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Saturday, December 1, 2001
Running Buffaloes stifle another top-ranked D
By Marc Connolly
ABC Sports Online
IRVING, Texas -- Question: How did anyone stop Colorado this year?
It's baffling to believe that the Buffaloes lost to Fresno State in their season opener and only scored a mere seven points against Texas in their other loss on Oct. 20.
|  | | Chris Brown scored nine touchdowns the last two weeks against Nebraska and Texas. |
That'll be the lingering thought among those in the Rocky Mountain State and around the Big 12 after watching Colorado once again pile up rushing yards at will in a 39-37 victory over the third-ranked Texas Longhorns in front of a 65,675 sellout crowd at Texas Stadium on Saturday night to win their first Big 12 Championship game.
"Nobody's playing better than we are right now," said head coach Gary Barnett. "We're one heck of a football team."
Combined with last week's 62-36 total dismantling of Nebraska, Colorado has now exploded for a total of 653 rushing yards in its last two games against two of the best defensive units in the nation.
Why only now?
"We just took some time to gel on the line," said senior All-American guard Andre Gurode, who was dominant once again. "What's helped is that it's been the same five of us all year. That's been the big key. It took awhile, but we're tough to beat right now."
Chris Brown, who is quickly making a case to be included in the dozens of "Heisman hopefuls" stories that will pop up on newsstands next summer, was a force to be reckoned with every time he touched the pigskin for the second week in a row. The sophomore tailback rushed for 182 yards and three touchdowns to key the victory. His two-week totals now look like something out of Barry Sanders or Rickey Williams' collegiate dossier: 380 yards rushing and nine TDs.
"This was a Chris Brown kind of game," said Barnett, in his third year with the Buffs. "I don't know how many yards he had, but he was a horse out there tonight and has been for two weeks."
With most of Brown's damage coming via the right side of the line -- Gurode and all-Big 12 tackle Victor Rogers -- as well as behind fullback Brandon Drumm's punishing lead blocks, he once again seemed in awe of the Big Uglies doing all the work for himself, Bobby Purify (6-62) and Cortlen Johnson (7-13).
"I think they are the best in the country," he said. "They were clicking on all cylinders today."
Rogers said that the O-line and running backs grew close as a unit because everyone else was raving about the usual suspects in the Big 12 and their running attacks (read: Nebraska)
"We relied on each other," said Rogers. "We knew we only had the guys who were in the locker room. No one believed in us."
Playing as well as any one team seen on the college beat in 2001, he said that a game against Miami would be a "toss-up." But when asked if Colorado could run on anyone, he stopped laughing, locked down, cocked his head and delivered a firm "YES."
After making mince meat of a defense that Barnett said includes nine future NFL players after creating holes the size of small universities against the Nebraska D last week, imagine the task their opponents in the Tostitos Fiesta Bowl have to tackle.
"We feel we can run on anyone," said Gurode. "We'll take anyone on."
Major Coward?
After showing the Texas faithful a glimpse of the player who was named co-Offensive MVP along with Eric Crouch during the 1999 season, Major Applewhite said this about his three-interception performance in Nebraska's 22-6 victory at the Alamodome:
"I played like a coward."
It motivated him to avenge such an outing if he ever was summoned into the UT huddle again.
"I told myself that if I had a chance to get into this ballgame, there'd be no excuses," said the senior quarterback, who was brilliant in leading the Longhorns back from a 19-point deficit with three touchdown passes and 24o passing yards. "I was going to look myself in the mirror."
Fake punt still baffling
Up by 13 points (36-23) with just over nine minutes to go in the game, the call on fourth-and-4 isn't usually a fake punt unless it's on PlayStation2. So perhaps the strangest play of the game came when backup quarterback Robert Hodge took the snap in a punt formation and tried to get the first down with a pass to the left side to tight end Jake Jones. Instead of moving the chains, or at least giving up the pigskin near midfield, Hodge threw the ball seemingly right at cornerback Roderick Babers, who promptly returned the gift 54 yards for a touchdown to bring Texas within a touchdown.
"That's something we've worked on in practice every day," explained Barnett. "We had it lined up right where we wanted it, we just didn't execute the darn thing. Any other team probably would have folded after something like that, but this team has so much heart, we just looked at each other and said, 'We don't care.'"
No blaming the man in the middle
Despite the success of the Colorado rushing attack, senior middle linebacker D.D. Lewis shined for the Longhorns throughout the night. The leader of one of the nation's top defenses had 13 tackles, including two for a loss and a sack to go with a QB hurry. Of all the Texas players to face the media after the game, Lewis looked the most emotionally spent after breaking the UT record with his 50th consecutive start.
"It was just missed tackles," said Lewis. "We fought our butts off and their backs made great runs. That is what it came down to."
Four enter double-digits in 2001
One of the most amazing statistics you'll ever find is that four Big 12 teams finished the regular season with 10 wins or more (Nebraska, Oklahoma, Texas and Colorado). That's the first time this has ever happened in the conference's history. Colorado became the seventh school since 1996 to win 10-plus games in the Big 12.
Home state bias or no respect for the Buffs?
All seven columnists and writers who pick games for the Dallas Morning News had Texas taking the Big 12 Championship.
Marc Connolly is a senior writer for ABC Sports Online. He can be reached at marc.connolly@abc.com.
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 Colorado's final drive continues when Texas gets penalized for roughing the punter (Courtesy: ABC Sports).
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Aaron Killion's interception return brings the ball inside the fifteen and sets up a Chris Brown TD (Courtesy: ABC Sports).
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Colorado's Bobby Purify scampers 51 yards setting a short TD by Chris Brown (Courtesy: ABC Sports).
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Marcus Moore intercepts Chris Simms and returns it 64 yards for the score (Courtesy: ABC Sports).
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Major Applewhite finds a wide-open B.J. Johnson for a 79-yard touchdown strike (Courtesy: ABC Sports).
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Roderick Babers intercepts a fake punt attempt and takes it back 54 yards for the touch (Courtesy: ABC Sports).
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 Gary Barnett details Colorado's Big 12 Championship win with ABC's Jack Arute.
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