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Celebrating with the Sooners
MIAMI -- I had filed my final story of this strange and wonderful season, and now it was time to crash the post-Orange Bowl party of the national champion Oklahoma Sooners. The bash was in a ballroom on the fourth floor of the Fountainbleu Hotel on Miami Beach, and it was still rocking at 5 a.m. Thursday when I rolled in with crack college football reporter and denizen of this Web site, B.J. Schecter. (B.J. really showed me something at this Orange Bowl. He busted his tail -- he got Snoop Minnis on the phone before anyone else spoke to him -- and played hard, too. Without getting into specifics, let's just say South Beach was very, very good to him.) By some inexplicable oversight -- Orange Bowl executives have assured me it will never happen again -- our names had been left off the guest list. Also inexplicably, the pair of 6 1/2-foot Miami cops working the door seemed never to have heard of us. The more I pressed the issue -- "So you're saying you've never read On Campus or B.J.'s Fearless Predictions?" -- the more they gazed longingly at their nightsticks. We were bailed out by running backs coach Cale Gundy, the ex-Sooners quarterback, who emerged from the party with white spots on his face. I didn't say anything: Gundy is still a reasonably young man, and I thought he might be breaking out. It turns out the spots were remnants of the Silly String that some genius brought to the party. Gundy hooked us up with magic bracelets, and we waltzed past the officers, to whom B.J. said, "You guys want me to bring you hors d'oeuvres or anything?" While standing on the edge of the dance floor, I was ambushed by Silly String-wielding strength coach Jerry Schmidt. I don't know how long Schmidt had been at the party, but let's just say this: He would've had trouble reciting the alphabet backward. Nobody ambushes me with Silly String without paying a dear price. I spend too much time on grooming, too much money on hair-care products to let such an act go unpunished. Unfortunately, when he isn't coaching, uh, strength, Schmidt manages to stay pretty buff himself. I was forced to let his act of aggression pass. For now. "Don't be mad," said head coach Bob Stoops . "He got me, too." Stoops was an oasis of calm amid the carousing. He seemed happy, but not surprised, by the fact that his team had just returned the national championship to Oklahoma for the first time in 15 years. While we in the press corps described the Sooners' 13-2 upset of Florida State as stunning, Stoops, his staff and his players, it seemed, would've been stunned to lose the game. All week we heard about the 12-point spread favoring Florida State, about the superior team speed and scary depth of the Seminoles. And all week, Stoops flashed his Mona Lisa smile, looking at once mysterious and vaguely amused while saying things like, "We've got some pretty good athletes, too." Let's talk about some of them. On defense, there were J.T. Thatcher and Ontei Jones, the free safety and nickelback, respectively, flying around before the snap, disguising coverages, leaving poor Chris Weinke on the sideline scratching his bald spot in bewilderment. There was middle linebacker Torrance Marshall, the game's MVP, a Miami native who admired the Seminoles growing up. Marshall's first-quarter interception of a strange Weinke pass set up a 37-yard field goal. Against a team averaging 42 points per game, those were the only points the Sooners needed. As receivers coach Steve Spurrier Jr. shouted at co-defensive coordinator Mike Stoops after the game, "Unbelievable! You suffocated them!" Spurrier added, "My dad is gonna love this!" Then a cry went up, and the triumphant Sooners rushed the platform on which ESPN was broadcasting its postgame show. Some of the guys had issues with Lee Corso, who had said that while the Seminoles "knew" they would win, the Sooners "hoped" they would. As the young gentlemen and student-athletes thundered past me, wild-eyed and baying Corso's name, I feared briefly for his welfare. Heupel stayed on the field a long time afterward, soaking up the moment. I'd wondered during the game why he seemed reluctant to take a shot down the field. To glimpse his left arm was to have the answer: His elbow was swollen to roughly twice its normal size. What a warrior he was this season. All night he had taken what the Seminoles gave him, the lobs and dinks that his receivers turned into substantial gains. He put his head down and ran it when he had to. He outplayed the guy who edged him for the Heisman Trophy. I heard from people close to him that Heupel was a little more disappointed than he publicly let on by his failure to win that award. Think he's over it now? Back at the party, Oklahoma athletic director Joe Castiglione was praising Stoops to the ceiling, pointing out, "He's just starting!" Castiglione had to raise his voice to be heard: the deejay would play a song, then play Boomer Sooner at mind-numbing volume. I overheard one of Bob and Mike's sisters -- I don't know if it was Kathy or Renee -- say, "I can't believe it's five o'clock in the morning and my mother is still on the dance floor." Nothing these Stoopses do should surprise anyone. When B.J. and I left, around 6:30, the gig was still going strong. That was the thing about this season's Oklahoma Sooners: They outlasted everyone. Sports Illustrated senior writer Austin Murphy covers the college football beat and goes On Campus for CNNSI.com each Friday throughout the season.
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