UTEP 48, SMU 45 (OT): The Miners were down by three touchdowns early, but found out they had a power running game and a defense able to bounce back. Meanwhile, on the opposite sideline, the Mustangs had hope before the season started, but it’s just about gone now.

ECU 37, HOUSTON 35: The Cougars have something to kick about. Two missed field goals in the closing moments proved costly. The victory for the Pirates was a close one, but will give them a boost.

TULSA 38, UAB 30: Hurricane QB Paul Smith wouldn’t call it an ugly win, but he admitted it wasn’t pretty either. Part of the loss, UAB coach Neil Callaway said, was confusion. Another part was just getting beat.

LSU 34, TULANE 9: The Green Wave shouldn’t be embarrassed. Indeed, Tulane played well against powerful LSU.

UCF 37, LOUISIANA-LAFAYETTE 19: Kevin Smith ran wild, but a fourth-quarter injury silenced Knights’ fans for a bit.

As the University of Memphis football fan base continues to lament this season’s progress, it’s apparent its frustration stems, in part, from a lack of success inside Conference USA.

While the Tigers appeared in three straight bowls from 2003 to ‘05, they never won C-USA. Their best finish since the league formed in 1996 has been second place: in 1999 under Rip Scherer (4-2 in league play), in 2004 under Tommy West (5-3) and in 2005 under West (5-3). The 2005 result was as a member of the C-USA East Division, the first year the league split into divisions.

In fact, outside the three straight 5-3 league finishes from 2003 to ‘05 and the 4-2 mark under Scherer, the Tigers haven’t had a winning year in C-USA play.

When C-USA formed in 1996, six charter schools — Cincinnati, Houston, Louisville, Memphis, Southern Miss and Tulane — formed the football league. Each of those schools won at least one C-USA regular-season title in the first six years with the exception of Memphis.

Cincinnati and Louisville departed for the Big East two years ago and were replaced by, among others, Tulsa. Tulsa won the league crown in 2005. UCF, also a league newcomer, won the East Division title in 2005 for the right to meet Tulsa in the title game. TCU won a C-USA title in 2002 shortly before leaving for the Mountain West.

The Memphis basketball team spent Saturday morning at the Colonial Park United Methodist Church, helping the Angel Food Ministries put together bags of food, as it does on the last Saturday of every month.

In a nutshell, the program (which is nationwide) puts together a month’s worth of frozen and non-perishable food items in a bag that costs just $30. Though anybody can buy the bags, it’s obviously targeted for those with severe restrictions on their income. It takes a lot of labor to make up the bags — from unloading the large boxes of food off a truck to setting up “stations” for each of the 20 items to actually putting one of each item in a bag and then cleaning up the mess afterwards. The players participated in each step of that process and appeared to have a good time doing it. One of the Tigers’ student managers, Paul Sutton, participates in the program every week and initiated the team’s involvement.

“What I’m hoping is, by these players being here, it brings light to a great program,” coach John Calipari said. “For our guys individually, I hope they get the idea. It’s hard for a 19, 20 year old to think about giving and others because he’s still trying to figure out who he is. It’s hard for them. I just hope it touches them a little bit and our program can bring light to great things like this.”

(Side note: Initially, Calipari didn’t want any publicity to come out of this venture. In fact, I didn’t hear about it until early Saturday morning and showed up kind of unannounced. This isn’t unusual. In fact, when Memphis hands out toys to underprivileged kids at Christmas, Calipari doesn’t allow the media to come along.)

You’ll notice in Sunday’s paper that I’ve written a feature on albino whitetail deer.

I did the story because I find the animals truly fascinating - and I know a lot of other people do, too.

I’ve never actually seen an albino whitetail. But I did see a piebald (half white) deer from a tree stand in Alabama once, and it was striking.

Through the years, I’ve done stories on albino blue birds and albino hummingbirds. I actually held an albino hummingbird in my hand once while wildlife officials fitted it with a leg band.

It really doesn’t make much difference what kind of creature it is. If it’s solid white with pink eyes, it’s an amazing sight.

If you’ve seen a solid white critter, I’d love to hear abou it.

I remember vividly sitting in the Liberty Bowl thinking that a bowl game for the Tigers was just around the corner, all that was needed was one last stop, and it was 4th and 27 to boot. We all know what happened on that play, it was a kick in the stomach except about a 6 inches lower.

From Wynne, AR. (although seemingly from Heaven) came DeAngelo Williams, He was the miracle all Tiger fans quietly prayed for. Although not dominant the Tigers went on a nice run, and you would have thought we were in the Sugar Bowl not the New Orleans Bowl. Excitement was at an all-time high, season tickets were at a all-time high, we were on a roll !!
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I can’t help but think of Thomas Jefferson after reading message boards and hearing folks complain over the past 20 hours. Jefferson said, “What is popular is not always right, what is right is not always popular.” Do you think Jefferson was clairvoyant about Memphis football?

It seems the misguided popular opinion is that Memphis needs to fire Tommy West. Message boards are covered with posts about letting him go. Local talk show hosts are all abuzz about West’s future at Memphis. Some fans muttering it as they walk out of stadiums. It seems everyone has an opinion about it.

The funny thing to me is that many of those that are on the airwaves aren’t even Tigers fans. These “anti-Tigers” are happy as a pig in….. right now. They love when the Tigers struggle so they will fill the phone lines on talk shows taking their shots.
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For those that read my first blog on the Edge you may remember it was about the Isiah trial and how ridiculous it was on face value. Apparently Bill Simmons at ESPN actually took the time to read the transcripts (I hope he didn’t attend the trial) and has some curious perspectives in his article “Idiots Guide to the Isiah Trial.”

Pau Gasol has hit the media circuit, joining Chris Wallace and Marc Iavaroni. Pau Gasol was interviewed by NBA.com via a confernce call, by Sports YA ( a Spanish site I believe but written in English) and Ron Tillery in today’s Commercial Appeal. Apparently Damon Stoudamire believes he is fully recovered from his knee surgery and will be competing for playing time with the young guns at tke point. Good luck Damon. We old folks are pulling for you! Read the rest of this entry »