What a great National Championship, and it lived up to its billing. Texas wins the championship, 41-38.
As a side note, I was rooting for Texas for two reasons. First, my favorite player on the Steelers, Casey Hampton, is a Longhorn, so I figured a win for UT might be good for his play this weekend. That is partially wiped out by the fact that Troy Polamolu is a USC grad, but oh well.
The clincher for me was the answer to this question:
“Which teams fans will be bigger insufferable pricks if they win?”
While no one on the planet is as annoying as Texans when bragging (Cowboys fans in the 90’s could almost provoke me to cold-blooded murder), Texas is a long way away and the instances I would have to put up with fans from Texas would be few and far between.
USC, while farther away, has had more success in the past few years, and as such has developed a bunch of bandwagon fans, and bandwagon fans are the WORST. I have noticed more than a few USC hats and jerseys here on campus.
Thus, it was my determination that USC fans had a better chance of being insufferable pricks and irritating me, so I rooted for Texas.
Thank goodness it was a good game.
srv
The Eyes of Texas are upon you,
All the live long day.
The Eyes of Texas are upon you,
You can not get away.
Do not think you can escape them
At night or early in the morn-
The Eyes of Texas are upon you
‘Till Gabriel blows his horn.
Brad R.
Seriously. Even better than last night’s Orange Bowl. Vincent Young’s TD run was… wow.
On a related note, is there some way the NFL can block the Texans from drafting Reggie Bush? I’d hate to see such an amazing talent stuck on such a sorry franchise…
John Cole
If Reggie Bush hadn’t tried that boneheaded lateral, the outcome of this game might be different.
ppGaz
Hook ’em horns!
(making horns sign with hand)
Stormy! Speech!! Speech!
Bob In Pacifica
It WAS an excellent game. I was nominally rooting for USC, but Vince Young was absolutely amazing. Is that kid Huff in the Longhorns’ defensive backfield in the NFL draft? I’d like to see him in a Niners uniform.
Brad R.
Yeah, very good point. Even so, if you give him a coach like Parcells to whack teh stupid out of him, he’ll be fine :-) Why Pete Carrol went for it on the Texas 17 on 4th down is a mystery too. That would have ensured overtime.
Grisha
Eh, USC really won by 3. Texas got six points they shouldn’t have because god knows why they didn’t review that lateral for a touchdown after Young’s knee was down.
Pooh
WTF in re Pete Carroll? Not just the timeout (before a 2 pt. conversion no less…) but the swing pass in 2nd and 7. WHY? Just give the ball to White/Bush and keep the clock moving…
I’m so glad I live so far from any Texans…
norbizness
The People’s Republic of Austin is goin’ apeshit, baby!
norbizness
Grisha: The result of the play, assuming the lateral was overturned, was a first down on the 10. Although no TD is assured, probability vitiates in its favor.
Brad R.
Pooh- yep. THat’s the type of shit we had to deal with in New England until St. Bill came along.
Grisha
norbizness: I stand by what I said.
Brian
The streets were empty here in L.A. tonight. Everyone’s home watching the game, of course.
The SC players must have bitch-slapped that defender of theirs who face-masked a Longhorn in their final drive. It gave them a first down they didn’t deserve.
In the end, I’m a Bruin (UCLA) who felt that SC had a very good chance of losing this game tonight. I’m not surprised at the outcome, or upset. It was a great game, and lived up to its hype.
Stormy70
Ahem….(shedding tears of joy)
Yes, we here in Texas can be insufferable pricks (not me of course, quit rolling your eyes, people!), but we earn it, baby! We own it! Hook em Horns!!
I can hear Austin from here, my favorite little communist mecca. I wish I was there eating their food and drinking their beer. Longhorns just look good on everything. I need a pair for my truck, so I can complete the stereotype.
Orange is a good color for my complexion, as well.
Sorry about the 90’s Cowboy’s thing, John. (Not really)
PPGaz – Where are the pet pics of your four masters?!
I am sure they need their pictures posted.
