40 Acres Sports

ESPN’s Kirk Herbstreit thinks the Longhorns deserved to be ahead of Oklahoma but like most of us saw this coming. In a decision between two teams with nearly identical resumes, the Longhorns settled the head-to-head on the field back in October. Watch Herbie break it down below:

It was a thing of beauty Thursday night as the Longhorns put the Aggies back in their place with a 49 - 9 thumping in front of a national Turkey Day audience. The Texas defense was completely dominant in the first half and the offense was led by an incredible night running and throwing by quarterback Colt McCoy. We won’t know till Sunday if it was enough but Mack Brown’s kids won with both class and style, something that should make any Longhorn proud.

Watch the highlights:

Texas head coach Mack Brown was on ESPN yesterday (and replayed a ton this morning) discussing tonights Texas A&M game and of course BCS rankings. It sounds like he’s saying all the right things and wants the kids focusing on the Aggies, but I imagine if the team takes care of business tonight he’ll be on the phone doing interviews during several games Friday and Saturday. He also does a great job at subtly reminding voters that the Longhorns beat the Sooners head-to-head earlier this year.

Watch the interview:

After losing to Notre Dame, Texas rebounded to take third place in the Maui Invitational with a win over Oregon. Texas forward Damion James stepped up big with his best game of the young season by pouring in 21 points and grabbing 12 boards. He was a very efficient 9 for 11 from the floor. Justin Mason had another solid game both on the stat sheet and running the offense.

Check out the highlights from ESPN below:

Game stats available after the jump.

The Texas basketball team faced their toughest test of the season last night in a top 10 match-up in the EA Sports Maui Invitational. AJ Abrams had a half court attempt that would have won the game but it came up short and the team lost 80 - 81 to Notre Dame. Watch highlights from ESPN below:

Justin Mason ran the point most of the game and played well, shooting 7 of 12 from the field while adding 7 assists and 5 rebounds. Abrams scored 23 points to lead the Horns but needed 27 shots to do it and Damion James continued to struggle to find his shot. For the Horns to make a serious tourney run James needs to find his groove, whether it’s as dominating force inside or as a wing scorer he needs to be this team’s leader.

With the loss the Horns are now 3 - 1 on the season. Up next is the third place game in Maui against Oregon today at 3:30pm.

Game stats available after the jump.

Finally. The best source for college sports coverage on the Web Rivals.com has upgraded their video player to allow embedding of video on other websites. They’re only allowing other sites to post non-premium videos so it doesn’t look like there will be a ton of free recruit videos but their features and highlight packages are also good and much of that content available.

Some of the better recent Texas videos are below…

A video breakdown of Colt McCoy’s day versus Kansas:

Rivals Minute’s Ashley Russell discusses Will Muschamp:

Some video has been posted on the Statesman’s site of the Will Muschamp announcement from yesterday featuring comments from AD DeLoss Dodds talking about the continuity of the program and why they locked him up with this deal. Muschamp also has some really good comments about why he took the deal and how much his family loves Austin. Mack Brown gives Coach Boom some very high praise and discusses the supposedly non-existent timetable for when he’ll step down.

Watch the video:

The Longhorns prevailed Saturday in a 35 - 7 win over the Kansas Jayhawks on the road. Road wins in the Big 12 should never be taken for granted, especially with weather conditions including a 30 MPH wind and 30 degree temps. Quarterback Colt McCoy had a good day both on the ground and through the air, but the star of the afternoon was Will Muschamp’s defense. Watch brief highlights of the game below:

Former Longhorns TJ Ford and Kevin Durant matched up Monday night and both had big games. Ford’s Pacers pulled out the win thanks in big part to his 11 fourth quarter points. TJ finished the game close to a triple double with 24 points, 10 assists, and seven rebounds. Durant kept the Thunder in it by leading all scorers with 37 points and chipping in eight rebounds.

Watch the highlights:

Video removed by ESPN! Bah.

