Message to Longhorn football fans.

Um, James, Alabama is not that good this year.

Plus, OU is now forced to play Nate Hybl at QB for the rest of the season.

Unless Chris Simms has the worst game of his life, I don't see OU beating Texas.

 

OU has the unique ability to consistently play what looks like crappy football and win. It finally caught up them against OSU last year, but their defense can win them any game out there. Somehow, they just make big plays whenever they need do. I wouldn't take OU for granted, and I wouldn't take Simms not having the worst game of his life for granted.

 

Alabama's not much better than North Carolina, if at all. And OU played them at home... we play UNC on the road.

With Nate Hybl at QB, the only question I have for the OU game is whether we win by 15 or 20. OU's defense is not one of the best in the nation. This Alabama team marched up and down the field on them, and would have blown OU out of the building had Watts been able to make a throw in the red zone. Tommie Harris, IMO one of the most overrated players in football, was dominated for almost the entire game.

ABC showed a great example of how much the OU defense misses Roy Williams. On one of the plays that Galloway got to the outside for about 25 yards, Roy Williams' replacement missed a tackle right at the line. Roy means more than people think, and Calmus as well. OU has a terrible offense-- what happened to the vaunted running game and the "Griffin is better than Benson" talk? Those 3 yards per game are pretty threatening.

Major, could you elaborate on what "big plays" they've made in these big games? Last year, against UT, was all Roy Williams on the blitz. He's gone. Last year, against Nebraska, they lost. Last year, against OSU, they lost. This year, against Alabama, they lucked out on what was a clear hold by Trent Smith on the first shovel pass.

Nate Hybl is one of the worst QB's in D1 college football, I think. He can't move, has a below average arm, terrible accuracy, etc. The only positive he has is that he can really take a lot of hits, which when you think about it is a negative for OU. Unless UT knocks out Nate like they did last year, there's no way OU can make this close. Texas has a better defense, better QB, better RB, better WR's, etc. And there's no Roy Williams to make the special plays to make up for it. Even if Simms played like he did in the second CU game (which he won't, 250 yards, 3 TD's, 0 INT's in the OU game... wait and see), I still think Texas wins. There's that much of a gap.

Texas will dominate OU the way Miami dominated Florida. Book it.

 

Major, could you elaborate on what "big plays" they've made in these big games? Last year, against UT, was all Roy Williams on the blitz.

Well, yesterday, they drove 80 yards in like 2 minutes when they had to. You can complain all you want about the non-hold on the shovel pass, but there's no telling if they would have scored anyway with the penalty - you certaintly can't just assume they wouldn't have. They had no trouble moving the ball on the last drive.

Then, when they had to make the defensive play, they did so with the final TD. Other big plays - their defense dominated the first half. Alabama had some great field position and was stuffed multiple times.

Did they involve some luck? Maybe, maybe not. The fact is that they made the plays, and they win by "looking terrible" nearly every week.

OU has a terrible offense-- what happened to the vaunted running game and the "Griffin is better than Benson" talk? Those 3 yards per game are pretty threatening.

I'm not sure where you get 3 yards per game, given that he had well over 200 yards last week. Their miserable offense this week still gained 80 more yards than we did against North Texas. If you're going to judge them by this one game, then we should do the same for Texas. I'm not sure Benson's 50 yards a game really scares them either.

Unless UT knocks out Nate like they did last year, there's no way OU can make this close.

OU can make it close because UT's offense has a bad habit of catering against them. OU can make it close by keeping it a low scoring game - they proved they didn't need an offense to be us last year.

Unless we get our OLine together really quick, their defense will manhandle us at the line as did North Texas.

 

Well, considering it's Nate Hybl, I have my doubts that they would've scored. Also, when Tyler Watts randomly drops the ball without being touched, I wouldn't call it a defensive play. Football games are two halves. I noticed the OU defense really becoming tired in the second half, and fatigue does play a factor. The OU game is during the day.

Usually, I don't count games against the worst team in D1 football. North Texas may not be Miami, but they at least made a bowl. The first time Quentin Griffin faces a somewhat decent opponent, his rushing yards go down from 237 to 3. Hmm...

I'm not judging them by one game. I'm going by more than a season. I heard all throughout the offseason how things were going to be different. I heard how Griffin was going to be a force, and the Sooners new passing game was going to have them a passing team as well. I heard how Roy could be replaced by these freshmen and sophomores in the secondary. It didn't happen last year, and call me skeptical but considering the same results happened the first time they played a decent team, I don't have a lot of hope for them.

