Locked and loaded

Bowl-rich Big 12 poised for successful postseason

Quentin Griffin and the Sooners, in a non-traditional turn of events, are headed to Pasadena in January. AP  1    Oklahoma  2    Kansas State  3    Texas  4    Colorado  5    Texas Tech  6    Oklahoma State  7    Nebraska  8    Texas A&M  9    Iowa State 10   Missouri 11   Baylor 12   Kansas   5-13   Combined bowl record of the Big 12’s South Division. Before last season’s 3-1 bowl finish, Big 12 South teams dropped 12 of their first 14 bowl games, including losing streaks of five and six games. “We can’t imitate the blue field, but we can imitate the cold and snow.” -- Iowa State coach Dan McCarney, describing his team’s challenge of playing at the Humanitarian Bowl in expected icy conditions, similar to what they find back home. By Tim Griffin, Special to CNNSI.com Big 12 coaches love to tell anybody who will listen how tough their conference is. They will get a chance to prove it over the next several weeks. In its previous six seasons, the Big 12 hasn’t lived up to its self-proclaimed billing as the nation’s toughest conference. Through that period, the conference’s 17-21 bowl record has not matched either the Southeastern (27-17) or the Big Ten (20-18) for postseason success. That could change this season as the Big 12 appears poised for its most successful bowl season. Although the conference failed to place two teams in the Bowl Championship Series for the fourth time in the last five seasons, favorable matchups could make this the Big 12’s breakout bowl season. Early odds from Las Vegas indicate that Big 12 teams will be favored in seven of eight bowl games. While those predictions rarely mean much before bowl games, it could be indicative of the chances for the Big 12 to make a case as the nation’s strongest and most balanced conference with a good bowl showing this year. The Big 12 had three teams in the BCS’ final top 10 -- Oklahoma, Texas and Kansas State -- and tied its record with eight bowl teams this year. The conference actually had a ninth team eligible, but Texas A&M officials decided not to push for a 13th game because of the coaching change to Dennis Franchione and because they didn’t care for playing in the Humanitarian Bowl. “When you look at the Big 12 right now, as young as the league is to have nine bowl eligible teams is just unbelievable,” Texas coach Mack Brown said. “In fact, we didn’t even have enough bowls for all of the teams. [Big 12 commissioner] Kevin [Weiberg] and the guys are going to have to look for another bowl game or two. “I think this conference has to be considered one of the best in the country. Three teams in the top 10 in the BCS. It’s hard for anybody else to compete with that.” The Big 12 again failed to receive an extra team in the BCS, as Southern California from the Pac-10 and Iowa from the Big Ten were selected for the extra two slots. Interestingly, both BCS at-large teams suffered losses to Big 12 teams during non-conference play. Nebraska coach Frank Solich said he was surprised that Kansas State or Texas didn’t receive more consideration for an at-large BCS berth. “I thought the Big 12 definitely had a chance,” Solich said. “In my mind, there’s at least two teams and maybe even more that could step in those [BCS] games and play at least at the level of the teams that will be there.” The conference’s balance was never more apparent this year, when each Big 12 team entered the championship game with at least two losses for the first time in history. That balance likely cost a Big 12 team an opportunity a chance to compete for the national championship. “I can remember growing up in the South and following the SEC and seeing their teams beat each other up,” Brown said. “The Big Ten was that way, too. An 8-3 season was a good season ... it looks like we’re headed that way.” That won’t win many national championships. But the Big 12 can emphasize a point to the rest of the country with a strong bowl showing. “I know there are eight teams going to bowls from this conference,” Iowa State coach Dan McCarney said. “There isn’t a better conference in America than the Big 12. I’ve been saying that since July at our media day. There’s no question when you look at what happened at the end of the season. The Big 12 is as good as it gets.” The podium at Colorado’s postgame news conference after the Buffs’ championship game loss was the best indicator of CU's youth this year. Three of the four players chosen by the media for comments after the loss to Oklahoma were freshmen -– including wide receiver Jeremy Bloom, safety Brian Iwuh and tailback Brian Calhoun. “I was sitting at the podium after the game and three of the players were freshmen,” Colorado coach Gary Barnett said. “They don’t own a shaver between the three of them.” Iwuh, a Houston product, made the most of his return to his hometown in his first college start with 12 tackles and a defensed pass against the Sooners. “I thought for his first start, he played particularly well,” Barnett said. “I thought he was fantastic. He’ll play better as he gets older, but thought he showed something for a freshman tackling the way he did and showing the presence of mind that he did we were really impressed. We were all along, but I thought he played well.” Iwuh’s production isn’t