Saturday, December 30, 2006

FROM THE REAL ART SPORTS DESK
McCoy ties freshman TD mark in Horns' Alamo Bowl win


From the AP via ESPN:

Colt McCoy was supposed be a placeholder for Texas at quarterback this season. Now, he's a record holder.

The redshirt freshman who replaced Vince Young turned in another gritty performance with two touchdown passes to rally the No. 18 Longhorns to a 26-24 victory Saturday over Iowa in the Alamo Bowl.

McCoy had been cleared to play just a week earlier after suffering a severely pinched nerve in his neck in each of Texas' last two games -- both losses. He also ran 8 yards on fourth down to set up a 2-yard touchdown run by Selvin Young early in the fourth quarter that proved to be the game winner.

And

Tate was just the opposite, passing for 184 yards in the first half. He played high school football in Baytown, just outside of Houston, and his final college game was his first back in his home state.

Click here for the rest.

Just a few thoughts:

It's been really nice, actually, these last two years since I downgraded my cable tv service to a bare minimum "limited basic." I spend much less time watching shows I don't even really like. However, during football season I've found that I sorely miss having the cable sports channels. That's how I missed this one, having to keep up with it via internet stats and the like. It's just not the same. What really sucks is that I only got to see the 'Horns on tv three times this year, and those were all of their losses.

It's cool that Texas snapped its two game losing streak, but beating a 6-6 team by two points spells trouble next season for my beloved Longhorns. Doctor McCoy is definitely great, and will no doubt be better still next year, but our defense really needs to sharpen up if we're going to make another run at the Big 12 Championship. Yeah, that's right, I'm not even going to let myself think about a national championship. Until we're playing for it, that is.

Finally, even though I didn't actually know personally Iowa's kickass quarterback when he was playing in Baytown for my school's crosstown rival Lee, I do remember how excited everybody was that he was going to be playing bigtime college ball. Some of that excitement, of course, came from the fact, at my school Sterling at least, that everyone was happy that he wasn't going to be beating up on our team anymore. Anyway, Tate's final game being a loss notwithstanding, I'm sure he's going on to the pros and will probably do pretty well there.


Head Coach Mac Brown and QB Colt McCoy bask in their win. (Photo by Brett Coomer, Houston Chronicle.)

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