Again, Roy Williams and Rocky Calmus were the primary reasons for them keeping the game close last year. Also, I'm assuming Cedric will play this year. How he performs statistically I don't care too much about. However, one of the main reasons we lost last year was Greg Davis totally abandoning the run and having Simms out there with five wide receivers on every play. If there's at least the threat of the run, and with Benson you have to honor it, there will be a lot more opportunities downfield and much less double coverage.

Also, most of North Texas' "domination" at the line came in the second half of a game that was 24-0. I wouldn't be too surprised if the UT players lost some intensity during a game that was already won.

 

Well, considering it's Nate Hybl, I have my doubts that they would've scored. Also, Tyler Watts randomly dropping the ball without being touched, I wouldn't call it a defensive play.

Nate Hybl started 11 wins for OU last year. He may not be great, but he's not asked to be in that offense. That offense is asked to basically not make mistakes. The defense is what wins games for them.

Again, you can call it luck, but OU almost always has it.

Usually, I don't count games against the worst team in D1 football. North Texas may not be Miami, but they at least made a bowl. The first time Quentin Griffin faces a somewhat decent opponent, his rushing yards go down from 237 to 3. Hmm...


The fact that we're comparing the quality of North Texas and Tulsa says a lot. By the way, vaunted Nichols State ran for 180 yards on North Texas this weekend.

I'm not judging them by one game. I'm going by more than a season. I heard all throughout the offseason how things were going to be different. I heard how Griffin was going to be a force, and the Sooners new passing game was going to have them a passing team as well. I heard how Roy could be replaced by these freshmen and sophomores in the secondary. It didn't happen last year, and call me skeptical but considering the same results happened the first time they played a decent team, I don't have a lot of hope for them.

New systems take time to implement. They have a new coordinator and lost their QB mid-game, and faced real competition for the first time. I'm not surprised their offense struggled. Their defense wasn't bad. There was basically one good drive against them to open the 3rd. Everything else was basically a result of special teams mistakes leading to TD's or short drives.

Is their defense as good as last year? Certainly not now. But a step down can still be a dominating defense.

However, one of the main reasons we lost last year was Greg Davis totally abandoning the run and having Simms out there with five wide receivers on every play. If there's at least the threat of the run, and with Benson you have to honor it, there will be a lot more opportunities downfield and much less double coverage.

I'll believe it when I see it. We couldn't or wouldn't throw downfield against North Texas last week. And we're certainly not "hiding the playbook" like so many people talked about last year.

Also, most of North Texas' "domination" at the line came in the second half of a game that was 24-0. I wouldn't be too surprised if the UT players lost some intensity during a game that was already won.

We couldn't run the ball in the first half either. And we weren't just experimenting or trying new things in the 3rd quarter. We were simply getting stuffed.

This UT team can very well beat OU, but its nowhere near a given. There are plenty of things to still work on. #1 is the O-Line and there's question how correctable it is. We have 3 new starters, and that takes just time to gel. We'll see how much progress we've made next week.

 

I hope our coaches perspective is a lot closer to Majors than the rest of ya'll.

OU's defense is still very, very good, maybe even great. If our offense is not completely on, we will not move the ball.

Overall OU's offense does suck, and UT's defense should shut them down.

Alabama is not that terrible, especially on defense. Unless our fresh lineman are ready to contribute as Harris was able to for OU last year, we will not be as good in the defensive trenches as Alabama is.

All it takes for OU to win is for our offense to not be clicking and 1 or 2 big players by their offense or special teams. And OU does have some playmakers, so a break down can easily lead to a TD against them. Factor in OU also has much superior game tacticians, the game could be trouble.

If we bring our "A" game we should win--maybe by a lot, but this was the exact same situation last year and we didn't win.

 

It's only the second game of the season. Texas didn't exactly perform that well against UNT. We shouldn't be scared of OU. Their offense is what's holding them back, not their defense. I'm more scared of Stoops outcoaching Mack than anything else. OU BARELY won that game. If that ball didn't slip, OU could be 1-1 easily.

 

When was the Alabama game scheduled? Most out of conference games are scheduled nearly a decade in advance, which would mean this game was scheduled before Stoops became the head coach at OU.

If the game was scheduled on short notice, that means Stoops had the advantage of scheduling a probation-ridden, talent-depleted Bama squad-- scheduling a name instead of a team, in other words.

Is playing North Texas a sign of fear of big name programs? Because OU played them in 2000.

Is playing North Carolina a sign of fear of big name programs? Because OU played them last year.

Is Tulsa a big-name program? UTEP?

Texas has Arkansas and Ohio State on the schedule in next four years, so UT is hardly afraid to play big name programs early in the season.

