<p>I can’t believe it.</p>
<p>Congratulations!</p>
<p>Roll Tide! It was a great game.</p>
<p>We watched every minute of it here in California! Roll Tide! I have to admit, with UT’s freshman QB suddenly looking better, we were a wee bit scared there for a minute or two. But, the Tide pushed through! What a year for Mark Ingram, eh! And two BCS wins for Nick Saban! Excellent coach. I can only imagine the celebrating going on in Tuscaloosa!</p>
<p>Yes, Alabama seemed to go into halftime thinking that they’d won…and almost ended up losing! </p>
<p>I have to hand it to that UT freshman. He was in tears at the end of the first half, but then really pulled it together for the second half.</p>
<p>It was an odd game in a few ways, but we were glad that UA pulled it out in the end (thank goodness for those turnovers.)</p>
<p>Alabama made us nervous at the end too, but they pulled themselves together. Kudos to Garrett Gilbert; he had no idea he’d be playing last night! TX is going to have themselves a good QB when he gets some experience under his belt. I have to say I am so impressed with Colt McCoy; he must have been so disappointed but his interview after the game was so sincere and classy especially in comparison to Tim Tebow’s crying after FL’s loss. I hope that the numbness in his arm is a very short term issue and that he’s fully healed quickly.</p>
<p>Yes, poor Garrett Gilbert. I’m sure he had no idea that he’d be playing about 7/8 of the game. </p>
<p>Once Texas realized that they could just have Gilbert throw to that one receiver, they started moving. And, Bama seemed frozen and unable to provide any sort of defense. </p>
<p>And, yes, Colt was classy at the end. He says that his right arm feels like it’s asleep, so I wonder if that’s some kind of nerve damage. I hope it’s temporary.</p>
<p>I can’t help but wonder about Texas’ coaching staff and why in the world the ONLY backup they apparently had to their “star” player (McCoy) was a largely untested true freshman? All I have read is how it “would have been different” if McCoy was not hurt, and of course that is true. But it seems to me that any good coaching staff would make sure all critical positions are backed up…</p>
<p>I am a very, very proud Alabama alum and I am still dancing and yelling “Rammer Jammer”, deep down inside at least! :)</p>
<p>Congrats to Bama…</p>
<p>And to answer churchmusicmom’s question: He was the backup. Just because he’s a freshman doesn’t mean he’s not a great player. It’s Texas. He was probably among the top half-dozen QB’s in the country coming out of HS. Plus, every team puts the backup QB in with the starters at every practice. So he had a lot of “reps” with the first team starting way back in August.</p>
<p>I don’t know if this is true, but my brother in California said that he heard that McElroy had the flu this week, but Saban didn’t want anyone to know. </p>
<p>I agree with the above…it’s odd that UT’s back-up quarterback was a true freshman. Of course, USC had a freshman QB this year, too.</p>
<p>McElroy had been injured in the SEC Championship game.</p>
<p>[Alabama</a> quarterback Greg McElroy reveals he suffered two cracked ribs against Florida - ESPN](<a href=“LIVE Transfer Talk: Chelsea, PSG join Man Utd in Olise race - ESPN”>Alabama quarterback Greg McElroy reveals he suffered two cracked ribs against Florida - ESPN)</p>
<p>ahhh…</p>
<p>That explains the problem. And, demonstrates how “close to the vest” that Saban keeps injuries.</p>
<p>Well, then actually, both teams were severely hurt quarterback-wise.</p>
<p>*“I cracked my ribs in the third quarter against Florida,” McElroy said outside the locker room. “Two of them – the ninth and the 10th. Left side. It’s bad. I got it numbed up before the [championship] game and it was killing me at halftime.”</p>
<p>McElroy did not look like the same quarterback who went 12-for-18 for 239 yards in the SEC championship game victory over the Gators. He completed 6-of-11 passes for 58 yards against the Longhorns and took five sacks. McElroy wore a flak jacket and an extra pad over his left ribcage for protection.</p>
<p>For about a week and half after Florida, I couldn’t really throw at all," McElroy said. “As I came back, they started to loosen up a little bit … It’s been pretty painful, pretty consistent for the entire bowl practice.”</p>
<p>One of McElroy’s good friends, junior H-back Preston Dial, said he held his breath every time that McElroy got hit.</p>
<p>“It’s like watching your little brother get hit,” Dial said. “You’re like, ‘Get up! Get up! You’re O.K.’ He wasn’t O.K. I know we’ve been on the couch playing Nintendo and he’s coughed and he about went to his knees.”</p>
<p>A spasm midway through his rehabilitation “jarred the bones loose again,” McElroy said. "I’m just glad that we got through it and we were able to do it without taking too many significant hits on the ribs.
