The Auburn Tigers are 2011 BCS Champions.   At least for now. 

To put a spin on the famous Goldwater campaign slogan, “You know in your heart that they’re WRONG.”    And I think we all recognize it.

Cam is a hired gun.  Fairly is a dirty player.  Trooper is a known bagman.  And Chizik is complicit in it all. 

And they’ve gotten ever freaking break on every freaking bounce of the ball all year long. But that is sort of necessary for a championship run, isn’t it?

The numerous officiating mistakes and/or oversights were equally necessary, and were the hardest to watch.  A crooked team coached by crooked coaches should not get every single call, should they?

Well, witness this breakdown of the play that won the game:

\With that said:

SEC!  SEC!  SEC!  SEC!

As you may be aware, we here at TRC like to broaden the scope of the blog from time to time to bring you, our faithful readers, items of particular pop culture significance.   In the past we’ve brought you internet meme updates, and even tips on grammar and language usage. 

Today we are focusing on the “Wilhelm Scream,” a stock sound effect that has appeared in dozens of movies and television programs.   First recorded in the early 1950s, this sound effect of a man screaming has made it way into dramas, comedies, and action movies.  It’s in movies as far back as Them, as popular as Star Wars and Raiders of the Lost Ark, and as recent as Pirates of the Caribbean and Toy Story. 

Since this is still a sports blog, however, we thought it might be best to demonstrate using something more relevant.  We picked–totally at random, mind you–some Shane Beamer coaching footage from the past couple of years.  Listen closely and see if you can hear a Wilhelm Scream or two:

In a previous post, we laid out 4 keys for the CFA Bowl.  Let’s review:

1.  Get #21 on Track.  FAIL.  He came out gang busters, with one over-the-shoulder catch for a big gain on the first series.  But the hit (a clean one, by the way) on Latti at the end of the first series spelled doom for this key and, in the end, for the Gamecock’s hopes.  Nice to see Bmad and Miles fight and claw for yards, but they don’t have the quick feet and wide angle lenses of Lattimore.  The murmurs of worry and disbelief in the GA Dome as #21 lay motionless on the ground were widespread.  Glad the kid’s OK, and that we will see him on his Heisman run next year and beyond.

2.  Stout, opportunistic defense. FAIL.  Stout?  Well, for the most part, yes.  But opportunistic?  Utter fail.  How many fumbles did we NOT recover?  How many picks did we NOT grab?  I lost count.  I loved these guys and their effort on Friday night, but the inability to take advantage of FSU miscues was a big part of the loss.

3.   Smart, efficient play from the quarterback position.   FAIL.  Do I need to even get into this one?  Three picks on three successive series (and a slew of other bad reads) were absolutely fatal to the Gamecock’s chances.  Again, I like how he kept his head up, and he bounced back for a couple of good 2nd half drives, but in the end Garcia’s play was not what we needed to win.  An interesting side note:  Spurrier stuck with him despite the repeated picks – what does that tell us?

4.  Run back a kick.   FAIL.  /shugs shoulders  /vomits /shugs shoulders /whimpers

Last year’s TRC staff trip to frigid, bitter, annoying Birmingham has been well documented elsewhere in this space (btw, have a blast this year, you annoying Kentucky fans, and be sure to plan ahead and attend all 4 minutes of the BBVA Compass FanZone).

This year we were hoping for something better than the frigid hell that was Legion Field, so when the fine folks at the CFA Bowl – who we’ve always loved and supported and believed in [ahem][ahem] – announced the selection of our fighting Gamecocks, the TRC staff was elated.

Schedules scheduled, contacts contacted, tickets ticketed, and plans planned we are now ready for gameday.  Buck, Mrs. Buck, and Buck Jr. will be tailgating from home with multiple Buck relations in the North Atlanta Suburbs.  Tbone, Kbone, Cbone, and Hbone will be driving down to the ATL for some pregame parading and touring.  Gman and Mrs. G will be – wait, perhaps I should introduce you all to him first; he’s the third TRC guy who’s supposed to be our resident basketball expert writer – swinging by the Buck pad and hopefully enjoying some South Florida Bulls Football.

The whole happy group will convene at the Georgia World Congress Center for prebowl festivities and then will be reporting live from the 2010 CFA Bowl inside the Georgia Dome.

