Huskers/Big 12 Media Day

[kramer]

2005 Big 12 Football Media Day Central

[Eric the Red]

Since things are a little slow, we'll keep all the Big 12 Media Days info here in this thread and forum.

 

Kansas went today and Mangino is quoted as saying: This will be the best Kansas team ever!!!!!!!!

 

Okay fat man,

[kramer]

Since things are a little slow, we'll keep all the Big 12 Media Days info here in this thread and forum.

 

Kansas went today and Mangino is quoted as saying: This will be the best Kansas team ever!!!!!!!!

 

Okay fat man,

Mang is straight up wrong. Glen Mason had his 95 team finish in the top 10, with a 51-31 thumping of UCLA in their bowl. They won 10 games that year. KU will be lucky to get 6-7 wins this year, IMO.

[Eric the Red]

STEVEN M. SIPPLE: In wide-open Big 12 North, anything appears possible

[Eric the Red]

Barnett has high hopes for his Buffaloes

 

BY CURT McKEEVER / Lincoln Journal Star

HOUSTON — Maybe if he had been speaking in Norman, Okla., the words from Gary Barnett would have come out in a nervous stutter. Or been meant as a joke.

 

But when the University of Colorado football coach declared to a roomful of reporters at the Big 12 Conference media gathering here Tuesday that his 2005 Buffaloes will be a group void of "any apparent weaknesses," he did so without batting an eyelash.

 

And his audience barely paused.

[Red November]

Does Snyder show this year?

[kramer]

http://www.insidedenver.com/drmn/cu/articl...3939795,00.html

 

HOUSTON - Not that Gary Barnett suddenly has bought into the hype - at this stage in his life and career he's presumably w-a-a-a-y past that - but he is in agreement with the media that his 2005 Colorado Buffaloes can be, well, pretty good.

 

How good? The media has established the Buffs as the team to beat in the Big 12 Conference's badly muddled North Division - a race Barnett calls "a crapshoot." Not to be outdone Tuesday, he essentially raised the bar, comparing his seventh CU football team to another that fared a bit more than OK before the Big 12's birth.

 

"Our team is as good as the (CU) team in 1991. . . . I'd compare this team to the '91," Barnett proclaimed on opening day of the Big 12 preseason football media session.

 

To revisit that year - Barnett's last as an assistant in Boulder before taking Northwestern's head coaching job - the Buffs finished the regular season 8-2-1 overall. And at 6-0-1 in the Big Eight Conference, they shared the league title with Nebraska after tying the Cornhuskers in Boulder.

 

CU's regular-season losses were to Baylor and Stanford, then Alabama in the Blockbuster Bowl. Some '91 Buffs of note: quarterback Darian Hagan, linebackers Greg Biekert and Chad Brown, tailback Lamont Warren, receiver Charles Johnson and punter/kicker Mitch Berger - all of whom, with the exception of Hagan - have spent quality time in the NFL.

 

By most early accounts, CU won't be nearly that well-represented in next spring's NFL draft.

 

Nonetheless, Barnett obviously likes this team's makeup, its experience (19 returning starters) and balance.

 

"I don't know that there's an apparent weakness on our team," he said. "The only thing I can say is that we don't have a lot of experience at running back."

 

He's counting on either Hugh Charles or Byron Ellis - or perhaps both sophomores - to successfully replace Bobby Purify. But, said Barnett, neither can be viewed as a "regular sophomore" because of the amount of work each received in practice last season while Purify healed from various injuries.

 

"These two guys and (Lawrence) Vickers have played a lot of football," he said, adding that he wants to continue to utilize Vickers' versatility at fullback - the position Barnett believes Vickers can play in the NFL. Yet as a hedge against productivity falling off at the tailback spot, he has told Vickers to report at 230 pounds and be prepared to play the position on a regular basis.

 

But CU's chances for a fourth North title in five seasons hinge on more than the emergence of a productive tailback. Barnett's team still is defining itself - perhaps a more complicated process than last summer, when the Buffs were unified by months of off-season turmoil.

 

"It's human nature to come together (under those circumstances)," senior quarterback Joel Klatt said. "This year it's on the seniors, completely on the seniors."

 

Added senior linebacker Brian Iwuh: "I think our team can be as good as our seniors want it to be."

 

But there's also the matter of the schedule possibly favoring Iowa State - last season's North co-titlist and the media's No. 2 North pick this season. Barnett agrees that the North team enjoying even a minor breakthrough against its South Division opponents - particularly on the road - will move into a favorite's role.

 

Here's why: Last season, Baylor was the sole South Division school the Northerners could master. In other interdivisional contests - including CU's 42-3 loss to Oklahoma in the league championship game - the North went a woeful 0-16.

 

Barnett's recipe for a North title: "A little luck and whoever can win on the road against the South Division."

 

Those ingredients in mind, CU could move to the inside track or to the outside looking in after its first three league games - all against South opponents: at Oklahoma State (Oct. 1), Texas A&M (Oct. and at Texas (Oct. 15).

