Cotton Bowl Preview: Alabama vs. Texas Tech

By Darrell Laurant  |   Sunday, January 01, 2006  |  Comments( 0 )

College Football
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This is officially the AT&T Cotton Bowl, but it could also be called the Terry Malloy Bowl.

You may have encountered Malloy on one of those late-night movie channels. He was the sad sack boxer in "On the Waterfront," played by Marlon Brando, who kept muttering: "I coulda been somebody. I coulda been a contender."

So it is with 13th-ranked Alabama and 18th-ranked Tech, especially the former. Mike Shula's Crimson Tide was 9-0 and an outside national championship possibility (OK, maybe in the event that Southern Cal or Texas had a bus or plane crash), only to lose narrowly to LSU and badly to Auburn, which turned 'Bama QB Brodie Croyle into a tackling dummy (11 sacks).

Tech's credentials were a little more dubious -- nobody really expected Mike Leach's high-scoring Red Raiders to upset Texas. The loss to Oklahoma State, however, definitely stung.

So can the colorful, unconventional Leach -- best-known as the "surfing coach" -- hang 10 (or maybe even 40) on the Tide? Or will all those nights in the film room have given the 'Bama coaching staff the where-with-all to figure out Tech's wide-split, go-for-broke offensive style?

Without question, it's one of those bowl games that football freaks love to dissect in advance. Great offense (Texas Tech leads the nation in total yards), versus great defense (Alabama has two of its best linebackers ever in DeMeco Ryans and Freddie Roach). Lots of scoring (42.8 a game for Tech) versus hardly any scoring (Alabama).

If Alabama's season proved nothing else, it's that Tyrone Prothro must be the greatest wide receiver since Jerry Rice. Before Prothro got hurt during the 31-3 victory over Florida, 'Bama was scoring points in bunches. When he exited, the offense managed more than 20 points only once the rest of the season -- and everyone kept blaming it on Prothro's absence.

Texas Tech, on the other hand, is a moving machine made of easily replaceable parts, quarterbacked by the legendary Insert Name Here. This time around, it was fifth-year senior Cody Hodges, who had never started before but amassed 4,042 passing yards and 30 touchdowns by throwing to just about everyone but the pep band. Before him, it was Sonny Cumbie, and on and on. A different QB every year, the same results.

An added Tech wrinkle this year was RB Taurean Henderson, who added some semblance of a running game. Here's an interesting comparative stat that speaks volumes about these teams' relative success in the red zone: Alabama's Kenneth Darby rushed for 1,161 yards, or more than 11 lengths of a football field, and scored three times; Henderson rushed for just over 800 yards and scored 17 times.

So what's your pleasure: An irresistible force or an immovable object? Tune in at 11 a.m. (EDT time) on Jan. 2 and find out.
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