Expect updates on gameday festivities, the game itself, and the whiskey-soaked aftermath via twitter throughout the day and into 2011.  Oh, and we may poke some serious fun at A.J. Green and the Mighty Georgia Bulldogs in the [giggle] [/focus] Liberty Bowl [bwahahah] and the not-so-Mighty CTU crowd in the Charlotte Tire or Muffler or whatever-we-lose-track Bowl.

Just the mention of the year ‘1984’ carries a ton of meaning to the average Gamecock fan.  It was a year of celebrated firsts, but also a year of numbing almosts  It was a year of unprecedented success, but also a year of devastating defeats (well, the Gator Bowl was probably just a ‘tough loss’, but the real facepalm moment came a few weeks earlier NOTE: don’t click the preceding hyperlink unless you are in a very, very, happy place).

But in the end, 1984 was the high-water mark for the Gamecock football program- we hope only ‘to date.  Ten wins, with those victories including Georgia, Notre Dame, Clemson, then-powerful Pitt, and a good Florida State team.

The coincidental similarity (NOT ‘irony’, see here) of this year’s attempt at 10 wins and our last 10 win season is that both years included a win over Georgia at home and a victory up the dirt road at CTU.  For this year to reach the 10 win plateau, we’re gonna need an additional similarity: wins over Florida State.

With that in mind, let’s go back to the future and preview what South Carolina will need to do to defeat the Seminoles in Friday’s Chick-fil-a (ne’ Peach) Bowl:

Get #21 on track.  By the way, what’s up with everyone saying ‘untracked’ these days?  It doesn’t make any sense, in that most anything that runs on a track is headed for disaster if it gets off the aforesaid track.  I think someone slipped up a couple of years ago and misspoke, and now sports commentators think it’s a real thing and keep repeating it (I’m looking at you, Scott Hood).

Anyhoo, for SC to win this game, we need Lattimore running hard and running free both early and often, as in:

Secondly, we need a stout, opportunistic defense, that gets to Ponder or Manuel or Rix or Weinke or whoever again and again.  Something like these guys did:

Next, its gonna take smart, efficient play from the quarterback position.  Stephen Garcia needs to take his drops and get rid of the ball.  He needs to avoid forearm shivers from opposing referees.  He needs to stay within himself and not try to win it on his own. He needs to protect the football.  And he needs to NEVER EVER EVER EVER NEVER try something like this:

And then, it wouldn’t hurt if we could run back a kick past the 20 yardline.  Yes, yes, I know we are prohibited, by rule, from doing that (or at least Coach Beamer thinks we are) so we put our smallest player back there to ensure we start every drive on the 17 yard line.  But still, wouldn’t something like this be nice (just this once)?

btw h/t to cockytalk for all the video links.

You just might be a middle of the pack team in a mediocre conference when you lobby and whine and beg your way into a cold bowl in Charlotte.

The #5 bowl pick in the Mighty ACC is the Meineke Car Care Bowl, and the trusty internet was on hand to witness the first CTU practice:

I think the CTU longsnapper may have inadvertantly mouthed a new slogan for the entire Tiger experience at the :35 mark. 

Clemson University, “You Gotta Do What You Gotta Do.”

Christmas morning, middle class dwelling in College Park, Georgia:

Son: Daddy, I can’t believe all the great presents I got!

Dad: We have been very blessed this last couple of years son, and this is really a great Christmas.

Son:  I can’t believe I got a Nintendo DS, an Xbox 360, AND a Wii!

Dad:  [laughs] [pats son on head]

Son: And Daddy, I also got a Range Rover, mom got a bunch of clothes, and you’ve got a new Rolex!  How can we afford all this stuff?

Dad:  Son, don’t you know that Santa is magic?  Don’t you worry about things like money, just leave that to me.  When I think of how many times you’ve made me smile over the last year . . .

Son: [eyes down] But Daddy, the other guys on my football team tell me its foolish to still believe in Santa.

Dad:  Don’t you listen to them! Don’t you dare listen!  There is a real Santa Claus, and he’s magic!

Son: [brightens, sips juice bottle]: Thanks Daddy, I love you!

Dad: I love you too, Cam!

[fin]

H/T to Tigerdroppings