Texas 13, Nebraska 12

TEXAS SCORES MORE POINTS, BUT DID THEY MAKE MORE OF A POINT?

The Texas Longhorns? Hmmm, notsomuch. Sure, the burnt orange out-slugged the Big Red enough times to put more points on the board, 13-12. But did they make more of a point than No. 4 TCU? Or No. 5 Cincinnati? Or No. 6 Boise State.

You saw the ending. In fact you probably saw both endings. The one that had Nebraska players celebrating and turning cartwheels in the end zone. And then, one second later, the ending that had Texas players rushing the field, putting their kickier Hunter Lawrence on their shoulders and thanking the Lord for the win.

This was a game that Texas was favored by 13 and a half points. For the second week in a row, the Longhorns showed they were vulnerable and barely hung on to beat middle-of-the-road teams. But Nebraska can only really blame themselves for this one. As much as the Big Red did to hang in this game to the very end, they also shot themselves in the foot at just the wrong time.

It started immediately after the 42-yard field goal by Alex Henery that put NU ahead with 1:44 remaining. On the ensuing kickoff, Adi Kunalic, who had put three kickoffs deep into the end zone, curiously kicked the ball out of bounds to put Texas on the 40-yard line. The next play, Jordan Shipley was tackled in Husker territory by his horsecollar. Add another 15 yards to their drive. Three plays later, there you have last-secondgate, Big 12 Title style.

Now, keep in mind, after tonight's loss, Nebraska will probably drop out of the rankings. That means that the win over Oklahoma State a few weeks back will be their ONLY win over a team that is going to be a ranked opponent. And that team, just lost its last game to an 6-5 team by a 27-0 count.

TCU on the other hand? The Frogs have beaten No. 14 BYU and No. 25 Utah, along with winning at Clemson, who played in the ACC championship game.

And, while we're on the subject, Cincinnati? They went on the road and beat No.15 Pitt and No. 16 Oregon State (though granted, both will drop now). They also beat then-No. 21 South Florida and then-No. 25 West Virginia. Hey, real teams people. Isn't that a novelty in this day and age?

Finally, Boise State. Sure, chuckle if you want, but at LEAST they are the only contender that can stake a claim to a win over a Top Ten team, No. 7 Oregon.

If anyone doubts the fact that the big money teams have the advantage in college football, Texas is exhibit 1A. Ranked in the top five of the pre-season, playing in a major conference and having the media love totally on their side.

After the game, as the confetti was flying, Mack Brown was at the mic, telling the burnt orange faithful, "I'm so proud of this team and what they've overcome and I'm really looking forward to playing Alabama for the national title."

Did this team play the kind of game to deserve a shot at the national title? Did they play the kind of schedule they needed to? Well they did a lot of things right, like winning every game, playing a safe schedule and saying all the right things.

So here's a question. Do you think the voters should do the right thing and re-think who deserves to be the opponent of Alabama in Pasadena? I'm not sure what my buddy Jerry Palm thinks, him being the BCS guru and all, and the head honcho of this site you're reading. But deep-down I think we all know.

OTHER GAME NOTES

Immediately after the field goal went through the uprights and Texas started celebrating, I made my way down to the hallway near the Nebraska locker room. I soon found myself as one of just four or five media members that witnessed a beyond-aggitated Bo Pelini lay blame exactly where he thought it should go.

"I want to talk to Dan Beebe." Pelini screamed at the officials who were in the same tunnel about his desire to talk with the Big 12 Commissioner. "I want to talk to Walt Anderson right f*#&@$g now!" referring to the Big 12's coordinator of officials.

He was steamed. He punctuated his tirade with a slam against the metal door of the locker room, looked back at us media members and barked, "You know why that happened? Because of the BCS. THAT'S why that happened. The f*%#@*g BCS!"

Bo's brother, defensive coordinator Carl, came out of the locker room barking, "You saw it! The clock said 'zero-point-zero-zero'! That's bull$#&!"

Even his other brother Vince shot me a look and said, "It's sick man. What they did was just sick."

After the furor was over, Pelini showed up at the post-game press conference in a calm demeanor. When asked about if Texas got the proverbial "home cooking", Bo said simply, "I have no comment." When another reporter asked another angle on the clock controversy, he snapped back with, "I haven't gotten an explanation about it. I'm not going comment about the officiating or that call."

Later on, after the official press conference was over, I asked Ndamukong Suh outside the press room if Coach Pelini mentioned anything about his BCS comment to the team in the locker room immediately afterward, Suh put things in a P.C. way, "Those things are the kind of things that the coaches handle. We just go out and play the game. The first thing he said was 'give credit to Texas' and didn't say anything to us about how he felt about what happened at the end of the game."

In pass interference, is there no rule for an uncatchable ball any more? Texas got the benefit of a pair of highly-questionable pass interference calls where the pass was obviously not within the realm of being caught. In fact, in one case, P.I. was called on a receiver that didn't even look back for the ball. C'mon refs.

The 40-foot HD replay board was strangely not used on the final play where the game clock went to zeroes and the replay officials put a second back on the clock. Standing down near the Nebraska section, I can vouch, there were a lot of irate Husker fans. And yes, the referees had to run to the tunnel that went right under the Big Red contingency. Had they replayed the second-to-last play, NU fans might've seen that there was a distinct possibility that one second still remained on the clock.

Standing next to a police officer well after the game was over, I overheard her saying that there were multiple fights out in the parking lots of the stadium. I'm guessing that could've been alleviated had some crucial replays been shown and not made the Cornhusker fans so angry. Just a thought there.

Going down the elevator with a half-dozen NFL scouts near the end of the game, one of them turned to another one and said, "Teams might want to start losing games so they can draft this Suh guy. I've never seen a beast like that in my LIFE!"

By the way, despite what Lou Holtz and Robert Smith said about Colt McCoy deserving the Heisman because of his remarkable career, if you needed any more proof that Ndamukong Suh isn't the best football player - regardless of position - you should've been rest assured of that fact tonight. The monster had 12 tackled, 4.5 sacks and seven tackles for loss despite constant double teaming and being grappled most of the night.

Just a side note here, no members of the media were allowed on the field at the end of the game. Unlike other stadiums, where you are allowed to go down with about five minutes remaining to get on-field interviews, Cowboy Stadium officials didn't allow us access. Worse part?... they never warned us of this policy beforehand. So we had a gaggle of about 30 reporters standing in the tunnel wanting to go out on the field and missing the action that was taking place. The Big 12 will get an Email from me soon about this.