The Brawl For It All

Jim Kleinpeter, writing for the New Orleans Times Picayune Monday afternoon opined, “If the Tigers contain running back Trent Richardson, get the ball in the hands of receiver Rueben Randle and showcase their talent on special teams, they'll have their best chance at winning their third national title in New Orleans.”

That turned out to be tall order that would not be filled.  So awful was QB Jordan Jefferson that LSU fans were chanting for Coach Les Miles to put Jarrett Lee in the game.  Jefferson fumbled three times and threw an ugly interception in the third quarter. He was sacked four times and finished with a pitiful 53 yards passing and 18 rushing on 14 carries.

Right tackle Alex Hurst was twice whistled for false-start penalties on first-and-10 and Senior Guard Will Blackwell did his share of whining after the game by claiming that Bama was calling out cadences.  He said, “…this is absolutely one of the worst officiated games I’ve seen in my career. I don’t know where the refs were from, what conference, but in my opinion, they did a poor job. Like I said, they called out a few cadences, which is, by the rules, illegal, and that got us a couple of false starts, put us in holes and really killed a couple of drives.”

If that were truly the case, wouldn’t Coach Miles have challenged the penalties?  Wouldn’t the broadcast commentators have called attention to it?  Maybe somebody needs to change little Will’s pampers.

The Crimson Tide rolled to victory with 384 total yards compared to the Tigers’ 53 total yards.  Bama had 21 first downs and LSU could only muster 5.  The Tigers crossed mid-field only once.

The cock-sure Tyrann Mathieu, known as the “Honey Badger”, was stopped cold throughout the game, but was particularly humiliated in the fourth quarter when Alabama stopped him when he caught the ball and was pushed back, back, back and summarily slammed hard into the turf.  It reminded me of the guy in the DirectTV commercial who is left in a roadside ditch.

Alabama now has won two national titles in three years and proved, at least to me, that they were far superior to LSU.  Critics agree that this has been the greatest season in SEC history.

And Pat, of And So It Goes In Shreveport, must donate $100 to Wounded Warrior Project to settle the bet we made in December.

I get to gloat.