Gamer
I’m with Brian on this one. After SC beat down the Bruins this year, I was hoping that they would turn it into a drubbing by the future National Champions.
No such luck.
Brad R.
Yes, we here in Texas can be insufferable pricks (not me of course, quit rolling your eyes, people!), but we earn it, baby!
We Massholes can out-insufferable-prick you Texans any day. Just try driving in Boston. Oh, and we have the modern-day equivalent of the ’90s Cowboys with the Pats (OK, so we don’t have any convicted criminals on our NFL dynasty, so I guess Dallas gets added prick points for that).
Stormy70
Michael Irvin getting caught snorting coke off of the two, young, and naked hotties is hard to top. But the rest of the team tries really hard. The fact that I think I have Michael’s rookie card makes up for it a tad. The rookie card is either him or Emmitt. I put a ton of cards up in a box in the early nineties, so we’ll see how that works out in another decade or so.
Stupid Cowboys.
Stormy70
The Steelers are still stupider. :)
Beej
Oh yeah, it’s alright for all of you to say you won’t have to put up with Texan insufferability, but what about those of us out here in the Big 12? Omygod, I think we have to play Texas next year! Please, somebody, convince Vince Young to enter the NFL draft NOW!!!! We’re slowly rebuilding the Nebraska dynasty, but I don’t think we’re quite ready for SuperVince yet. Then again, maybe nobody is.
B. Minich, PI
I love the small of National Champions in the morning.
I thought of another advantage of Texas winning and USC losing. Sure, USC losing bums out Polamalu. BUT . . . it also psyches out Carson Palmer, Polamalu’s former roomate at USC! So we lose one, but we get one taken out as well.
Also, the commentators on Sunday’s game had better not mention the roomate thing more than once. Seriously. I’ve heard them repeat it way too much in the past.
Pooh
Don’t worry, he just filmed the post game commercial:
“I’m going to Disney World. And Drew Rosenhaus is paying. I’m Rich BITCH!”
joshua
Grisha: that’s retarded and you know it. The entire outcome of the game is changed if Texas is spotted the ball at the ten instead of being awarded the touchdown, not just the final score. Texas most likely would have scored a touchdown anyway, but they also might have scored a field goal or went away with nothing and turned the ball over, pinning USC deep in their own territory which could have easily led to a Texas safety and another possession or an ensuing turnover and points after that. Or the entire fabric of space and time might have been ripped apart leading to the creation of multitudes of universes wherein Vince Young beats USC over and over again for all eternity, just like he did tonight.
Shut up. The Pac-10 sucks ass and USC was the most overrated thing since that damned Segway scooter.
Beej
No, Stormy, I’m sorry, but any team that has the unmitigated gall to bill itself as “America’s Team” just because it can deserves to lose over and over and over and over and over and over and. . . . . .
KC
John, this is truly one of your best posts. Nobody can call you a liar, at least on this one.
Pooh
josh,
It was a bad call, but USC’s defense was atrocious. Young could have duck-walked into the endzone in 4 downs from the 10.
Grisha
Joshua: Obviously it was retarded & obviously I was joking. But it was still a horrible call that gave Texas six points they shouldn’t have gotten. Granted Young probably would have walked in untouched a play or two later & gotten it anyway–hell, they’d have probably gotten the extra point too, but we’ll never know.
& if you want examples of me being retarded, that’s nothing: I thought the Raiders were going to make the playoffs this year.
Stormy70
Ahhh. Victory is still so sweet.
Had to live up to the Texan reputation tonight.
Brian
Right. And now watch the Monday morning (or is it Thursday morning?) quarterbacks saying that the absence of SC defensive coordinator Norm Chow, who left last year, was the reason.
Richard Bennett
The Condoms are so used to bad calls going their way they whine like little bitches when they don’t. Notre Dame beat their asses fair and square, but the zebras gave that game to them because they’re Hollywood’s team.
There were arguably two bad calls in this game that weren’t corrected, one the knee-is-down play that was questionable because the camera angle didn’t show that Vince had already started to release the ball before his knee touched, and the other an interception that was waved off when the Texas defender lost the ball after hitting the field. The one that the Condoms got was more significant.