surprising considering his athletic lineage. Among his distant relatives include baseball’s Reggie Jackson (his grandfather’s third cousin) and Ralph Garr and former Outland Trophy winner Russell Maryland. HOT: Oklahoma RB Quentin Griffin Notched his ninth straight 100-yard rushing game against Colorado, breaking Chris Brown’s championship game record by rushing for 188 yards and two TDs. NOT: Colorado K Patrick Brougham Shanked all three field-goal attempts, squandering the chance the Buffs had to stay close to Oklahoma before the Buffs’ defense wore down in the second half. Brougham finished the season by misfiring on 14 of his 25 field-goal attempts. HOT: Colorado PR Jeremy Bloom Produced his second punt return for a touchdown this season with an 80-yard score against Oklahoma. It gave him a Colorado freshman record for touchdowns on punt returns and three of the five longest plays ever produced by a first-year CU player. NOT: Iowa State’s bowl prospects Not only to the Cyclones have to pack their longjohns for their trip to Boise for the Humanitarian Bowl, they will be facing perhaps the most difficult task of any Big 12 bowl team. They merely have to beat one of the nation’s most explosive offensive attacks on their home field.   Iowa State coach Dan McCarney thought he didn’t have anything to worry about when he flippantly told reporters last month that he hoped to avoid playing in the Humanitarian Bowl. The Cyclones’ chances looked good, considering they had soared to a school-record No. 9 ranking in The Associated Press after a six-game winning streak pushed them to 6-1 earlier this season. “One of the goals I set was to play somewhere hot in December,” McCarney said. “Well, Boise, Idaho, sure as hell isn’t going to be hot in December. We’re going to try to go somewhere hotter than that.” But a late losing streak dropped the Cyclones to 7-6 and earned them a berth in the Humanitarian Bowl. Making matters worse, ISU’s opponent will be Boise State, which has won 10 straight games since losing at Arkansas on Sept. 7. Playing the Broncos on their home field is just another tough road game for the Cyclones, who already have met Texas, Oklahoma, Colorado, Kansas State and Iowa on the road. “It’s a very big advantage for Boise State,” McCarney said. “It would be like having a bowl game at Jack Trice Stadium and calling it a bowl game and inviting somebody in here to play.” Texas A&M president Robert Gates The former CIA director promised that he would be an “agent of change” after taking his job. He showed he knew something about athletics with bold hirings of respected Nebraska athletic director Bill Byrne and Alabama football coach Dennis Franchione in a three-day period last week. Oklahoma defensive coordinators Mike Stoops and Brent Venables Cooked up a defensive game plan that limited Colorado to 193 total yards in the Sooners’ championship game victory over the Buffs. After allowing six passes for at least 20 yards last week against Oklahoma State, the longest pass completion against the Sooners in the championship game was 19 yards. Oklahoma State coach Les Miles After a disappointing 2-4 start, the Cowboys rebounded for a 7-5 record and a berth in the Houston Bowl -– the program’s first bowl trip since 1997. In the process, the Cowboys beat Nebraska and Oklahoma for the first time in the same season in school history.     Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops will be returning to a familiar spot when he brings the Sooners to the Rose Bowl on Jan. 1 against Washington State. Stoops was an undersized but hard-hitting defensive back who started for Iowa in 1982 when the Hawkeyes made their first Rose Bowl appearance in 23 years under Hayden Fry. The Hawkeyes dropped a 28-0 decision to Washington that day, but Stoops said the bowl trip, along with a 1986 trip there with Fry as an Iowa assistant coach, remain some of the most vivid memories of his time with the Hawkeyes. The Sooners will become the second Big 12 team in as many years to play in Pasadena, although they are the first actually chosen by the Rose Bowl. Nebraska dropped a 37-14 game to Miami last year for the national championship game as the No. 2 team in the final BCS poll. “It’s just rare that this opportunity comes around,” Stoops said about the Sooners’ visit to California. “This is the way the BCS works out and it’s just fantastic. “Oklahoma’s never been in [the Rose Bowl], and I don’t know how many other opportunities we’ll have to be in one, so it’s really special for us.” The game against Washington State will be a big test for Oklahoma’s secondary, which has struggled at times this year against deep passers. Their challenge of containing WSU quarterback Jason Gesser, who should be healthy for the Jan. 1 game, should make the Rose one of the most intriguing bowls this year. Some traditionalists have scoffed about the two teams in this year’s Rose Bowl, particularly when higher-rated teams Iowa and Southern California moved the Rose Bowl’s traditional Big Ten-Pac 10 matchup 3,000 miles east to the Orange Bowl. But Washington State coach Mike Price took issue with reporters’ repeated questions that the Rose Bowl’s contest was lessened this year because it didn’t follow tradition. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” Price said. “This is going to be a great game. Both teams are excited. They’re really excited to come out here. I know they are. And we couldn’t be more excited. “This is a big deal for Washington State and the Pac-10, for our champion to be able to play [the Big 12’s] champion. It’s great for both conferences and it’s great for both schools. And it’s going to be great for the Rose Bowl.” Oklahoma has won both previous games against the Cougars, claiming a 28-0 victory in 1938 and a 21-0 win in 1967. Both games were played in Norman. It will be the Sooners’ first appearance at the Rose Bowl since a 34-14 win over UCLA in 1990.   Big 12 commissioner Kevin Weiberg gave the conference’s championship a ringing endorsement, despite this year’s game falling more than 6,000 fans below a sellout at Houston’s Reliant Stadium. It was the conference’s first non-sellout for a championship game since 1998 and was made even worse with approximately 20,000 no-shows at the stadium on game night. “I’ve always said I like this format in the sense that we settle it on the field,” Weiberg said. “I think in a 12-member conference, that’s just something we need to do.” … Colorado coach Gary Barnett said he favors a change in the conference’s rules that would slot the loser of the championship game at a particularly bowl rather than allowing it to plummet through the conference’s list of bowls. The Buffs fell to the Alamo Bowl, the Big 12’s fourth bowl in terms of payouts, after losing to Oklahoma in the championship. They were nosed out of the Holiday Bowl, which ranks third in payouts, by Kansas State, a team the Buffs beat during the regular season. “Until our conference slots and forces the bowls to take our teams 1-2-3-4, then it will always happen,” Barnett said. “Kansas State has played great this season and certainly deserves the best thing they can get out of the deal. But until we come to an agreement and slot those teams … people will always do this and we will always have this issue.” ... Colorado top rushers Chris Brown and Bobby Purify are listed by Barnett as questionable for the Alamo Bowl against Wisconsin. Brown has missed his last two games with a bruised sternum and Purify was limited to spot duty against Oklahoma with a high ankle sprain … Kansas State coach Bill Snyder said his current team ranks among the two best he has ever coached. He considers this year’s team and his 1998 North Division championship squad as his two best squads during his 14-season tenure at KSU. After R.C. Slocum’s firing last week, Snyder has more tenure than any other Big 12 head coach. “I guess it just means I’m older,” said Snyder, who turned 61 in October. “I don’t even think about it. Maybe it just says I’m crazier than the rest for hanging around so long.” ... New Baylor coach Guy Morriss is expected to bring most of his staff from Kentucky to Waco. The key hire could be defensive coordinator John Goodner, who worked on Grant Teaff’s staff at Baylor from 1982-92 and later worked seven years at Texas Tech, the final five as defensive coordinator. ... Nebraska’s trip to the Independence Bowl will stretch the Cornhuskers’ streak to 34 straight bowl games, an ongoing NCAA record. The Cornhuskers sold 510 tickets for the game on the first day they were available. That total compared to 17,000 Rose Bowl tickets purchased by Oklahoma fans on the same day. … Texas' No. 1 recruiting class of 1999, headed by former USA Today offensive and defensive players of the year Cory Redding and Chris Simms, will leave school without ever playing in a BCS game. … Oklahoma State will be looking for revenge against Southern Mississippi in the Houston Bowl after losing in 2000-01 against the Golden Eagles. … New Texas A&M coach Dennis Franchione is excited about coming to his new school, which will provide him his first chance at directing a program that didn’t have a losing season the year before he arrived. “It’s been 21 years since Texas A&M has had a losing season,” Franchione said. “That’s exciting to me because it’s my first time to take one over that has a foundation in place and is not coming off a losing season. That’s a nice way to get started and I’m certainly ready for that.” … Texas Tech QB Kliff Kingsbury helped former Tech running backs coach Art Briles get his new job as head coach at his alma mater, Houston. Kingsbury called Houston athletic director Dave Maggard before Briles was hired to give his former coach a ringing endorsement. … Victories over Nebraska, Oklahoma and Texas A&M have helped fund-raising activities for Oklahoma State’s $75 million renovation project at Lewis Field. “It does make a difference,” OSU athletic director Harry Birdwell told the (Oklahoma City) Daily Oklahoman. “People are giving money. People are excited. People believe. In some cases, people have given more than they intended. In some cases people just stepped out of the woods. … The success of the program has had a definite impace on people’s willingness to support the project.” … Oklahoma TB Quentin Griffin has extended his streak to 478 consecutive touches (receptions and carries) without a lost fumble.

Tim Griffin covers the Big 12 for the San Antonio Express-News. His "This Week in the Big 12" column appears Tuesdays during the season.

 

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