Of course, there were many great moments the whole night, but how about that opening drive? It was right after Sean McDonough had said, somewhat plaintively: "We hope we have a close game for you." Then straight down the field for 10 plays and 75 yards in four and half minutes: no penalties; no sacks; no tackles for a loss; pinpoint passing to stud receivers; excellent blocking; the defense confused (and looking at each other for help) by a couple of our shifts and alignments; great offensive preparation, playcalling, and execution--all of which left the announcers (and I'm sure Georgia players, coaches, and fans, as well) stunned at the way UT sliced through the big, bad SEC defense. What a great statement to start a game! Hell, yes, we're back.
Last year OU put up 48 on that great Georgia defense, Big XII teams can score on SEC defenses what was impressive to me was how the Texas defense just dominated the line of scrimmage and shut down Georgia's run game. there were no huge runs and even the big ones were limited to 10-15 yards, it was those long runs last year that killed OU, SEC teams can be beat but you have to play the kind of defense Texas played last night to beat them consistently because just hoping to outscore them is not a sustainable plan.
Sean McDonough is a moron. He is the worst major play-by-play guy in the business and it's not close. He rarely knows the rules, he spouts off nonsense on a pretty regular basis, and he can be counted on to say something like "I don't know why they don't just..." when the rest of America yells at its TV set "the rest of us do!"
Blackledge's paychecks come from the $EC via ESPN and McDonough was just reading from the $EC propaganda playlist all night.
I always cringe when SD calls a Texas game. He has always been anti-Texas imo. He was practically having a meltdown when Texas upset OU in 1990.
Well, they came around, and in the end they acknowledged that Texas was the better team and outplayed Georgia. The halftime crew said as much also. I, too, was sort of scratching my head when McDonough made the "I hope we have a close game" comment. The players were apparently very aware of the pro-Georgia press as well, and it motivated them. On LHN after the game, Tre Watson walked by the set and was saying repeatedly, "Ask them who the better backs are now", or something like that. Edit: When they said Texas was the better team, they framed it by saying some may try to make the excuse that Ga. wasn't motivated because of their belief they should have been in the CFP. Shawn and Todd pretty much attempted to debunk that.
That first drive was everything you said Stanhin. The drive energized and gave confidence to the team early on that they can beat these guys, while it also fired up our fans at the game. It sure gave me confidence that the Horns were ready, focused and came to WIN the game! The D was physical the whole game and dominating for 3.85 quarters... Orlando had 'em ready and the players executed. I really enjoyed that late series where the D had em pinned deep and Orlando called 3 blitzes in a row to pressure Fromm into an important 3 and out.
Speaking of Sean McDonough, wouldn't you have just loved it if Gary Danielson had been forced to call that game--he would have been apoplectic.
The SEC love is obviously contrived. It's interesting to watch old games on LHN. Theses same announcers had no such gushing over the SEC when Bama wasn't dominating.
I liked it when they were saying Bama, GA, and Clemson were the most physical teams in College football. As we were manhandling UGA and up 17-0. Glad they came around, but it took them long enough to figure out Texas wasn't gonna follow their stupid script. I also liked it when they tried to pontificate on the targeting calls. "I understand the rule... but... ...I don't know." and that was it. In other words, "I know I should have an opinion on this... But I don't know what it is." Brilliant insight bro.
I think us losing the coin toss and receiving the opening kick was pretty big. The statement our O made on the opening drive set the tone for the entire game.