Texas held little Reggie to 80 yards rushing, and made fools of the Heisman committee. Vince was better than Princess Leinart and Bush’s bastard son combined, and there needs to be a Special Prosecutor looking at the Heisman ballots.
Texas has had the best winning record in college football over the last six or seven years, and it’s obvious that the Pac 10 doesn’t deserve to be on the same field with us. Ohio State played us a much better game than these pansies did.
After we won the national championship in 1969/70, we had a celebration on the Drag at the edge of the campus that was epic, hippies, rednecks, Frat Rats, and homeboys all stoned and drunk and trippin’ while horns honked, chicks pulled their shirts up and people walked down the street pissing on the bumpers of the pickups in front of them. I hope the young ‘uns do as good this time.
Next we’re gonna win March Madness and the College World Series.
Mark
ESPN made me root for Texas because of their stupid “History in the Making” segments, where they decided USC was the second greatest college team ever over the holidays.
I eagerly await the same segments made for Texas.
Grotesqueticle
“(Cowboys fans in the 90’s could almost provoke me to cold-blooded murder)”
I’m with you on that one. And I ain’t a Cowboy hater, but damn the band-wagon jumpers that crawled out of the woodwork back then used to seriously make me glad we weren’t living in an era where everyone carried guns.
moflicky
As good as Bush is, Vince Young is the man. I don’t think i’ve ever seen a more convincingly dominant performance in a football game at any level. what did he have? 270 yards passing and 200 yards rushing?
He’s younger, bigger, stronger, faster michael vick who can pass.
If he comes out this year, houston should pick him over bush.
Another Jeff
Norm Chow was SC’s offensive coordinator.
John, if you wanna see insufferable pricks, just go to the college football message boards at Sportingnews.com.
You’ll find some insufferable pricks among the USC fans there, but EVERY Texas fan there is an insufferable prick and have been for the last year.
And I’m a Penn State grad and fan, so i know insufferablly prickish fans when i see them.
Another Jeff
Oh, and can people stop automatically annointing this the greatest National Championship game EVER?
It was great–and entertaining as hell–but “great” always seems to mean “no defense”.
This was definitely top five, but i’m not ready to say it was greater than Miami/Nebraska in ’83, or Miami/Ohio State in ’02, or even Penn State/Miami in ’86 (ok, it was better than that game, i just had to get a Penn State reference in there).
skip
Yeah, it was the “greatest team ever” nonsense that made me root for Texas. The greatest team ever doesn’t almost lose to a dubious Fresno State and a good-but-not-great Notre Dame.
The same delta-minus dopes voted Ronald Reagan a greater President than Theodore Roosevelt.
skip
Oops. I should have mentioned Nebraska-Oklahoma in the early 70s.
ppGaz
I sent them to John. He probably has a zillion pet photos by now. Sooner or later one of my little furry tyrants will get her 15 minutes of fame, I’m sure.
Davebo
I knew it. I knew Bush would (deservedly) get the Heisman and that then Vince would make the country look like fools for giving it to him!
Here’s hoping Vince sticks around for a repeat next year. Lord knows he doesn’t want to end up playing for the Texans hometown or not!
Paul Wartenberg
Go Gators.
SoCalJustice
Amazing game.
Texas deserves the win just for stopping LenDale White on 4th down – after he spent the entire game running right through their defense.
And Reggie Bush – a few flashes of brilliance – but that lateral was such a bonehead move.
Congrats to Texas.
Rob
I was rooting for them both to lose. I sorta got my wish. Neither one played like national camps. Totally sorry-ass defense. Way too many fumbles and general F&%k-ups.
Bob In Pacifica
USC sports fans are legendary assholes in the Pac 10 mythology, and now that Stormy informs us that Austin is the home of the new Communist International I can cleanse my mind of any connection between the Longhorns and Dubya.
Whatever, this morning I am still shaking my head at how Young cut through the USC defense like butter. That was USC’s Achilles Heel. When they scored fifty points a game it wasn’t hard to overlook how many points they gave up. They had no one that could spy him and keep up with him.
