremely excited about playing number 4 Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl. Pardon me, but in the three years I attended WVU between 1978 and 1980, we won 12 games. I was in my late twenties before I saw us take Penn State down . A Peach Bowl bid used to be the ultimate culmination of a great 8-3 season. So, I dealt with the disappointment of that Pitt game quickly. With one big outing against the Sooners, we can get just about all of it back. This is the only game we have remaining. We have a month to get healthy and to heal our spirits, and Oklahoma has a month to cool off. Drop it, dude. It's not for the Crystal Football, but it's a great opportunity.
* * * * *
In conclusion...raining a team with 'boos' of displeasure and disappointment, a 10-2 team that is bound for a BCS bowl by virtue of winning its conference, a team ranked 9th in the BCS standings and winners of at least 10 games in each of the past three years, raining that team with those 'boos' is inexcusable. We're supposed to be fans with a good deal of football acumen. We shouldn't have our blatant disgust displayed for all to see and hear on national television. That's low class.
Foremost, we should have respected the rivalry. That includes all of us: coaches, players, media, and fans. The collective We. The collective We had a psyche problem. We didn't respect the rivalry, and for that We had our heads handed to Us.
Pitt was merely a rung on the ladder to the Crystal Football, We thought. A rung. How rude can We possibly be? After all the decades of scorn, you'd think The University of Pittsburgh should have earned a spot in the contemptuous side of Our souls, not condemned to the indifference We displayed. True, this wasn't just any game. It was the national championship semi-finals, albeit in a secondary sense. Most importantly, it was a game against our arch enemy Pitt. However, We played to go to New Orleans, without concern as to who was on the other side of the ball.
Among all the French Quarter-bead-laden fans at the game, where were the Pitt Sucks shirts? There weren't many, fewer than the past when the game was just your normal, seismic Backyard Brawl. In a convoluted manner, the absence of Beat Pitt caparison is disrespectful. We treated Pitt as if they were Cincinnati. So, by the end of the third quarter, by the time We had figured out We had better beat Pitt, it was too late. We allowed them to hang around for so long, they thought...no, they knew...they could win. And, the rest is history, leaving Us wondering how this happened.
We didn't respect the rivalry. That's how it happened.
* * * * *
Q: How could the Mountaineers put up 66 on Connecticut and be held to 7 by Pitt?
A: It's Pitt.
* * * * *
Contrary to the opinions of those of us who right now feel frustrated and angry, I think Rich Rodriguez is the man who will someday take us to the championship game. However, he was completely outcoached by Pittsburgh's Dave Wannstadt. Coach Wannstadt, a man whose job may still be in jeopardy, knew his one chance to win was to keep our 66 point offense off the field. He bled the clock every play, breaking our hearts in the third quarter by holding the ball for almost fourteen minutes. That gave the Pitt offensive line an opportunity to believe, to really believe that they could push us back every time. On that strip of turf, three yards wide and six or seven really large men broad, it was a Panther butt-whippin'.
The Pitt offensive momentum spread to its defense. At times with only seven in the box, Pitt plugged up our vaunted, formerly unstoppable running game. Steve Slaton was held to seven carries; Noel Devine, nine. Pat White had no where to go, and Jerrod Brown did only a little better. Where was Owen Schmidt? Blocking. The line couldn't do the job themselves.
Butt-whippin'.
* * * * *
Where was Owen Schmidt? More relevant, where was Steve Slaton? Still more relevant, where has Steve Slaton been this season? He's hailed as a team player by the media with his disregard for personal stats, but what does that truly mean? To me, it means he's not getting the blocking he had in the Sugar Bowl against Georgia when he romped for over two hundred yards, breaking Pitt Panther Tony Dorsett's game rushing record. In a pure straight ahead race, Steve Slaton beats Pat White and Noel Devine. However, whereas White and Devine need but a sliver of a hole to break it, Slaton requires a door, at times a garage door. Steve cannot shake and bake like Pat, and he doesn't have the feet and balance of Noel. Slaton needs a lot of help.
* * * * *
I'm extremely excited about playing number 4 Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl. Pardon me, but in the three years I attended WVU between 1978 and 1980, we won 12 games. I was in my late twenties before I saw us take Penn State down . A Peach Bowl bid used to be the ultimate culmination of a great 8-3 season. So, I dealt with the disappointment of that Pitt game quickly. With one big outing against the Sooners, we can get just about all of it back. This is the only game we have remaining. We have a month to get healthy and to heal our spirits, and Oklahoma has a month to cool off. Drop it, dude. It's not for the Crystal Football, but it's a great opportunity.
* * * * *
In conclusion...raining a team with 'boos' of displeasure and disappointment, a 10-2 team that is bound for a BCS bowl by virtue of winning its conference, a team ranked 9th in the BCS standings and winners of at least 10 games in each of the past three years, raining that team with those 'boos' is inexcusable. We're supposed to be fans with a good deal of football acumen. We shouldn't have our blatant disgust displayed for all to see and hear on national television. That's low class.
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