'11 Rice - Texas
week
Texas 34, Rice 9
Owls hang in for better than a half, but miscues, sloppy play
eventually allow Texas to run away late in the game
UNDERSIZED, BUT NOT OUTMANNED -- RIce lineback Justin
Allen was in the UT backfield all night, winding up being credited with eight tackles,
which understates his performance (Mark Anderson photo)
AUSTIN (Sept. 4) -- Five minutes deep into the third quarter Saturday night,
the Rice Owls were driving, looking at a first and goal from the Texas eight yard line
while facing only a 13-6 deficit.At
the point, anyone paying the remotest attention among the 101,000 fans in attendance at
DKR Memorial Stadium at the season opener both teams could have admitted that the score
easily might, in fact ought, have been reversed.
For it was simply the presence of bone-head errors, one after another, which had
prevented the Owls from converting crisp drives into touchdowns instead of three pointers,
while allowing Texas to escape from cliffhanger movie scenes more than once.
As painful as it is to recount, the litany of miscues is part of the record of
the game. A few key ones:
–After the Owls’ first play from scrimmage netted eight yards to the
Texas 40 on a quick pass from Taylor McHargue to Tyler Smith, the ensuing snap sails two
feet over the head of TMac, who was forced to smother the ball for a 14-yard loss,
effectively killing a promising potential drive.
–Moments later, it’s first and ten at the Texas 42 and the
Owls are driving after Charles Ross set them up with a 43-yard kickoff return. After the
first down play, an Owl lineman is called for a silly personal foul and the Owls are
looking at second and 25. Drive over.
–With the Owls up, 3-0, Texas faces a first and 25 at their own 17 yard
line after being penalized for an illegal block. At least one Rice fan in the crowd
turns to his seat mate and says, "Uh-oh, they’ve got us right where they want
us." Under a heavy rush, Horn QB Garrett Gilbert heaves a desperation pass 56 yards
downfield. The Rice defender is completely out of position, and UT’s Mike Davis is
able to haul in the catch. "Could have been worse," comes the retort. "It
could have been third and 25."
–Still tied 3-3, early in the second quarter, the Owls stuff three straight
pass incompletions down the throat of the Texas offense. Boos for Horn QB Gilbert echo out
over the now comparatively quiet UT crowd. But the Rice deep man muffs what appears
to be a relatively cream-puff punt, Horn rusher Adrian Phillips recovers at the Rice 20,
and Texas surges in for the quick and cheap touchdown to go up 10-3.
-- Rice, down 20-9 but still within reach mid-way in the third, is driving
at midfield, when a consecutive pair of false starts dooms the drive. Kyle Martens comes
in to pin UT at its own one yard line. But the Owls get called for onsides, the Horns get
room to operate, and they proceed to drive 99 yards for the clinching score.
"I'm really disappointed," Rice head coach David Bailiff said
afterwards. "It's one of those where you put a lot of hard work into it, and you go
out there and you expect to win. And it hurts when you don't. But I thought we played a
tremendous first half."
Well, Coach, perhaps it could be said that the Owls played tremendously hard, and with
tremendous heart – but the net result of that benighted first half could hardly be
reasonably termed "tremendous."
Owls came out of tunnel ready to go in
second half
Horn tackler digs divot while trying to bring down
Charles Ross on kickoff return (Mark Anderson photo) |
Still, with all the first-half decombobulation, the Owls came out of the second
half tunnel and sat the receiving Longhorns right on their collective bottom round roasts.
After an initial UT first down on an 18-yard pass completion, Gilbert to adorable
freshman protégé Jaxon Shipley, Owl defender Brian Stacey got in to sack UT quarterback
Gilbert for a loss of two. Then, on third and eight, Phillip Gaines blitzed in to nail
Gilbert for a 14-yard loss and force the punt.
It wasn’t quite three-and-out, but it was an impressive stop, given
Texas’ obvious need to make a statement by scoring on the half's opening possession.