 

Alabama is being underrated here. Not much better than UNC? Jeez.

I too became worried for Texas after watching that game. OU was totally dominated for 28 minutes, then acted as if they were in control all along on that last drive. That is mental toughness that I'm not sure Texas has, especially not at the QB position. Chris Simms will be the key to the OU game as well as every other big game UT has this season.

 

I'll bet I already know your answer to this based on your remarks about the QB position, but what happened in the Holiday Bowl last year?

 

Umm, Alabama needed a late drive to barely escape with a 39-34 win over Middle Tennessee State at home. No, they're not underrated. This is a team with very, very average talent. UNC went on the road yesterday and beat a pretty decent Syracuse team. Also, if you let UT's linemen hold the OU defenders, my guess is that Chris Simms might look in control too.

And if you think that OU's defense, without Roy Williams and Rocky Calmus, is capable of stopping Texas with Cedric Benson, you're really reaching. For Oklahoma to win the game, they need to hold Texas to single digits in points. Considering the players they lost and the fact that Alabama marched up and down the field on them, I'm not quite sold on that happening.

Well, usually there is a greater sense of urgency to throw downfield and try to make big plays when you're not up 24-0.

But we sure could throw. That's going to happen a lot this year. People are going to try to concentrate the defense on stopping Benson first and making Simms beat them. UNT was not stopping Benson with 4 man fronts... they had linebackers and safeties up in the box several times. I have my doubts that the OU corners will fare well during the sequences when they are left in single coverage against Roy and BJ.

 

TheFreak, Bama beat MTSU 39-34 last week. They had alot of drops that killed drives against ou.

 

The thing about OU is that they have a bunch of players from the 2000 National Champs team. They might not do a pretty job of it, but they know how to win football games. They always seem to pull it out at the end. Remember K-State last year? Or how about the A&M game 2 years ago in Kyle Field? Those are just two examples, not to mention yesterday's Bama game, of how they refuse to lose.

The Horns' achilles heel right now is Greg Davis. He's got a playbook the size of the Houston yellow pages. Imagine if we had Miami's offensive coordinator in Austin. We'd be putting up 50+ points every game. And I don't want to hear about how many games this team has won under Davis. We've won IN SPITE of him, not because of him. I really think that if he lets Simms loose, then he'll have a great year. Otherwise expect more 3-yard outs, and wide receiver screens. Oh ya, I forgot the the shovel pass on 2nd and long that everyone expects.

Bottom line, OU played like sh*t yesterday, but still managed to pull it out. They showed a tremendous amount of heart. There is no reason why the Longhorns shouldn't be able to win in Dallas, except for a poor game plan. We have more offensive talent at every position except for TE. Their defense is slightly better than ours, but we don't have Tyler Watts at QB like Bama did. UT is tremendously talented, and a good game plan, and we should be able to blow them out by 20+ points. But the Sooners have heart, and the game will be low scoring, and come down to the fourth quarter.

 

OU should be worried. All this crap about having an"even better defense than last year" should have been laid to resst by now when Alabama was taking it to them at the end of the game only to lose on an unforced error. You just don't lose the best LB and DB in the country and get "better" because "all of their replacements run 4.3 40's". Every college recruit allegedly has 4.4 or 4.3 speed these days (although by the time they reach the NFL scouting combine, those 4.3's magically turn into 4.5's. I wonder how) They don't play games with shorts and stopwatches.

 

That 4.3 40-yard dash is bullcrap. Everyone knows that Lehman can run a 1.7 sec 40, while dragging Mangino.

 

You mean to tell me that my alma mater (MTSU) is not any good??

I know that hardly anyone here other than me got to watch that game (Alabama vs MTSU), but it took a bogus holding call against the f*cking noseguard for MTSU to keep an Alabama drive alive that led to a field goal and them increasing their lead from 2 points to 5 points instead of giving the ball back to MTSU. Also, it helped chew off another 3 minutes off the clock, so when Middle did get the ball back, they only had 3 minutes left in the game instead of 6 minutes. It was a huge momentum buster for MTSU, and one that was done, I say, to prevent having a lowly Sun Belt team win in Birmingham.

So, yes, I would say that the statement that Alabama is underrated is a ridiculous one (sorry Freak).

 

Major Applewhite is hosting a radio show in Austin now. 2:00-3:00pm, 1300am. You should check it out.

 

I've heard it a couple times. I love Major to death. I also think that he had 10 guys on offense and 11 on defense (plus special teams) that contributed significantly to UT's Holiday Bowl comeback last year, so questions about UT's "mental toughness" are indications of lazy analysis.