 

The Cyclones, meanwhile, don't play either Texas or OU but do travel to Texas A&M (Oct. 29). And they catch Baylor (Oct. and OSU (Oct. 22) in Ames, Iowa - CU's destination Nov. 12 for a game that could decide the division if South teams don't do it long before.

 

Last season, noted Klatt, the Buffs were picked fourth and were "a little unsure of ourselves. This year, we're more confident because of the way we finished (2004). That gives us more confidence than where the media picked us."

[Eric the Red]

"Our team is as good as the (CU) team in 1991. . . . I'd compare this team to the '91," Barnett proclaimed on opening day of the Big 12 preseason football media session.

 

Can you say fot in your mouth

[kramer]

Brown's hope for beating OU: the Rose Bowl

 

By Berry Tramel

The Oklahoman

 

HOUSTON — Houston, Mack Brown has a problem. And to solve the Oklahoma Sooners, Brown has done everything but commission NASA.

Brown has tried talking about his problem. Tried ignoring it. Tried toughening up his Longhorns. Tried easing up on them.

 

Tried advice from every big name in his cell-phone menu. Bowden, Paterno, Royal.

 

Nothing has worked. Not this century, at least. Brown is 0-5 vs. Bob Stoops in the 2000s, and 2005 seems a watershed year for Brown. If Texas doesn't beat the Sooners this October, will it ever?

 

Brown's latest tonic seems the goofiest yet. Rose Bowl.

 

That's all Brown wanted to talk about Thursday as the closing act on Big 12 Media Week. The Rose Bowl. Texas' 38-37 victory over Michigan last New Year's.

 

Hey, Mack. What did you have for dinner last night? Rose Bowl.

 

Hey, Mack. Why did offensive tackle Jonathan Scott show up Thursday wearing crimson shorts? Rose Bowl.

 

Hey, Mack. Why is Houston so danged muggy? Rose Bowl.

 

Rose Bowl. Rose Bowl. Rose Bowl. That is Brown's new theme.

 

Brown credited Pasadena with, no fooling, everything from increased UT student applications to a rise in sales of Longhorn caps and shirts. You'd think it was the War of the Roses, the way he talked.

 

"The Rose Bowl was an exciting game for us," Brown said. "Really a special game for all of us. People are walking around with so much pride over the Rose Bowl."

 

Hey, Mack. The Rose Bowl is one cool event. Michigan is one cool opponent. But let's not get carried away. It was one bowl game among thousands. It will not help Brown beat Stoops, his great white whale.

 

And Brown knows it. He knows he must beat Oklahoma to get Texas to a bowl game that really will capture America's fancy. He knows he must beat Oklahoma to beat back the pit bulls who growl that his coaching lacks.

 

Brown is a likable guy. A charming guy. And a darned good coach who has elevated Texas football to its greatest heights since 1969, Royal's last national championship year.

 

But sometimes, Brown just talks to be talking.

 

"I like the media," Brown said. "I respect your opinions. When you write that you think we have a chance to be the best team, that's a great compliment."

 

Hey, I don't even respect the media's opinions, even though that's who I am and what I do.

 

And talking about quarterback Vince Young's fumble against Texas A&M, which the Aggies turned into a 99-yard touchdown return, Brown said, "If you have a 14-point swing like that in the last minute before the half, there is a 93 percent chance you lose the game."

 

Huh? Where's the data on that obscure occurrence?

 

Brown serves his team, and himself, best when he doesn't try to snow us. When he talks straight about OU's dominance.

 

He talked once with Florida State's Bobby Bowden, who had his own big-rival problems, losing consistently to Miami.

 

"Talk about it, got beat," Bowden reported. "Quit talking about it, we got beat."

 

Truth was, Bowden said, "they've been better."

 

Truth is, OU's been better. Throughout each season. And particularly on that Saturday in October.

 

The Sooners are not invincible. OSU, Texas A&M, LSU and Southern Cal have proven that in recent years.

 

"OU plays us better than they do those teams," Brown said. "They don't look like the same bunch."

 

Hey, don't pile on Brown for that one. He's right. The Sooners have peaked five straight years against Texas. Coaches prime OU for that game, and they are ready to play.

 

Which means Texas has only one answer, even in a season like this, where the experience edge is burnt orange and maybe the talent edge, too.

 

The Longhorns must match the OU zeal. Brown must get the Longhorns ready to play. Must get them to believe they can win.

 

Which conjures another old-coach story. In 1999, Brown's second UT season, the Horns were picked to win the Big 12 South. But Brown was worried.

 

He went to see Royal. "Coach Royal, we're not very good, and people think we are," Brown said. "What do we do?" Answered Royal, "Get better."

 

Thus the solution for Texas against OU. Quit talking about a faded Rose Bowl, and get better.

 

Berry Tramel: 475-3314, btramel@oklahoman.com; Berry Tramel's radio show, the Writer's Block, can be heard Monday-Friday from 4-7 p.m. on KREF-AM 1400, KADA-AM 1230 and KSEO-AM 750.