*</p>
<p>He got sacked so many times. McElroy also held onto the ball for toooo long many times.</p>
<p>My dad is a huge 'Bama fan. He went crazy.</p>
<p>Oh, I know that Gilbert was, indeed, a top HS player and will go really far. What I don’t understand is that he had evidently not had much playing time at all. At least that is what the announcers made it sound like (which might not be accurate at all!). It even sounded like he had not practiced much with the starters, because the announcers kept commenting on the “rhythm” of exchanges being “off” because having to work with new people. Maybe it was more hype on the part of the ESPN broadcast team, making it sound like he had virtually no playing time during the regular season…</p>
<p>I think they did mention the number of plays that he had been involved with previously, and it hadn’t been many.</p>
<p>As crazy as this sounds, it’s not that unusual. This year, Bama’s backup QB (Star) got very little playing time. I have no idea how much Star got to practice with starters, but it does seem like schools act as if their starting QB will not get hurt.</p>
<p>And, unless a school can build up a comfortable lead, a team pretty much plays the starting QB. (During the Bama vs. UT-Chat, I think everyone got some playing time (at least all the seniors did.)</p>
<p>But… look at UF, they would keep Tebow in just to run up the scoreboard. It was very unsportsmanlike. UF was luckly that Tebow didn’t get hurt during one of those times when he didn’t need to be playing (he did suffer a concussion, but that wasn’t during one of the unneeded times.)</p>
<p>We had a big game in HS, and within the first quarter, the starting QB was out with a collapsed lung, and then the back up QB was out with a broken femur. They had to reach to 3rd string, who then promptly broke his arm. </p>
<p>At that point they had to go to the Strong Safety who hadn’t played QB since Pop Warner. LOL…he did an amazing job and we won. I still have the news clipping since it was such a big deal. This kid was an amazing 3 sport athlete - some kids are just naturals.</p>
<p>Wow! That sounds like one crazy HS game! </p>
<p>I bet you are a fan of “Friday Night Lights”! If you are not, you should be! I kinda hate when college football season is over!</p>
<p>Oh, and I absolutely agree that UF was ridiculously unsportsmanlike in how they almost ALWAYS played Tebow and ran up the score. In fact, at the end of the SEC championship, when Alabama had been clearly moving the ball on them and likely COULD have scored again, they just took a knee and ended the game. The commentators even commented on how classy they were and noted something like “some in this conference could learn from them”! I thought that was pretty priceless…</p>
<p>It was a crazy game and when we get together for reunions, we still talk about it. </p>
<p>Yes, I do hate it when college football is over (I don’t like pro sports as much). </p>
<p>In fact, at the end of the SEC championship, when Alabama had been clearly moving the ball on them and likely COULD have scored again, they just took a knee and ended the game.</p>
<p>Exactly. </p>
<p>I think the only reason Bama didn’t take a knee last night when there was about a minute and half left was because Nick felt that for the win to look more legitimate, he needed more points on the board. </p>
<p>If the ending score had been too tight, there would have been too much grumbling that Bama didn’t deserve to win.</p>
<p>And, I’m glad that the news about McElroy’s ribs came out this morning. That explained a LOT.</p>
<p>And, Stanford has freshman, Andrew Luck.</p>
<hr>
<p>Mom wrote:</p>
<p>I agree with the above…it’s odd that UT’s back-up quarterback was a true freshman. Of course, USC had a freshman QB this year, too.</p>