There was a few questionable calls by the officials and coaches, but it really was a great game.
beloml
Even at Texas A&M, t.u.’s historic archrival, there are new T-shirts that show a longhorn with bandaids over where the horns are typically “sawed off” and the slogan “Today Only: Gig’em Horns.” Neat!
Brian
Right you are. I could have sworn he was a DC, but then again, I’m a Bruin and don’t drive a cardinal-colored Escalade and wear gold chinos.
Patrick
If you don’t think the Longhorn fans will be insufferable pricks then you don’t live anywhere near Texas.
As an A&M grad, I can tell you that for the last month I’ve been damn near tortured by Horns arguing that I *must* root for them against USC. (This is evidenced by the mass capitulation of my fellow Aggies who sold/bought/wore those ridiculous shirts mentioned by beloml.) Something about the state or the Big 12 conference or something.
Whatever.
Like they were rooting for OU last year against SC; or that they’d ever root for A&M or Tech or any other Texas school.
Nope.
For the foreseeable future, it’ll be nothing but hot air and general obnoxious fan douchebaggery from the Longhorns.
In the battle of insufferable pricks, Longhorns vs. Trojans is like the Yankees and Dodgers playing in the World Series. You may ultimately think you’re selecting the lesser of two evils – but you’re still selecting evil.
Gig ’em.
Mike in SLO
Wow! So much hate for USC running around here. People always hate the frontrunners and love the underdog, but really, Texas as an underdog? Both teams lacked in glaring areas, but both shined more than any other college game I saw this year. Both teams stand heads and shoulders above the rest of the NCAA.
The game reminded me of the 2000 election. Very exciting–holding your breath till the last second, and you’re left with a Texas win (with a little help from the judiciary)– Okay, let the flaming begin!
Mac Buckets
I thought it was a great game, and that had absolutely nothing to do with the three-underdog (WV-Mizzou-UT) straight-up parley that put a few grand in the pocket. OK, it’s got a little to do with that. It may not have be everybody’s Greatest Championship Game Ever, but it certainly was the greatest individual performance ever in such a game, if not any game period.
And, no defense? UT was held to ten points below their average, and USC was held to 13 below its average. Don’t mistake unprecedented offense with no D.
Mac Buckets
Oh, and for all the haters, take solice in the fact that Texas still aren’t the real National Champions. Until there is a playoff tournament, it’s still a Mythical Championship. If polls determined champions, Kansas would have about 7 basketball titles in the last 15 years.
Zifnab
w000000000~!
Go Horns!
Suck it USC!
National Championship for teh win!
In your face America!
We’re #1!
We’re #1!
Ok, it’s out of my system.
To be honest, the first quarter had me horrified when we just couldn’t keep our hands on the ball. I mean, a fumble on a kickoff return? Completely unforgiveable unless you go on to win a National Championship in the same game. And while Vince Young was a machine on the field, I have to give it to the Texas Defense. The game would have gone entirely differently without those guys constantly putting the pressure on Bush and shutting down the USC trick plays.
But yes, I’m with you Mac and I eagerly await a full-blown College Football Championship done NFL style. Although, when you beat OSU on its on turf and take down the only other undefeated team, Mythical Champions takes on a whole different meaning. These guys’ll go down in Texas history for generations.
Stormy70
His daughter attended UT and the rest of Republican Texas supports them, so sorry about that.
Rob
In game 2, and I think if I remember correctly, OSU did not have Smith as the quarterback.
Not to mention the dropped pass in the endzone for an OSU win.
Another Jeff
He was quarterback against Penn State and OSU scored ten points.
Due to Big 10 unity, I was pulling for OSU against Texas in that game, but why is it constantly referred to as a “dropped” pass. He got drilled by a Texas DB. It’s not like he was standing there all alone and just didn’t catch it.
Mac, the fact that Texas scored less than they did against the Colorados and Baylors of the world, and USC scored less than they usually do in the totally defensless PAC-10 really doesn’t mean a helluva lot.