Texas got back on the horse after a loss with a blowout win over Baylor on Saturday. The team jumped out to a quick lead but mistakes including two interceptions by Colt McCoy let the Bears tie up the game. Eventually McCoy and the Horns righted things and went on to win in a blowout. Watch highlights of the game below:

Absolutely fantastic play by a couple of high school football players from Lassiter High School in Marietta, Georgia. A high pass in the back of the end zone and tight end Philip Lutzenkirchen volleys it back into play and his teammate grabbed it for the touchdown.

Might be one of the best, smartest plays I’ve seen. Check it out:

Wow. What a tough, heartbreaking loss to take. The Longhorns fell in the last seconds to the Red Raiders and may have had both their national title and Big 12 title hopes dashed in less than 90 seconds. Bevo Sports will have additional postmortem on the game in the next couple of days, for now watch the ESPN highlights below if you have masochistic streak:

Texas players Roy Miller and Chris Hall spoke the media earlier this week about the season and the upcoming Texas Tech game. The Statesman has posted excellent videos of the players answering questions, which you can watch below.

Roy Miller talks about leadership and not being satisfied…

Chris Hall very happily answered all sorts of questions…

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We all know how good Brian Orakpo has been on the field this season, but wait until you see what he can do in the weight room. Pretty scary.

It wasn’t the high scoring game most of us expected but the number one Texas Longhorns were able to hold off a valiant effort from number six Oklahoma State Cowboys yesterday. The Horns got in front early and stayed there but the game was tight through out and the team had to stop a hail mary attempt on the game’s final play to win.

Watch highlights and post game interviews below:

We’ve heard this before but that doesn’t mean it’s not great news: Texas quarterback Colt McCoy says he will return to Texas for his senior season. Of course, until press conferences announcing they were gone both Vince Young and TJ Ford were saying the exact same thing. There’s a long time and a lot that can happen before McCoy needs to make a final decision, but as a high school coach’s son Colt seems like the type of kid who will want to not only finish his education but leave Texas as a legend.

From the SportingNews.com:

There is not a high level of agreement among scouts about where Colt McCoy will ultimately fit into the NFL draft. As for the “when,” the Texas junior quarterback — a favorite to win the 2008 Heisman Trophy — made that clear this week, telling Sporting News, “I’m going to play here for four years.”

“I’ve been blessed to be able to play here,” McCoy said. “Not very many people get to (start) here for four years, so what an opportunity.”

While he has solid size and fantastic accuracy, McCoy lacks prototypical NFL arm strength. His play so far this season has gotten his name mentioned occasionally as a first round guy but he’s more likely a mid-rounder. NFL scouts fall in love with QBs with the huge arm and guys like Colt fall to teams not looking for immediate help at the position.

ESPN NFL Draft expert Mel Kiper thinks highly of his NFL prospects and agrees with Colt that he’s a similar player to NFL starters Tony Romo and Jake Delhomme:

Both Romo an Delhomme are great NFL players, but ironically neither was drafted high so the comparison is a little awkward. Maybe the success of guys like Romo and Tom Brady mean teams are more likely to take a quarterback based on skill, success, and intangibles and not just arm strength. Hopefully we won’t find out until 2010 with Colt.

Saturday night with a national television watching the Texas Longhorns showed everyone (well, almost everyone) that they’re the clear number one. They took a very good Missouri team behind the woodshed and beat them handily. In a near perfect first half the Longhorns jumped out to a 35 - 0 lead before the Tigers knew what hit them.

Watch the ESPN highlights of the game:

Stay tuned to Bevo Sports for more coverage of the Mizzou game and preview of Texas and Oklahoma State.

Great video analysis from ESPN of what Oklahoma State did defensively last Saturday in their upset win over Missouri. They look at how the defensive line did such a good job getting pressure on quarterback Chase Daniel and at how the OSU secondary took away Daniel’s options if he did have time. Watch:

With the athleticism of the Texas defensive tackles a similar strategy would be effective at getting to Daniel both up the middle and around the edge. It will be interesting to see what wrinkles Texas defensive coordinator Will Muschamp will use to shut down Mizzou’s high powered offense and if their coaches have any answers now that a team has them “figured out”. We’ll find out Saturday at 7pm.

In his weekly press conference, Texas head coach Mack Brown discusses the upset victory over Oklahoma and the players that excelled during the game. Mack names the players of the game for the defense, offense, and special teams, discusses the Horns being ranked number one, and looks ahead towards Missouri.

