Close calls overshadow classic game
After all the swords have been returned to their scabbards, and the last cry of “fix” is heard across the Sabine River, only one thing may be remembered.
The eventual losing coach took a Gatorade shower when LSU played Texas A&M Saturday night (almost into Sunday morning local time) at historic Kyle Field.
Lovable Ed Orgeron received a watery tribute from his players late in regulation with the Tigers poised to claim a 31-24 victory. A 10-2 record would make Orgeron’s team a likely candidate for the Sugar Bowl if Alabama beats Georgia (which LSU crushed in October) in the Southeastern Conference Championship Game Saturday.
How quickly perspectives can change. For an LSU fan, cheering for Alabama in a big game couldn’t be any more nauseous than what the Tigers swallowed in College Station, Texas.
Starting with an apparent game-saving interception that was disallowed, LSU was victimized every which way by the SEC officiating crew working the game. Cynically, one wondered if the men in striped shirts also worked the 1972 Olympic basketball final in Munich between the United States and Russia — an outcome so controversial that the losing American players still have not accepted their silver medals.
Or that these guys counted the votes of infamous Box 13 in Alice, Texas, which in a 1948 U.S. Senate election produced a recount favorable for a future president, who thereafter heard jeers of “Landslide Lyndon.”
Seemingly safeguarded down the stretch, Texas A&M pulled out the victory, 74-72, in the highest-scoring football game in NCAA history. To the very end, LSU felt bamboozled with the Tigers’ Greedy Williams penalized for pass interference and unsportsmanlike conduct after breaking up a two-point conversion attempt that would have prompted an NCAA-record eighth overtime period.
Jimbo Fisher, for whom A&M broke the bank, thus joins
Houston Dale Nutt as the only SEC coaches to win a seven-overtime game. Nutt, in 2001 at Ole Miss and 2003 at Kentucky, did it twice while at Arkansas.
Razorback fans tend to forget that on Thanksgiving Friday 11 years ago, in what would be Nutt’s last Razorback game, Arkansas beat top-ranked LSU in triple overtime at Death Valley in Baton Rouge. Underappreciated despite winning on the road against what would be that year’s BCS champion, Nutt was soon off to Ole Miss with a shrug of indifference from his home state. Fast forward to 2018: After the first 10-loss season in Arkansas football history, who’s sorry now?
If he never wins another game in College Station, Fisher became an A&M hero overnight. The spirit of Aggieland was manifest throughout this classic between old rivals. Gene Chizik, a national championship-winning former Auburn coach, said on the SEC Network later that above all, he would remember the physical and mental toughness required of the Aggies.
The same can be said of LSU, which with a 9-3 record remains worthy of a prime bowl bid. Despite Orgeron not settling on a No. 1 quarterback until the Monday before the first game, the Tigers have quality wins over nationally ranked Miami, Auburn and Georgia teams. They should be denigrated in no way for being shut out against an Alabama squad, 12-0 after an Iron Bowl conquest of Auburn, that may be the best ever seen (at least offensively) in college football.
A week after losing to ‘Bama, LSU slipped past Arkansas 24-17 on a cold night in Fayetteville. That marked the last vestiges of competitive football played by Chad Morris’ first Razorback team, one outscored
90-6 over the last two weeks by Mississippi State and Missouri — one that beat only backwater opponents, Eastern Illinois and Tulsa, and embarrassed itself repeatedly on national TV. Getting one turkey after another when it picks up the game, CBS is entitled to ask for an upgrade over Arkansas vs. Missouri on Thanksgiving weekend next year.
If we can quit blaming Bret Bielema and Jeff Long for the current mess, Razorback football program also should be held to a higher standard. Because as it stands, they don’t make Tylenol strong enough to cure the headache felt by Arkansas fans after a season that the interstate running by the campus should have been changed from
49 to 210.