And when the Owls got the ball back, they cranked right up. First off, Xavier Webb got
an 11-yard punt return to set up the Owls at their own 46.
The Owl cause was aided by personal foul penalty on Texas safety Blake Gideon for a
late hit out of bounds. Horn fans didn’t like that call, but the replay showed that
the late hit was blatant and deliberate.
Moments later, Tyler Smith slashed off tackle for 20 yards to give the Owls a first and
goal at the Longhorn eight.
But on first-and-goal, Tyler was nailed in the backfield for a loss of two.
Still, the Owls eschewed the pass on second and goal from the ten.
Actually, some sort of offensive confusion ensued, as the offensive players appeared
out of position as TMac took the snap and got what he could, which was a two-yard gain
back to the eight.
"There was a little confusion on my part," TMac said afterwards.
"It wasn't really anything. There wasn't a procedure penalty. There
wasn't anything where we really beat ourselves. They gave us a look there on that second
down play. We weren't expecting that. We tried to check out of it, but the clock was
running down."
When Randy Kitchens couldn’t quite haul in a third-down alley-oop pass in the
corner of the end zone, Rice had to settle for a chip-shot Chris Boswell field field goal
– his third of the evening out of three tries.
DB decried mistakes, especially by seniors
Randy Kitchens hauls in short pass and heads for the
first down marker (Mark Anderson photo) |
"At times where we are right now, we're talented but we can't beat
ourselves," Coach Bailiff said after the game.. "We have to eliminate those
mistakes, especially against a team like Texas. We knew going into this football game to
walk out of here with a win that we couldn't make those kinds of mistakes."
But make them they did. And David Bailif wasn’t blind to
that fact. But what perturbed him the most was that the miscues weren’t being
committed by rookies.
"Almost every one we made was one of the fifth-year guys that you're counting on
not to make them," DB noted. "If it's a younger player you're not as upset, but
because it was the fifth-year guys that's bad. Every time I wrote one down in my little
pad of who was making them, that's another guy that we're counting on to lead us and keep
us steady."
And too bad for that, because at least in the first two-thirds of the
game, the Rice offense was at times effective.
On their second possession, the Owls marched 50 yards in eight plays, reaching as far
as the UT 16, mainly on the strength of the short passing game to Luke Willson and Randy
Kitchens.
But on third and two from that point, the Owls set up in the Wildcat for the first time
in the game. Jeremy Eddington got the call, ran left, encountered opposition, and reversed
his field. He ran right into about three Longhorn tacklers for a loss of eight, and so
Rice had to settle for field goal number one, and a short-lived 3-0 lead.
That play appeared to discourage Rice offensive minds from employing the Wildcat
any further, and Eddington saw only one more carry on the day – so scratch that arrow
from the Owl offensive quiver this night.
After UT went up 13-3, on a 23-yard Justin Tucker field goal, his second of the half,
the Owls took the ensuing kickoff at their own 18 with just under six minutes to
play in the second quarter. This time they got cranked up, in no small part due to four
straight carries by Turner Peterson totaling 22 yards and picking up a pair of first
downs.
But a couple of key pass drops slowed down and eventually stalled the drive at the
Texas 33, where on fourth and seven, Chris Boswell nailed a 50-yard field goal that
could’ve been good from six or eight yards farther.
Horns make it academic in the fourth quarter
Owls' Brian Stacey is en route to sack of UT
quarterback Garrett Gilbert (Mark Anderson photo) |
After the Owls had to settle for three on their first
possession of the third quarter, UT head coach Mack Brown opened up the play book,
and the wheels fell off defensively for the Owls, who wound up surrendering 308 yards in
the second half.
In fact, the UT playbook was exploited by Horn offensive brain trust quite more
liberally than that of their visiting counterparts. Apparently a mere one or two-touchdown
win wasn’t going to be enough to satisfy the orange-clad hoi-polloi.
