Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Legal Commentary Blogs -> Houston's Clear Thinkers

Legal Commentary

: Houston's Clear Thinkers

2008 Weekly local football review

By Tom Kirkendall

(Previous weekly reviews are here)

Texas Longhorns 45 Oklahoma 35

In the most entertaining college football game of the season to date, the Longhorns (6-0/2-0 Big !2) vaulted to No. 1 in the AP, Harris and Coaches Top 25 polls with their win over the Sooners (5-1/1-1 Big 12).

Texas prevented OU's prolific passing offense from getting too far ahead for three quarters of the game and then eventually wore down the Sooners to pull the game out in the fourth quarter. Although QB Colt McCoy (28-35-0/277 yds/1 TD) and his receivers get most of the publicity, I thought that the Longhorns' offensive and defensive line play in the second half -- particularly in the fourth quarter -- was the difference in this one.

The Horns better not rest on their laurels, however, as they face a killer schedule down the stretch -- 11th-ranked Missouri (5-1/1-1 Big 12), 8th-ranked Oklahoma State (6-0/2-0 Big 12), 7th-ranked Texas Tech (6-0/2-0 Big 12), and 16th-ranked Kansas (5-1/2-0 Big 12) in four of the next five weeks. The Horns are solid, but I don't see them going undefeated through that stretch.

Texans 29 Dolphins 28

In an entertaining but not particularly well-played game, the Texans (1-4) finally won their first game of the season by beating the Dolphins (2-3) on QB Matt Schaub's draw play with 3 seconds remaining.

With a bit of luck, the Texans could be 3-2 and in position to contend for the playoffs. However, the reality is that they aren't ready for that yet -- Schaub is still a relatively inexperienced QB and the defense, although improving over the past three games, still has too many lapses to produce a consistent winner. The fact is that the Texans are in the vast expanse of NFL teams that are below the elite teams and above the truly hideous ones. That means that the Texans will probably win about as many as they lose against teams of their caliber and may pull off an upset of an elite team every once in awhile. They simply aren't consistent enough yet to be a viable playoff contender.

The Texans have eminently winnable games the next two Sundays at home against the winless Lions (0-5) and Bengals (0-6).

Houston Cougars 45 UAB 20 

Geez, think how bad this would have been had the Cougars (3-3/2-0 C-USA) had shown up for the first half against UAB (1-6/0-3)? If the Coogs pull that sort of performance next week at SMU (1-6/0-4), the Ponies -- who just gave conference leader Tulsa (6-0/3-0) its first scare of the season on this past Saturday night -- might just feast on the Cougars for their first conference win of the season.

Kansas State 44 Texas Aggies 30

The woeful Aggies (2-4/0-2 Big 12) basically allowed Kansas State (4-2/1/1 Big !2) to score at will. At least the Ags showed something on offense as they rolled up almost 550 yards of total offense on the Wildcats.

There is simply no telling how many points 7th-ranked Texas Tech (6-0/2-0 Big 12) will put up on the Aggies next Saturday in College Station. Suffice it to say that it will likely be a record score against the Ags in Kyle Field. The Aggies will be lucky to win two more games this season.

Rice (3-3/2-1 C-USA) were off this weekend. The Owls play Southern Miss (2-4/0-2) at Rice Stadium on Saturday afternoon.

Full post as published by Houston's Clear Thinkers on October 13, 2008 (boomark / email).