On Vince Young’s performance I’ll agree with you. The only two individual performances in a big game i can think of that come close were Christian Laettner against Kentucky when he shot 10-10 from the field and 10-10 from the foul line, or Magic Johnson in the 1980 NBA Finals when he played Center for an injured Kareem and rang up 42 points and dominated the game.
norbizness
Patrick: Try gigging 6 wins for a bowl game appearance, weirdo.
Stormy: At least UT rejected him. Better yet, the School of Law (even if we got his nephew).
Stormy70
I love President Bush as much as those here hate him. Flame on, I’m off to Kong.
Mac Buckets
I guess we’ll have to decide what people mean when they say “no defense.” If both teams are below their averages by double-digits, I can’t say there was “no defense.” In a couple years, eight to twelve of those defensive players will be playing on Sundays.
USC held UT to 30 points less than CU and 20 less than Baylor — and Baylor and CU were average defensive teams in the NCAA this year, and both were better than, for instance, Notre Dame. UT scored a million on Oklahoma (13th ranked defense). They scored 25 on the road early in the season on Ohio State, the 5th ranked defense. UT scored a million on TTech after an indifferent start, and ‘Bama only got one TD on Tech. That UT offense (Vince) is just pure evil. It’s a hard sell that USC played a bad defensive game, especially since no one is saying they are a great defensive team to begin with.
It’s easier to say that Texas was disappointing on defense. I thought that UT would do a better job on Leinert (which is why I got on them so heavily in Vegas), but the O lines on both sides did great work. Again, I saw unprecedented offenses which were occasionally stopped by great defensive plays (the Griffin INT and the 4th downs spring to mind).
BTW, congrats on that Orange Bowl win. That JoPa sure is a washed up has-been!
Mac Buckets
Yeah, AJ, the Laettner game in the 1992 Elite Eight is fairly close (although if I were 10-10, I’d have found a way to get up 8 more shots! Also, it loses value for only being the Elite Eight), but the Magic game at center pales against Vince’s (gulp) “267 passing/200 rushing,” which is so filthy I can barely even type the words!
rob
They kept coughing up the ball.
Another Jeff
Thanks Mac. It was nice to get the win, but i’m only 34 and i was getting just like JoePa, saying let’s get this game over with, it’s past my bedtime.
One thing last night’s National Championship game showed me was that, prior to the Orange and Rose Bowl, I thought Penn State could’ve given either USC or Texas a run, but after last night, i don’t think that anymore.
Ben
Grisha,
Waaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. You forgot to mention the massive amount of holding by the SC offensive line (especially on Bush’s TD run). You also forgot to mention the Drew Kelson interception that was ruled an incomplete pass… it was an interception and SC got a field goal out of that blown call… 10 point turn around. Quit your whiny little bitch complaining and take your loss like man (or woman). VY was the best player on the field and the best player in college football.
Hookem’
texas dem
To that Aggie up in midthread:
This longhorn would cheer for the Aggies in a title game. I’d never cheer for Oklahoma though, unless the opposing team were somehow even more loathsome.
I might cheer for Cal or Wisconsin or Michigan over TAMU, just as a liberal state school solidarity measure, but against USC or a random school like Florida State? Aggies all the way.
Bob In Pacifica
I said this morning that USC fans are notorious assholes, but in just a day enough Longhorn fans have displayed their rubber rings to suggest a commonality with the Trojan fans.
I stand by what I said: the game was great. Smack talk by dipshits who live within certain statelines because of what someone else has done is useless, although it may help these people find some meaning and false pride.
Stormy70
I am married to a Sooner fan, and he cheered for Texas. He did use the phrase the enemy of my enemy is my friend.
Jason
I’m a USC alumni and was certainly rooting for USC.
That said, Vince Young was superb. The USC defense was totally flummoxed, and I didn’t see Young make more than one or two bad passes all night. He was accurate and fast on the throws. He was effective in the air, and because he was effective in the air, he was able to dominate on the ground.
I wasn’t happy with the result. But there’s no shame in losing to a fantastic team like Texas.