Up by only four, the Horns appeared to administer a demoralizing blow when wide
receiver John Harris, who was a quarterback in high school, flipped downfield in the
direction of Jaxon Shipley at the goal line. The pitch was set up by a reverse pass from
backup quarterback David Ash, who next handed off the ball to Fozzie Whittaker, who then
lateraled to Harris. Owl DB Paul Porras was there defending against Shipley, and the pair
both clamped onto the ball and wrestled for it on the way down. Shipley won the wrestling
match.
It was the next series when when the Owls were gigged for false starts on consecutive
snaps. The Longhorns converted their next two possessions into two more touchdowns to win
going away, and, oh, by the way, beat the 24-point spread.
Rice’s Sam McGuffie appeared for only two plays in the game, although afterwards
Coach Bailiff said that Sam was suffering from a minor injury and he wanted to keep him
fresh for this week’s home opener with Purdue.
When one looks at the stat sheet and sees who handled the ball for the Owls against the
Longhorns, it makes one wonder what happened to the Owls’ most potent offensive
weapons, because for the most part they just weren’t there.
Especially when considering the secrecy which was imposed around Rice’s August
two-a-days, the mystery is compounded.
Rice veteran DL Scott Solomon said aftwards that the defensive line effort faltered
somewhat in the second half – and at just about the time that Mack Brown decided to
go to the back of the play book and pull out those alumni plays.
"That's something that we need to focus on -- getting pressure on that play
action," he said. Translation: 'We've got to stop getting suckered in by those
trick plays.'
"I wanted to win, really," Scott added glumly. "I felt like we could
have, we just needed to eliminate those big plays, get some more turnovers and, like I
said, get pressure on that play action."
--P.T.H.
Owl eyes on Texas
Rice kicks off season against familiar foe
Once upon a time...
Rice students celebrate on the floor of Historic Rice
Stadium after 19-17 win over Texas in...when was that? 1994 |
HOUSTON (Sept. 1) – Well, here we go again. The Rice Owls,
victims in 41 of their last 42 tilts with the University of Texas, gamely travel to Austin
Saturday for their 2011 season opener against a typically talented, but
uncharacteristically question- mark-filled Longhorn team.
With kickoff scheduled for 7 p.m., and the temperature on the field of Darrell K.
Royal Texas Memorial Stadium at that point likely not to exceed, oh, 101 or 102 degrees,
history alone tells us that this will be nothing but another steamy walk in the pasture
for Bevo.
Surely both the Rolex and white oxford cloth-clad frats and the the Kmart
t-shirt-garbed pickup truck alumni alike should be able safely to repair to their
respective watering holes for a cooling-off session by, say, midway in the third quarter.
Owlook
 |
Or will they?
Rather than giving up the usual 50-point laugher, the Owls were competitive in a
season-opening, 34-17 loss to Texas at Reliant Stadium last year. That
less-than-impressive UT win presaged a 5-7 season for the Horns, their worst effort of the
last quarter-century.
Unfortunately for the Owls, the game also saw injury to redshirt freshman
quarterback Taylor McHargue – a setback instrumental to Rice’s season fortunes
until the last couple games of the year, when the Cedar Park native returned to the
Flock’s starting lineup.
TMac earns Horn respect
This whole thing started just a long, long time ago |
Senior Longhorn safety Blake Gideon showed a measure of respect for the
Owl signal caller. "McHargue came from a great school district, the best in
Texas," he told press this week. "So you know he's a good player."
At Monday press briefing, the Longhorn players were at the very least
circumspect in their assessment of the Owls. Still, expectations for a turnaround season
run high at the Forty Acres.
"Maybe a few people outside the program feel that we're a mystery
team," defensive end Alex Okafor said this week. "We know we can play. We plan
to win games, and we're coming to shock the nation."
The mystery, however, appears to lie more in the Longhorn coaching staff numbers
than the starting lineup. On the sidelines and in the pressbox, there’ll be five new
faces among the clipboard brigade for the Horns.
