2006 Hotel California #6 Event of the Year

#6 November 25, 2006. Salt Lake City, Utah. 3:45pm MST. Let me take you back. 3.2 seconds remain in this thrilling game. Ball on Utah’s 11-yard line. BYU is down by 5. No time outs remain. They have to take a shot at the endzone. This is it. This is the game right here. Beck takes the snap. He drops back. All the time in the world. He scrambles to the right. He rolls his left. Looking for a receiver. Looking. Looking. Now comes the pressure. He rolls to his right. Pressure is coming. He throws. Across his body - across the field. He’s got a receiver open. Down in his knees goes Harline and…And we all know the outcome. TOUCHDOWN!! TOUCHDOWN!! COUGARS WIN!! BYU DEFEATS UTAH! Nearly 11 seconds in all.

The #6 Event of the Year is Beck leading the Cougars to their victory over in-state rival University of Utah Utes by completing a TD pass to TE Jonny Harline as time expired. Trailing by three points, Utah marched 83 yards on nine plays capped by the go-ahead 19-yard touchdown catch by Brent Casteel with 1:19 on the clock. Then, With 1:19 left in the game and down by 4, Jo Beck led the Cougars 75 yards down the field and as time expired threw the game-winning touchdown against the stinkin Utes. What a great, great moment.

As we all know the Cougars had already locked up the MWC, and already knew they were going to the Vegas Bowl. So, what did the game mean? EVERYTHING. If we lose every game of the year and beat Utah, that is a successful season. Beating Utah is goal of every single season. Now I’d love to beat them by 80 each time we play, but to take away that feeling that they thought they won is even better. We ripped their hearts out. We tore that winning feeling from their grip. And left them stunned, in awe, and totally dejected. We won that game. We beat them. They didn’t doink the crossbar to lose; they got beat by a vicious, growling Cougar squad.

ESPN gave us some pretty good credit. That was the play of the day on ESPN. We even got about 30 seconds of hightlights on Sportscenter. What irks me though is that the front page of Mountain West Conference.com was an article about Utah women’s volleyball. And you actually had to click the football section and scroll down to find the BYU/Utah result. WHAT??? We get no love. See below.

http://themwc.cstv.com/sports/w-volley/recaps/112606aac.html

http://themwc.cstv.com/sports/m-footbl/recaps/112506aac.html

Well, that’s not true. We do get lots of love from Outsports.com. A website for gay and lesbian sports fans. They chose to show the dogpile of cougar athletes at the end of the game (picture above). Interesting.

http://www.outsports.com/newLockerRoom/locker_room.cfm?room=collegefootball&SR=1

But, we won. We beat the stinkin Utes. And now, we’ll wait and see if Beck and Harline get drafted. By the way, did any of you else hear Sarkisian’s name being thrown in the mix of NFL head coaches? Would be cool. But I can’t imagine Steve Sarkisian being ready for the NFL. Who knows?