Dude

Oh yeah, one more question: WTF was that?

I’m not going to rant and rave about the inefficiency of the offense, the run-it-to-the-short-side-of-the-field-where-the-defensive-is-overloaded-on-third-and-three play-calling, the OMG-they-just-did-that-where’s-the-safety-over-the-top secondary, the can-we-please-send-more-than-four-down-linemen-so-Teel-doesn’t-get-ten-seconds-to-sit-back-there-and-pitch-a-tent pass rushing, or even the ineptitude of the special teams (saving Dane Mattingly, Long Snapper Nation for Life).

What I want to know is this: Coach Kragthorpe has been adamant since the WVU game that, if we were to go up to Piscataway and get a W, the Cards could be bowl-bound. (Frankly, I never bought that jive. Anybody who goes .500 and finishes last in arguably the worst BCS conference in the world is, to put it mildly, undeserving of the post-season.) But that’s what the man said to us, so you’d think he’d have the troops ready to go. Right? Maybe one of those “This is your last chance, seniors. It’s do or die time, let’s put the women and children to bed and go out looking for supper” speeches? I mean, this was our chance of redemption for spoiling those NC title hopes just a couple years (seems longer, I know) ago. I thought, based on Coach’s representations to us – the fans, the ones who endured the 150 degree heat in August to watch our offense fail to score against our most bitter rival, the ones who braved the downpour against our other bitter rival to vehemently defend some wooden keg filled with nails and leave only with a soaking wet L, the ones who shivered out in the cold a couple weeks ago to support the Cards and the seniors against another bitter rival, only to get laughed out of our own stadium – and the urgency of the situation, that we would come out fired up on national TV, with a chip on our shoulder and with something to prove. But that didn’t happen.

Instead, like so many times in these past two years, our boys came out flat. We seemed bored. We had didn’t play with any urgency at all; if Coach was serious about that playing for a bowl berth, we sure didn’t act like it last night.

As Sweeney and Crawford both point out, fans deserve answers. My question is simple. And anybody can respond.