N. Mexico State could cure Bobcats’ slump
Brown’s status may not be an issue, but team’s still enigma as it closes against tough Wildcats. Team tries to cap first FBS season with victory while saying goodbye to 16 seniors, WAC.
Some big questions will be answered tonight in the Little Apple.
Questions involving bowl destinations, and perhaps even coaching futures.
From the burnt-orange perspective, the most intriguing question this side of what Mack Brown will be doing in 2013 — he insists he’ll be back, for his 16th season at Texas — is this:
Just what, and who, are these 2012 Longhorns?
Considering that Texas is playing its regular-season finale in Manhattan, Kan., against No. 7 Kansas State, it’s a question that should have been answered long before now. And perhaps it was, on a mid-October afternoon in the Cotton Bowl.
Despite the Longhorns’ outwardly respectable 8-3 SAn MArCOS — After spending all of November mired in a five-game losing streak, Texas State has one more game to try to recapture the fire from its early-season success.
The Bobcats (3-8 overall, 1-4 in the WAC) likely have the perfect opponent to help them out of their doldrums. New Mexico State has lost 10 straight games.
Today’s kickoff at Bobcat Stadium is at 3 p.m. It will be the last-ever football game for the Western Athletic Conference, which is dissolving.
It’s also the first time the Bobcats will play in December since 2005, and only the seventh time in school history, which covers 105 seasons of football.
Those past December games all came in the NCAA playoffs, where the Bobcats went 5-1. They won twice each year in the 1981 and 1982 Division II playoffs, and went 1-1 in the Division I FCS playoffs in 2005.
The Bobcats are trying to get out of a rut, having lost last record heading into the regular-season finale, many fans feel Texas defined its season, and Brown’s current pro- gram, in the 63-21 embarrassment to Oklahoma in Dallas. That’s why they’re howling for coaching scalps from Brown
3 p.m., 1260, 89.9, 92.5 week to UTSA, which came off back-to-back losses to bowleligible teams San Jose State, Utah State, Louisiana Tech and Navy.
“We are very glad to have another game — and another home game — for our seniors,” Bobcats coach Dennis Franchione said. “I am proud of the way this group has battled every game and worked hard in every practice, and we want to be able to end the season
SWe’ll kick off our Texas-Kansas State game chat at 6:30 p.m. — 30 minutes before the real kickoff — and will continue chatting till after the game, at on down, and that’s why there is such an unsettled feeling around the Longhorns that was exacerbated by the 20-13 loss to TCU in Thanksgiving’s home finale.
So has Texas made substantial progress from the 8-5 campaign of 2011, which was the first year of Brown’s rebuilding project after the 2010 meltdown? According to one Longhorn, check back after the dust settles on the Kansas plains.
“I think a big thing will be seeing how we respond in this game,” offensive guard Trey Hopkins said. “I think that will really help us going forward, to see what kind of team we are.
“We’ve seen where we’ve with a W.”
Texas State will say goodbye to 17 seniors, including quarterback Shaun Rutherford, tight end Chase Harper, running back Marcus Curry, linebacker Brian Lily and defensive backs Jason McLean and Darryl Morris. Those players, and the Bobcats’ other 11 seniors, helped form the foundation for the move to the FBS this season.
“It will be very difficult for me to take off my shoulder pads for the last time Saturday evening, and I am sure I will get a little emotional after the game,” Lily said. “Win-