Texas 34, Oklahoma State 21

No doubt many of you watched this epic game on the radio and after having made the drive to northern Oklahoma, I can't say that I blame you. But the wireless wasn't good enough for this reporter. No sir. So what do you do when you want to drive five hours to some no-name, small town in the middle of nowhere to witness firsthand the deterioration of 20th century civilization? You call and wake up your single friends at 6AM, entice them into the car with an Egg McMuffin in one hand, a beer in the other, and by the time they look up, you're half way to hell. Props to my roadie friends for riding shot gun with me to that stagnation of societal progression called Stillwater. Besides only being 20 minutes from the world's biggest ball of mud, Stillwater is home to Oklahoma State and some Eskimo named Joe. That bar is an oasis in a dust bowl. For two dollars you get to choose from a variety funky-colored plastic cups filled with beer that promises half the alcohol and twice the number of trips to the pisser. I thought I'd seen it all until I saw one of those baby changer stations right next to the trough in the men’s room. One slip and baby's getting baptized in warm 3%, and I don't mean milk. Next stop on the tour o' troughs is Lewis Field, home of the OSU Cowboys and Bob Villa's worst nightmare. This stadium is on loose screw away from being a gravel pit. It's a demilitarized zone with Astroturf. With chain link fences, exposed pipes and old rusty steel gurters all over the place, you'd think they would give out Tetanus shots with every hot-dog purchased. And going to the rest room is a death march all in itself. There's only one and if you've been drinking heavily, you're either going to be pushing the edge of the bladder envelope or begin the journey of a 1000 steps to trough world. This critic gives Lewis Field, Eskimo Joes and the town of "Shitwater" a rating of Piss Poor at best. Either OSU has drastically cut their music budget or Lenny Kravitz was in the press box because they played "American Woman" every time the cowboys threaten to play football. Fortunately at the end of the game, as the final seconds ticked off the scoreboard clock, they mercifully decided to play a popular Toby Keith song which blared over the PA system as the sparse OSU crowd exited the stadium. Anything but "American Woman" was all right with me. Even "I should've been a cowboy..." started to sound good. The crowd seemed receptive anyway, and sang along as if somebody had just cued up the "Star Spangled Banner". Well OSU fans, you better add "I should've scored more points..." to the Stillwater Top 40 because you just added another loss to the column. The game was pretty much won and done on two plays. The Horn's first offensive play from scrimmage went for 80 yards and a touchdown. The first play of the second half, Texas picked off a Tony Lindsey pass and walked into the endzone for 7 more. From there we pretty much put the game on cruise control and let Hodges Mitchell do the rest. He had 150 yards on a couple of carries. Applewhite didn't look particularly good but got the ball to Kwame enough to make him the all time Texas hook-up. Otherwise the defense was solid except for another missed assignment by the secondary on a 50 yard touchdown pass to some cowboy who found himself all by his lonesome in the Texas secondary. I'm no cornerback, but I'm guessing if some stranger moseys on by wearing the opposite brand, you might want to saddle up and ride with him for a while, because chances are, he's about to make Texas Toast out of you. The Cowboys got a cheap one with 21 seconds left and the game pretty much ended with the pomp and circumstance of a plate of cold cheese fries at Eskimo Joes. Horns roll 34-21. Not quite the blowout I predicted, but a win just the same. On to...

THE NEXT GAME

According to the good people of Lubbock, the annual Tech game is our biggest rivalry. Whatever? Next weekend the Red Raiders pop a viagra and try and get it up for the so called "biggest game of the year". Well I got news for Tech fans, the biggest game of the year is always the next game. Maybe they wouldn't lose to North Texas so much if they figured that one out for themselves. Of course nobody ever accused Tech of being the Harvard of the south or even the Southwest Texas of the north for that matter. Either way, the Big XII South championship and a trip to the Alamodome are on the line in Austin this weekend. It's simple, a Texas win means there in. We won't even bother with any of the other scenarios. After the heartbreaking loss last year in Lubbock, the Horns will be focused on not giving a repeat performance. The last time Texas played Tech in memorial at night was in 1995 and Zach Thomas and the Raiders took it right in the red eye, 48-7. Booze hounds unite. Which leads me to the unprecedented…

UNPREDICTABLE PREDICTION

Start drinking early, be drunk and pass out late because the Red Raiders are getting served on the "blue plate". Horn's run it up.