There’s an obscure, not-much-believed artifact from Biblical lore known as the Lazarus Bowl. It’s the stuff of science fiction to most, but the story goes that an old woman was making a pottery bowl when Christ raised Lazarus from the dead and his voice was recorded into the object.
It’s more of a fringe lunatic relic than anything else, but if the old woman was sitting on a bench making pottery and listening to College Football, 2015, you could hear the vibrations of the fan bases in Fayetteville, Ark. and Eugene, Ore.
To the rest of the world, Arkansas and Oregon were dead to rights two months ago, early in the season, getting flogged out of conference and unable to turn it around in the SEC and Pac-12, respectively.
Now, here they are, relegated mostly to the level of “guy that cuts you off in traffic only to jam on the breaks at a yellow light and assure you’re going to be late to work.”
Arkansas handed LSU some DOOM, ripping the Tigers, 31-14, in front of their home crowd and ostensibly ending the shift of the engraving dude who was supposed to make sure Leonard Fournette’s name was on the Heisman Trophy. Fournette wasn’t bad at all, rumbling for 91 mostly violent yards. The issue is that the Heisman has become completely tethered to team success, and LSU has officially not met most folks’ expectations.
Since losing four of five, quarterback quarterback Brandon Allen has thrown for 12 touchdowns to two interceptions. Not too shabby. Running back Alex Collins has averaged 10.8, 6.4, and 8.8 yards per carry in the last three games. Goodness sakes, that’s solid.
Arkansas, free of expectation and full of obtuse luck, has been the primary spoiler in the conference, looking like many thought it should all season long. Yet, this team was buried by three straight losses before November.
Then you have Oregon, which may be an even greater surprise. The loss to Michigan State was predictable. Then, the Ducks got liquidated by Utah at home and were outplayed in overtime by Washington State two games later. Questions about Mark Helfrich’s ability to walk the path paved by Chip Kelly were swirling.
Was this the future of Oregon football once the last of Kelly’s clan had departed?
Since then, Oregon has gone on a four-game tear, three of which were on the road, one of which was on the road against a CFB Playoff contender in Stanford. Lay the questions to rest, no language capable of bringing them out of the tomb.
To be frank, what Bret Bielema (Arkansas) and Helfrich have done is nothing short of amazing. Both go about it in polar opposite ways … Helfrich the quiet coach of a flashy offense; Bielema the bombastic Donald Trump of college football with a mostly plodding offensive philosophy.
Both are in the midst of completing the genuine really good coaching task of getting their teams to re-calibrate expectations while seeing their respective teams improve. Arkansas couldn’t score more than 13 against Toledo.
The Hogs just hung 31 on LSU. Oregon couldn’t get 21 against Utah. The Ducks just ripped Stanford for 38.
Bielema in his own right is a unique character, truly the Trump of college football, with a mouth not necessarily befitting his personal success versus failures, but a person no less willing to be loud, proud, and capable of putting on the earmuffs to any dissenters.
Each dude has become the horror movie character who gets the hell kicked out of him the first half of the movie and is completely ignored. Then, with about 10 minutes left in the film, that guy comes back (think “Texas Chainsaw Massacre,” the modern version with Jessica Biel) to surprise the viewing audience and give the antagonist-psychopath type all he can handle.
It’s coaching staff genius that is rarely recognized because the ends don’t validate the expectations.
Arkansas and Oregon are relegated to spoilers, yes, but only because they had the mental sack to turn it around and get there in the first place.
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