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WTH Moments – Red River Rivalry

Posted October 13th, 2011 by Ross
Filed under: Feature, Football

WTH?! (What the Heck?) moments are attempts to find the memorable and the off-beat perspective on Longhorns sports. Here are some interesting moments from the Texas’ game against the Sooners.

Pre-Game (15:00) WTH Defer?! Is it me or do we lack that killer instinct? What a great opportunity to take a young team and attack on offensive first after winning the coin toss. Horns chose to defer to the second half. I will defer to the 96,000 plus in attendance, but I believe no one liked the choice of shirt by Mack Brown with the Longhorn on the pocket.

1st Quarter (9:30) WTH McCoy?! This would be the first of many turnovers for the Longhorns. A sack and subsequent fumble by Case McCoy was later turned into an OU field goal. I guess Case forgot his horseshoe. Great job by the defense to bend but not break in the first quarter, but that was about the change quickly.

2nd Quarter (15:00) WTH Diaz?! Understand that you were trying to play coverage most of the day, but there were no blitzes of memory that were up the middle to disrupt the timing of Landry Jones. An easy lob over the UT defense to Kenny (crazy hair) Stills was a sign of bad things to come to start the second quarter.

2nd Quarter (2:50) WTH Ash?! The Horns are a young team… young team… young team (trying to justify the mistakes). I just wish they had not made a whole season’s worth in one game. David Ash was trying to make something happen by throwing across his body to the waiting arms of OU Demontre Hurst who rambled 55 yards for the first of three defensive touchdowns to establish the Red River Rout.

2nd Quarter (2:38) WTH Cap’n America?! One of the few bright spots was Fozzy Whittaker (aka Captain America) 100 yard kickoff return to bring the north side of the stadium to its feet. Thanks Fozzy for the highlight.

2nd Quarter (:31) WTH Dagger?! After the kickoff return by Fozzy, the OU offense dialed up a quick 8 play drive to the end zone to retake the mojo for a 34-10 lead into halftime.

This year's OU game quickly slipped away from Mike Davis and Texas.

3rd Quarter (8:12) WTH One Play?! I have heard of offensive efficiency but this is ridiculous. OU Dominic Whaley takes the hand off at its own 36 and is never touched for a 64 yard touchdown. I guess every play is drawn up to score… this one did.

4th Quarter (12:29) WTH Davis?! I am sorry kid but I am going to have to bust you on this one. The OU defensive back rips the ball away from Mike Davis and takes it 56 yards to the house. I thought our problem was not catching the ball, now we have to hope you hold on to it?!

Next up for the Longhorns are the Cowboys as they host to Oklahoma State for the game on Oct. 15th.

Thanks for following my WTH articles throughout the season. I appreciate the opportunity to rant about the greatest University sports program in the country. You can continue to follow comments on all of UT sports on twitter at 40AcresSports or follow me at Horns1991. HOOK EM!!

Tags: Case McCoy, David Ash, Foswhitt Whittaker, Mack Brown, Manny Diaz, Mike Davis, Oklahoma, Texas

WTH Moments: Lost my 12 Pac

Posted September 27th, 2011 by Ross
Filed under: Baseball, Basketball, Football

1 comment

We have completed a quarter of the season and it’s time to start looking at conference match ups for the Horns. But before we get back to football, I want to look back at Realignment Armageddon 2.0. We can surmise that the Big 12 is back together and everything is back to normal. (Who believes that?) I do think we need to take a look at what was lost. Here is what I believe the PAC 16 would have looked like if Larry Scott and the rest of the universities on the left coast would have opened the door to the 4 schools in the East.

Northwest Pod

Oregon state
Oregon
Washington
Washington State

West Pod

Stanford
California
UCLA
USC

Mountain Pod

Arizona
Arizona State
Colorado
Utah

East Pod

Texas
Texas Tech
Oklahoma
Oklahoma State

The pod system would have played out by having the schools in the East only having to travel to the western time zone twice a year for football. The teams would play a home and away series for two years and switch to the other remaining teams in that pod. The travel schedule for most of the other university sports would be quite different due to the size of this conference, but we all know that football pays the bills. The media markets that this league would boast would cover 12 of the major 28 markets including the biggies such as LA, SF, Houston, & DFW.

Here is a look at the possible football schedule using the pod system for the Longhorns for the 2012 and 2014 season. The odd years would result in the teams switching destinations to accommodate the home and away series. The OU game would still be played at the Cotton Bowl every year. The remaining 3 non-conference games of the season would be a host of cupcake teams to offset a brutal but highly entertaining regular season (goodbye A&M)!