Watch Mack Brown’s 22-minute press conference:

Quan Cosby levels Lendy Holmes

The play that had Texas fans up out of their seats screaming the loudest Saturday against Oklahoma didn’t end up being a touchdown. Quarterback Colt McCoy found an open Jordan Shipley across the middle and hit him in stride. Shipley was headed to the end zone for an apparent score when BOOM, fellow receiver Quan Cosby flies in knocks the daylights out of OU’s Lendy Holmes with a bone jarring block.

Shipley ended up being ruled down inside the one yard line, but that didn’t matter as the Horns eventually scored and Cosby’s big hit will be watched over and over by Texas fans for some time.

It was a thing of beauty. Enjoy it with an animated .gif and some YouTube clips:

Watch a couple more angles of the play after the jump.

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The Texas Longhorns picked up one of the biggest wins of Mack Brown’s career Saturday as they upset the #1 ranked Oklahoma Sooners 45 - 35. The Horns went down repeatedly but responded to every punch with one of their own until they finally knocked out the Sooners (literally) in the fourth quarter. A huge win for the Texas program quite possibly setting up a run at a national title.

Watch the ESPN highlights of the game:

Jordan Hamilton at the Lebron Skills Academy

Less than a month after reeling in 5-star guard Avery Bradley the Texas basketball program continued their ascension to national power with another top 10 commit. Yesterday 5-star small forward Jordan Hamilton committed to Rick Barnes and the Longhorns after long considering them his favorite. Hamilton is a 6-foot-7 small forward from Los Angeles who is considered one of the top players in the 2009 class by every major recruiting site. Rivals.com has Jordan as their fifth best player in the country and their top overall small forward.

Hamilton is an excellent scorer with the ability to shoot the three. He’s got great size and athleticism and should be able to take the ball to the hoop and finish. He has the ability to play anywhere from shooting guard to power forward depending on the type of lineup Barnes wants to put on the court.

Rivals.com expert Jerry Meyer gives the following scouting report on Hamilton:

“Hamilton is a physically imposing wing player with a multidimensional game which is effective anywhere on the court. Beyond his ability to score at all three levels, Hamilton is a tremendous rebounder and a lethal passer in the open court. His unique size, skill package and feel for the game make him a legitimate four position player.”

Hamilton’s commitment gives the Longhorns three of the top players and one of the top 2009 classes in the country. Barnes may not be done yet as he and his coaches are still pursuing several other elite recruits for this class. Hamilton, Bradley, and 4-star forward Shawn Williams will help make the 2009-10 Longhorns a national contender if they can be mixed with some experienced leadership and depth. It should be exciting to watch.

Watch highlights of Jordan below:

Go check out some more videos of Josh over at YouTube, you’ll be impressed.

BevoBeat has posted three nice long videos of interview sessions with Colt McCoy, Ryan Palmer, and Chris Ogbonnaya. The team sounds ready to come out and give the Sooners hell. Watch the videos below to see the guys talk about this week’s match-up.

Colt McCoy talks about being a Big 12 quarterback and how much he loves the week of Texas/OU:

Ryan Palmer says the team needs to practice hard and the defense needs to tackle better to stop the Sooners’ offense:

Chris Ogbonnaya shares a story about the “lovely” Sooner faithful:

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Houston Chronicle writer Joseph Duarte has posted three brief but good interviews from after Saturday’s game with Texas players. Maybe it’s because I’m not living in Austin but hearing from the players in this casual situation is a rarity. The only video we usually get is from organized press conferences so it’s nice to see them talk in a different setting.

Senior Quan Cosby discusses CU and the Big 12 schedule:

Roy Miller talks about the difficulty in not looking past Colorado:

Brian Orakpo talks about the match-up with OU:

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Texas played their best defense in years as they knocked off their first conference opponent Colorado. Quarterback Colt McCoy wasn’t perfect but he was darn good and senior running back Chris Ogbonnaya had his best day as a Longhorn. Watch video highlights of the game from ESPN below:

There’s also some good but not embeddable highlights available from FSN to check out.