I was in school during the lost decade of Akers-McWilliams. I remember losing to Cougar High. I remember 4-7 in 1988. I was at the games.
This is worse. I think we're looking at another lost decade. So much has changed that one or two good recruiting years just won't fix it. Baylor, froggy, aggy, piggy, Tceh, even pony and Cougar High - they're not going away. Baylor scored 70 yesterday. Coach Gosling hung 52 on the frogs last night and lost. aggy would put 50 on our defense without breaking a sweat.
I've been a die-hard Longhorn fan since I started watching college football games at Jones Stadium in Lubbock when I was a little boy. I saw Darrell Royal and Earl Campbell play out on the high plains against the Red Raiders and fell in love with the stormtrooper white unis, the stark longhorn insignia and the simple power of Longhorn football.
But this team is hard to watch. Not hard to root for, but hard to watch. And it makes me sad. There are so many ways that a college football team can be good: air raid, spread, read option, power run, good defense, etc. Texas is exactly none of these things. There are schemes and there is talent and there is coaching out there, but Texas has none of it:
- 106th in passing offense
- 75th (yay!) in rushing offense
- 111th in total offense
- 78th in scoring offense
Match those against:
- 106th in passing yards allowed
- 104th in rushing defense
- 114th in total defense
- 104th in scoring defense
and you have the recipe for 3-9.
I get that there were some atrocious calls that influenced the outcome of yesterday's game. But Okie Lite is not a great football team. Rudolph gifted us two touchdowns. Our defense outscored our offense. We had 40 total yards of offense in the second half. The list goes on and on. We lost yesterday because we are a bad, poorly coached football team that can't execute simple things like extra points and punts.
I'll watch every snap this year, as I do every year, but this is a terrible football team by any measure. And I see little hope that these coaches have any clue as to how to fix it. 21 months into his tenure as HFC is a reasonable amount of time to measure Charlie Strong's coaching ability. And the team continues to regress. After being spoiled for a decade with Simms, Applewhite, VY, and Colt, I guess we're back to Chance Mock and Shannon Kelly. At this point I'd settle for Peter Gardere.