What happens when you go 5-and-7 at a football factory, where you, I or Sister
Josephine, for that matter, could do that well (in fact, last year, Sister Josephine
probably would’ve been 7-and-5 for the Horns)?
Well, what you do is fire the coordinators, that’s what you do. At least
you do if you’re Watson Brown’s little brother.
Manny Diaz takes over over for former heir-apparent Will Muschamp on the
defensive side, while former Boise State OC Bryan Harsin has landed in Austin to direct
the Longhorn offense.
With those new arrivals, UT two-a-days this August have been veiled in secrecy.
Reporters haven’t been allowed east of Trinity for the duration of the sessions.
Consequently, one is left to make of the situation what one wishes to see.
Monday, while decrying the requirement for naming a depth chart at all, UT head
coach Mack Brown announced last year’s front-runner Garrett Gilbert will get the
starting quarterback nod against the Owls. Mack said he’d start, but he had no idea
who’d be playing QB for the Horns in the fourth quarter.
Hmmm. That could be taken more than one way by Owl fans. But Mack persists in
his optimism.
Mack insists that...then again on the other hand
"This could be our best defense," Mack told press. "I think our
secondary could be as good as we've ever had."
Then again, ever the politician, Mack hedges his bet. "It may be the
youngest team we've ever fielded," he came back to reporters in his press conference
Monday.
One thing’s for sure – any defense headed by Manny Diaz will be
blitzin’ fools. His previous charges have tended to blitz more than 50 per cent of
the time. But he cautions that a hell bent for leather approached needs to be tempered the
first time out of the box.
"Well, first game of the year in a new scheme, the first thing you're
worried about is assignments," he told press. "Rice is going to present pre-snap
problems to us because they're a different style of offense than what we've seen through
spring ball and August camp, and they're going to do it with tempo. They're going to
no-huddle us and do some things."
"They're going to ask us questions before the ball is even snapped that we
don't have the answer to. If we're already beat, there's nothing we can do about it.
That's the first challenge."
"Second challenge in game one, regardless of who you play, is tackling.
Everyone in college football, because of the scholarship numbers, there's only so much we
can tackle live bodies during August camp. So with a guy like Sam McGuffie, they're going
to throw the ball out in space. They're going to try to get us in one-on-one. The spread
offense in theory is designed to make one-on-one tackles. That's what they want."
Offensively, last year’s starter, Garrett Gilbert, didn’t exactly draw
rave reviews from any quarter, particularly the Kmart alumni. Don’t expect a standing
ovation when he takes the field on Saturday.
But Rice head coach David Bailiff cautions this cat has got a year of experience
under his belt.
"The weight of the world was on that young man to perform last year,"
Coach Bailiff said. "I'm sure he is a lot more confident going into this year. I've
also read where we may see all four of their quarterbacks. You better have a good
plan."
Veteran Horn running back Fozzy Whittaker, who’s had his share of fun
against the Owls, implied that whatever Rice’s game plan is, a superior one by Texas
will trump it.
"We got hit in the mouth last year, and basically it's not necessarily what
we did last year but how we respond to it," he said. "So this Saturday, this
year, is going to be an interview for us playing against Rice. How we respond to what we
did last year, and I feel like our attitude is very positive."
As for the Men of South Main, whatever they see thrown at them in the way of new
and unexpected strategy on either side of the ball, don’t expect the Owls to lay down
and give away this one.
"We played them a very competitive football game last season and we have
the majority of our football team back," DB said pointedly. " I'm looking
forward to a very competitive game in Austin. Our football team is coming out of camp with
a swagger and a belief because of the number of seniors we do have who have been starters
for three years. Last year we went toe to toe with them and there is not a reason in the
world we can't do that this year."
"You have to take risks in a game like this," DB opined. "We just
have to make sure we are the best team we can be that day."
--P.T.H.
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