2012 – Pac 16 conference games

@ Oregon
Washington St
@ Standford
UCLA
@ Colorado
Arizona
@ Texas Tech
OU
@ OK State

2014 – Pac 16 conference games

Oregon St.
@ Washington
USC
@ California
Utah
@ Arizona St.
@ Texas Tech
OU
@ OK State

The Pac 16 games would provide better match ups and great destinations over the Big 12. The conference titles games would be the former Pac 8 schools (NW/West) against the Mountain/East division schools in locales such as Pasadena, Tempe or maybe even at Cowboy Stadium. Texas wants to play in large television markets for exposure and to play in mostly southern climates to recruit elite high school talent. The cons to this new frontier is that it would be much more difficult to reach a BCS bowl game or even the National Title game under the PAC 16 scenario. It looks like the Big 12 will allow the Longhorn Network to exist as long as the Tier 1 and Tier 2 television rights are shared among all schools in the league. There are probably some hurt feelings and back room deals that still need to be ironed out and another team needs to be added for this Big 12 conference to work. I just thought you might want to see what was lost last week when the Pac 12 was said that their full right now. I did enjoy DeLoss Dodds assessment of Texas during this entire upheaval. “We are who we are.”

Tags: Big 12, NCAA, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Pac 12, Pac 16, Texas, Texas Aggies, WTH

WTH Moments – Texas at UCLA

Posted September 22nd, 2011 by Ross
Filed under: Feature, Football

4 comments

WTH?! (What the Heck?) moments are attempts to find the memorable and the off-beat perspective on Longhorns sports. Here are some interesting moments from the Texas’ game against the Bruins.

1st Quarter (15:00) WTH Bruin Fans?! I have never seen so many empty seats at the Rose Bowl (54,583 in attendance). The Rose Bowl is a beautiful venue, but it was an eye sore with the overhead shots of the stadium where there were plenty of seats to be had.

1st Quarter (12:35) WTH Prince?! UCLA QB Kevin Prince was in a royal mood by supplying the greatest of all gifts which were three interceptions all in the first quarter. The prince became a pauper and sat the bench for the rest of the game.

2nd Quarter (11:36) WTH Malcolm?! We have to call out the freshmen’s first touchdown run of his career as a Longhorn. Malcolm Brown had a spectacular day finishing with 110 yards while running for his first touchdown with only one shoe on. Wonder what he will do to top that feet on his next TD run?

2nd Quarter (:58) WTH Flag Football?! It is amazing to see how Marquise Goodwin has set the tone for this team with his speed and blocking. The hit that laid out the UCLA defender was a thing of beauty to spring Mike Davis for a nice reception. The referee thought that they played two hand touch in California when he threw the flag for the personal foul.

2nd Quarter (:21) WTH Horseshoe 1?! Shout out to Beau Edge from 104.9 The Horn to give the ultimate description for Case McCoy. Not a great practice player and not the measurable you would see from a top ranked prospect but the kid has a golden horseshoe up his butt and he just makes plays. Case scrambles around and makes something out of nothing by hitting Mike Davis for a 25 yard play that eventually leads to another touchdown before the half.

3rd Quarter (9:45) WTH Horseshoe 2?! Case McCoy delivers another crazy play when he throws up a prayer that is tipped by the UCLA defender right into the waiting arms of Mike Davis for 45 yards. Case will make more mistakes as he is growing into the leader of this team. But it does seem that he has the IT factor that we all want from the position.

3rd Quarter (1:40) WTH Harsin?! Coach Harsin is demonstrating how to operate an offense when he uses the wildcat formation to spring Fozzy Whitaker in for a back braking touchdown to put the Horns up by 22 points. Hope that Coach Applewhite is learning the play calling skills because Harsin will be head coach sooner than the Horn fans want to think about it.

4th Quarter (12:29) WTH DB’s?! What a coming out party for this young secondary. Adrian Phillips, Kenny Vaccaro, and Carrington Byndom all had interceptions. But Adrian needs to be singled out for the ferocious hit he delivered to force the ball out from the UCLA receiver which was recovered by Blake Gideon. Great job by the defense to switch momentum after the Horns suffered a fumble deep in their own territory.

Next up for the Longhorns are the Cyclones as they travel to Ames for the game on Oct. 1st.

Tags: Adrian Phillips, Blake Gideon, Bryan Harsin, Carrington Byndom, Case McCoy, Fozzy Whittaker, Kenny Vaccaro, Major Applewhite, Malcolm Brown, Marquise Goodwin, Mike Davis, Rose Bowl, Texas, UCLA, WTH

Game Day Live: Texas vs BYU

Posted September 10th, 2011 by Brian
Filed under: Feature, Football, Live

0 comments

Tonight’s Texas game against BYU will be the first time the LHN deprived Longhorn fanbase will be able to watch their team this season. We’ll be active here and on Twitter and would love to have you join in on the conversation.

Follow along live with @40AcresSports on Twitter and below for our coverage. We’ll be live right around kickoff so join us to discuss the game at 6pm Saturday.

Feel free to leave comments and questions using the live tool, but not all comments will be published. Read below for more notes on comments and how the live blog will work. Hook ‘em!

Saturday September 10, 2011