(AP Photo/Dave J. Phillip; previous weekly reviews for this season are here)
Well, as one salty high school football coach used to put it, "That went over about as well as a fart in church!"
In a home opener that was arguably as bad as the one in the their disastrous 2-14 Year Four season, the Texans had their collective ass kicked by a Jets team that was led by a rookie coach and QB. The Jets defensive front manhandled the Texans’ offensive line, which is supposed to be one of the team’s strengths.
Key tip of the day: Don’t even think about listening to sports talk radio shows in Houston this coming week.
The reality of early-season games such as this is that the Texans (0-1) probably aren’t as bad as they looked and the Jets (1-0) are probably not as good as the Texans helped make them look.
However, what should concern Texans owner Bob McNair is that Head Coach Gary Kubiak and his supposedly experienced and top-notch staff were clearly out-coached in preparation for the game and in making adjustments during the game. To his credit, Kubiak admitted as much during his post-game interview. But coming in his fourth season as a head coach, these types of debacles have to be wearing thin on even the extraordinarily patient McNair. And let’s face it, despite their reasonably respectable 8-8 record last season, the Texans were only 3-7 going into their 11th game on November 24th.
The Texans face the Tennessee Titans (0-1) next Sunday in Nashville. Anyone who watched any of the Texans-Jets game already know the Titans’ defensive game plan.
Houston Cougars 45 Oklahoma State 35
As I noted several times last season, the Houston Cougars (2-0) under second-year coach Kevin Sumlin are an endearing and fascinating team to follow. Thus, although the Coogs were a 16-point underdog at fifth-ranked Oklahoma State (1-1) on Saturday, anyone who has followed the Cougars under Coach Sumlin was not shocked (pleasantly surprised, yes) that Houston pulled off the upset of the Cowboys.
Behind third-year QB Case Keenum, Houston sports one of the best offenses in the country. Oklahoma State eventually figured out how to slow it down a bit in the 2nd half, but they were never able to stop it. Keenum throws the screen pass better than any college QB that I’ve seen in years — his 32-yard TD pass to WR/Sprinter Tyron Carrier on a middle-screen play just before the half against OSU will be used by offensive coaches around the country for the next several years as the quintessential example of how to execute that particular play.
The trick for the Cougars this season will be to figure out how their young defense — which lacks depth from several seasons of under-recruiting on the defensive side by previous head coach, Art Briles — can maintain the type of gritty effort that the unit displayed against OSU’s potent offense. UH defensive coordinator John Skladany is a master at getting the most out of undermanned defensive units (he was the DC for my friend Dan McCarney during Iowa State’s bowl run earlier this decade), but he will have his work cut out for him in the coming weeks. If the Coogs defensive unit can consistently play at the level it did against OSU, and the team can avoid injuries to key personnel, the Cougars are likely to be a top-20 team.
The Cougars take next Saturday off before taking on high-powered Texas Tech (2-0) at Robertson Stadium late on Saturday, September 26th. Now that is shaping up to be one wild affair.
Earlier in Texas Head Coach Mack Brown’s tenure at UT, this is a game that the Horns (2-0) could have lost or at least sweated until the very end. An inexplicably bad offensive game plan, poor special teams play, a below-average 1st half performance by star QB Colt McCoy, only 30,000 or so fans watching the game in a far-off locale — those were all elements that could have led to an upset of the Longhorns under Brown five or six seasons ago.
But things are different for the Texas program now. Not only does Texas have as much NFL-caliber talent as any program in the country, the Longhorns of this part of Coach Brown’s era at Texas play rock-ribbed, tough defense. Accordingly, against the likes of Wyoming, Texas now can under-perform for a half on offense and still win the game going away.
Now, the Horns won’t want to risk that approach against Oklahoma, or even Texas Tech (2-0) next Saturday in an unusual early-season Big 12 Conference game. But my sense is that they won’t. If the Horns can find a consistent running back out of their four or five good prospects at that position, then this team will be very difficult to beat.
Through two blowout losses, this season is shaping up to be a very difficult one for Rice (0-2), particularly after last season’s success.
Undecided at the QB position and working in a new offensive coordinator, even an Owl defense that held the potent Tech offense to 14 points in the 1st half wilted during the 2nd half as the Owl offense continued to struggle.
And things don’t get any easier for Rice over the next month. They face an angry Oklahoma State (1-1) team at Stillwater next Saturday, then they have consecutive home games against Vanderbilt (who gave LSU a good game last Saturday night in Baton Rouge), Tulsa (2-0) and Navy (1-1).
This could be a very long season for the Owls.
The Texas Aggies (1-0) were off on Saturday after last week’s blow-out win over a poor New Mexico team (0-2, scorched by Tulsa 44-10 on Saturday). The Aggies take on Utah State next Saturday at College Station.