Wednesday, January 04, 2012

Sugar Bowl: Michigan 23, Virginia Tech 20 in OT

What an ugly game. Truly ugly. Raises the question as to why either team was here.

Neither seemed to want to win it. Neither team played up to their hype. Both made errors galore. Some even started long before kickoff.

Virginia Tech’s starting field goal kicker got arrested for B & E and was told to stay home. His replacement broke curfew and was given a bus ticket home. So, of course, the game came down to the toe of the third string, senior kicker, Justin Meyer. Let me repeat that “third string, senior kicker”. i.e. someone unable to beat out two other kickers.

For a good long while the kid did fine. Meyer did all the scoring the Hokies managed in the first three quarters as he connected on field goals of 37, 43 and 36 yards. And, in the fourth quarter, after Logan Thomas scored on a 1 yard run and passed for a 2-point conversion, Meyer kicked a 25-yarder to tie the game.

So the kid made four field goals, scoring 12 of Virginia Tech’s 20 points in regulation. Will he be celebrated for doing that? No. He’ll probably be vilified for missing a 37-yard attempt in OT that allowed Michigan to escape with a victory after Brendan Gibbons drilled his 37-yard field goal down the middle a few moments later.

Virginia Tech had just 377 yards net offense but even that was double Michigan’s 184 yards. And while Michigan’s defense stiffened in the red zone, hence the four Meyer field goals, it was bad play on special teams, of all things, that cost Frank Beamer’s Hokies dearly.

Michigan succeeded on a fake field goal, had a drive kept alive on a roughing the punter, forced a fumble on a kick return and blew up a VT attempted fake punt late in the game.

The Wolverines’ Denard Robinson was just 9 of 21 passing for 117 yards with one TD. He also had just 13 yards on 13 carries. Quite possibly it was his worst outing this year.

Virginia Tech’s Logan Thomas was 19 of 28 for 214 yards. He had 53 yards rushing on 16 carries but they all seemed to convert big third downs and one of those yards was for a TD.

I picked the winner correctly, but this was a loser of a game as far as entertainment is concerned.

No comments: