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Written by Matt
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Tuesday, 14 July 2009 15:22 |
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It's gonna take a few years before we can really properly put this season and this era of Tiger football into context. Some overweight sports columnists have already deemed the success and records of the last four years a fluke and a product of cupcake scheduling. Only time will tell if that's the case. I really don't think enough evidence exists to determine whether or not the last four years were an aberration or proof that the program has completely turned the corner.
(Mini-rant: Fat jokes aside, I've always been a big Whitlock fan. I think the guy usually tells it like it is and could give a damn about the consequences. But how the hell does he get off calling the Alamo Bowl the "signature moment of the Chase Daniel-Dave Christensen-Spread Offense era"? Is he even vaguely familiar with the victories over kU at Armageddon and Arkansas in the Cotton Bowl? I'm pretty sure every Mizzou fan will remember those games more fondly than the one over Northwestern on Monday night. Pretty sure the ramifications were a lot greater in those two games as well. Come on Jason, you're better than that.)
But as a good, hardworking blogger I feel it's my responsibility to try to put things into some sort of proper perspective for everyone. I'll give it my best shot: - I've read some people talking about how Chase was able to get the no-4th quarter-comebacks monkey off his back by winning this one. I'm not buying that. You don't get to credit the quarterback with a come-from-behind victory when the biggest reason the team is losing is because of the quarterback's play. Bill Simmons would call that the Brett Favre Rule. The only reason Wolfert was kicking a 44-yard field goal at the end of regulation instead of a 30-yarder is because the coaching staff was obviously worried that Chase was going to force another pick. And I can't blame them. Chase was shakier in the fourth quarter than Elvis Grbac circa 1998. But he got the job done in OT. Hats off for that.
- After the game I was trying to describe what it was like watching Chase struggle like that and I couldn't really put it into words. But Bernie Miklasz likened his struggles to Rick Ankiel's in the 2000 playoffs and I thought that was the perfect comparison. It was kinda surreal to see Chase fall apart down the stretch of this season. Before the start of this season I considered him to be as clutch as any player in college football. Now I think the complete opposite. But like Bernie said in his blog post, unlike Ankiel, Chase found a way to get the job done and went out a winner, something he deserved more than anyone.
- I would love to hear more about what was said by HCGP to the fan that was heckling Chase on the way to the locker room at halftime. You can really tell how much he cares about this senior class. I'm sure Pinkel has put up with a good amount of heckling himself considering what the perception of him among most MU fans was like about four years ago. It's pretty telling that this is what it took for him to go after one of them. That's gotta look good to potential recruits considering Mizzou when they see their potential coach sticking up for his guys like that. And unlike some 40-year-old Big 12 coaches, he didn't make a production out of it. Major props to GP for that.
- I wasn't very impressed with Christensen's play-calling in this one. It doesn't seem smart to me to have 57 plays scripted that you're going to run to start the game regardless of what the opposing defense does. I'm all for asserting your gameplan but aren't good coaches able to react, adapt and adjust?
- Speaking of asserting things, can we agree to make more of an effort to establish our run game next season? It seemed like every time this year that D-Wash got off to a slow start the coaching staff decided to completely abandon him. It's not a good sign when opposing coaches are telling sideline reporters that they're going to completely focus on stopping the pass game because they know the other team isn't patient enough to run the ball, which is what happened Monday night. It also might be a good idea to insert a few more run plays into the playbook other than that stretch play that every team after Nebraska seemed to figure out. D-Wash is probably going to be our best offensive player returning next year so it'd be good to find multiple ways to utilize him.
- Regardless of his final night's worth of botched play-calling, here's to Dave Christensen having a successful run as a head coach at Wyoming. Who knows where this program would be if it wasn't for DC convincing HCGP to completely alter the offensive gameplan four years ago. Best of luck, Dave.
- I don't know what else we can say about Sean Weatherspoon, but how good is Sean Weatherspoon? If you were only watching Spoon on Monday you might have thought the Tigers were playing in Miami rather than San Anton. He was a tackling machine as usual but also made some nice plays defending some passes and was his usual vocal self, getting his teammates and fans pumped up. If you really love football then this guy is every bit as entertaining to watch as Maclin and Coffman.
- I'm telling you right now, this defense is going to be improved next season. Obviously Eberflus made some changes to the gameplan in the offseason that simply did not work. But give him a few months to go back to the drawing board and he should at least be able to work this defense back into decent shape. Spoon will be a monster, Carl Gettis will hopefully return to his freshman form and Kenji Jackson and Jacquies Smith (the two most pleasant surprises of this season) should continue to get better. The most difficult thing will be replacing Stryker Sulak and Ziggy Hood. Both of those guys were unstoppable on Monday. Ziggy was probably one of the more underappreciated players on this team. He was getting double-teamed on practically every play in the Alamo Bowl and I'd say that happened more this season than most of us realize. Stryker, on the other hand, well...he played like a guy whose first name would be Stryker. The key to this defense improving next year will be whether or not they can get a consistent push from their front four. Jaron Baston will have to consistently play like he did the second half of this year and Brian Coulter will have to find some consistency as well. And I hate to put too much pressure on a freshman, but we really need Sheldon Richardson to make an immediate impact.
- Looking back I think a lot of us underestimated how hard it is to make a run at a National Championship. Not only do you have to play with extraordinary consistency and focus but you have to catch a lot of breaks. Last year we might have been two plays away from 10-4 instead of 12-2. If Pig Brown doesn't make a last second INT to save us against Illinois and if Castine Bridges doesn't make a spinning one-handed INT in the endzone against kansas, who knows how our season would've ended up. And this year we might have been two plays away from having a second consecutive 12-win season. What if Justin Garret hadn't lost Kerry Meier? What if Chase hadn't forced that final INT against Okie State? I don't say that to try to somehow prove that this team was better than its record. Last year the Tigers were good at coming up with timely turnovers. They deserved to go 12-2. This year's team struggled with untimely turnovers and the secondary was awful. They deserved to be 10-4. But it's amazing how slim the margin is between the two seasons. There are always four or five plays in a season that separate a decent from a great team and vice versa.
- I don't know how we'll remember this group of players 20 years from now. Maybe they'll be seen as a flash in the pan during a run of fairly mediocre football. Or maybe they'll be remembered as the group that helped Mizzou take its first step toward being considered an elite program. We'll see. But regardless of what their legacy ends up being we should always remember them as a group of guys who totally bought into our program and did everything within their power to make Missouri Tiger football something that Tiger fans could and should be proud of. Six or seven years ago Mizzou football was rarely if ever televised. Occasionally I'd listen to the games on the radio but usually I would just look up the score, see that the Tigers had gotten slaughtered, shrug my shoulders and go on with my life. Now I'm able to live and die with Mizzou football every Saturday from late August to late December (and sometimes the first of January). These guys have played a pretty significant role in making these last four years the best four years of my life. I thank them for that and wish each of them well in all their future endeavors. Once a Tiger, always a Tiger. Mizzou Rah.
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