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Redemption songs Kingsbury, UGA, Mackovic have 'Salvation Saturdays'Posted: Sunday November 17, 2002 6:52 PMUpdated: Tuesday November 19, 2002 6:48 PM
Twelve hours of thrillingly memorable football were nearing an end Saturday when ESPN’s late-night studio crew coined a little nickname to sum up the day’s events: “Sabotage Saturday.” Now, you could either spend the next several minutes scratching your head, trying to figure out exactly who or what got sabotaged or did said sabotaging. Or you can subscribe to a different ditty I came up with on my own: Call it "Salvation Saturday." Salvation, as in what Texas Tech quarterback Kliff Kingsbury must have felt as the final seconds wound down against Texas. Salvation, as in what hovered over an entire state when Georgia receiver Michael Johnson hauled in a 19-yard touchdown catch on 4th and 15. And salvation, as in what embattled Arizona coach John Mackovic experienced -- at least temporarily -- while being lifted onto the shoulders of his players after beating Cal. In the case of Kingsbury, all the Red Raiders senior has done in three seasons is attempt and complete more passes than any quarterback who’s ever played the game, throw for more yards than all but three. But before Saturday, the so-called experts -- this one included – were inclined to downplay Kingsbury’s talents because most of his 42-of-60, 470-yard, five-touchdown games seemed to come against Baylor, Kansas or New Mexico, not Oklahoma or Ohio State. On Saturday, though, Kingsbury absolutely shredded the nation’s No. 4 team and No. 2 pass defense in a 42-38 upset, completing 38 of 60 throws for 473 yards and an astounding six touchdowns to outduel his cross-state counterpart -- the one guy most often apt to overshadow him -- Texas’ Chris Simms. Suddenly, a whole bunch of Heisman voters are reevaluating their short lists, probably wondering why it took them this long to include a guy with almost 4,500 yards, 41 touchdowns and a 68 percent completion rate. And if he were to somehow do it again next week against Oklahoma? Needless to say, we’d probably have a new front-runner. Salvation, however, was not unique to West Texas on Saturday. At Auburn, Ala., Georgia coach Mark Richt was accomplishing in his second year what his predecessors couldn’t do in the previous nine: take the Dawgs to the SEC championship game. That it would happen against Auburn, in last-minute fashion, was only fitting for Richt. It was against the same opponent a year earlier that the rookie head coach’s honeymoon officially ended, as he called an ill-timed running play at the Tigers’ 1-yard line that, when stopped, caused the clock to run out and Georgia to lose 24-17. A year later, with the game again on the line in the waning moments, Richt this time called the perfect play. Quarterback David Greene (about whom Richt has experienced a whole new rash of criticism for rotating with freshman D.J. Shockley) and receiver Johnson (a fill-in for the injured Terrence Edwards) executed it flawlessly, and Georgia won 24-21 to earn its first SEC East title. As for Mackovic, the hardest week of his coaching career ended with one of its sweetest victories. Just days after half his team had requested his ouster, followed by Mackovic’s tearful apology and even rumors some players would boycott the trip to Cal, the 3-7 Wildcats seemed headed for certain disaster against the 6-4 Golden Bears. Instead, QB Jason Johnson played his best game of the season, throwing for 492 yards on 31-of-45 passing, and Arizona notched its first Pac-10 win, 52-41. Afterward, Mackovic said he told his players: "This is a game they will probably remember forever." Elsewhere, Mike Leach and Mark Richt surely told their squads the same thing.
Now that Kingsbury’s gotten his props, it's time to salute another guy whose performances are becoming harder and harder to overlook. In Saturday’s 58-25 rout of Indiana, the senior tailback rewrote Penn State’s single-game rushing record for the third time this season, carrying 28 times for a staggering 327 yards and four touchdowns. With that effort, Johnson also set a school mark for rushing yards in a season with 1,736 yards, just eight behind national leader Chris Brown of Colorado. The one knock against Johnson would be that he’s largely feasted on the Nittany Lions’ weakest opposition, notching nearly half his yardage in three games against Northwestern, Illinois and Indiana, who are a combined 10-22. Against Iowa, Michigan and Ohio State, 32-3, his average is a more modest 70.7 yards per game.
Beating Texas brings validation not just for Kingsbury but also for third-year head coach Mike Leach, whose Air Leach pass attack, while extremely exciting to watch, had yet proved capable of bringing his program to the next level. His first two seasons of 7-5 and 7-6 included only one victory over a team that finished with a winning record, Texas A&M in 2001. At 7-4 with another victory over the Aggies, 2002, headed into Saturday, was shaping up to be more of the same. Instead, Tech now stands 8-4, the top team in its state this season and one more upset over Oklahoma away from reaching the Big 12 championship game.
After trying to follow everything that was going down at about 6:45 p.m. ET on Saturday, I’m convinced channel-flipping could be an Olympic sport. There was real skill and dexterity involved in navigating Ohio State-Illinois, Georgia-Auburn and Texas-Texas Tech -- all nail-biters, mind you -- without missing anything important. With apologies to the other two, though, Horns-Raiders took the cake in terms of pure aesthetic value. As fabulous a game as Kingsbury and WR Wes Welker played, Simms and Roy Williams kept pace step for step, at least until Simms’ latest, fateful interception in the closing minutes. Nonetheless, he was 24-of-37 for 345 yards and four TDs, good enough to leave almost any other opposing offense in the dust.
Stewart Mandel covers college football for CNNSI.com. Got a comment, question or scoop for Stewart? Click here. |
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