McGee, Lane just too much for NU
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BY RYLY JANE HAMBLETON / Lincoln Journal Star
Stephen McGee was looking forward to a snooze on the plane ride back home to College Station, Texas.
The junior quarterback required some help as he limped off the field Saturday following his career-record performance of 35 carries for 167 yards. He was given intravenous fluids after Texas A&M finished off a 36-14 victory against Nebraska.
“I’m definitely sore right now. I need some rest,” he said. “But there’s no better feeling than to come off that field victorious.”
Nebraska couldn’t solve the puzzle that McGee presented, which is why he carried the ball for a school- record number of carries for a quarterback.
That wasn’t originally in the plans, according to Aggie coach Dennis Franchione.
“When I was calling those plays, I was more worried about making first downs and touchdowns. That’s not exactly the way we want it,” he said. “But when you have something they can’t stop, you’re going to make them do it until their nose bleeds.
“I’m not going to quit doing what is hurting them just because somebody is running with the ball more times than we want. This was an unusual game for that.”
McGee would pull the ball away from his backs at the last second, cut to the outside and find running room. When he didn’t do that, 268-pound running back Jorvorskie Lane made Nebraska pay up the middle. He finished with 130 yards on 15 carries and four touchdowns.
“I have to give my whole offensive line credit for all the yards we got today, including the McGee yards,” Lane said. “I could have drove my car through the holes they were making.
“And every time we ran the zone play, McGee did a good job of pulling it and going outside and getting 4, 5 or 6 yards.”
Franchione said that’s the basis of the Aggie offense.
“Stephen did a magnificent job of reading the zone read and that really was the story. ‘J’ (Lane) made some great runs today, but Stephen did a great job of reading it,” Franchione said. “He had a good feel for things and he did a great job of reading the blocks and finding the lanes to cut back and make plays.”
According to Franchione, there were four keys to the game for A&M.
“In the third quarter, we had two 80-yard drives for touchdowns, into the wind,” he said. “Those two drives were huge, we had a big fourth-down stop in down there inside the 10-yard line by the defense and I thought the turnover on the punt was a big play early in the game for us and I believe we responded with a touchdown after that.”
Corey Gibas pounced on the loose ball when Nate Swift fumbled an A&M punt early in the second quarter. Lane rumbled 27 yards on the next play, then finished off the short drive with a 1-yard dive.
The Aggies marched 80 yards in nine plays to open the second half and, after the defense forced a Nebraska punt, A&M went 80 yards again, this time in 11 plays, to take a 30-14 lead.
Nebraska drove to the Aggies’ 6, but on the first play of the fourth quarter, NU quarterback Sam Keller was dropped for a 3-yard loss on a vicious hit by linebacker Misi Tupe, assisted by lineman Red Bryant.
“He (Keller) stood back up, so I don’t think he was that woozy,” Tupe said. “He kept going. He’s a tough quarterback. I’ll give him that.”
Teammate Marquis Carpenter would beg to differ.
“I thought the second-string quarterback was going to come in. But he’s the starter and they didn’t want to take a chance,” Carpenter said. “When you get hit by Misi, you know it. You hurt. We made a good stand, so it worked out.”
Franchione said the Aggies’ play in the third quarter exceeded his hopes.
“When I knew we were going to go into the wind in the third quarter, I felt really good because I felt if we could survive the third quarter, then we’d have the wind in the fourth quarter,” he said. “Well, we didn’t survive the third quarter. We got after it and were able to put the time-consuming drives together to finish off the game. That was a huge statement in the third quarter.”
Ryly Jane Hambleton at 473-7314 or rhambleton@journalstar.com.
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