BCS Capsules: Hold that pose: Florida, Oklahoma play for No. 1

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - Bob Stoops posed next to the crystal football and played along with a wave of photographers.

They asked him to look to the left, he did. They asked him to smile, he did. Any shot they wanted Wednesday inside a hotel ballroom, he gave them.

Then a shutterbug shouted to the Oklahoma coach, telling him to hold up his finger, showing who's No. 1. Stoops tilted his head, stared at the guy and kept his hands still.

"Too soon," he said.

First, there's a game to play. The hurry-up Sooners and speedy Florida meet Thursday night for the BCS championship, a matchup that includes a pair of Heisman Trophy winners, an SEC vs. Big 12 debate and more than its share of trash talk.

Besides, enough teams already are claiming the top spot. Southern California, Utah and Texas hope their bowl wins impressed enough voters in The Associated Press poll, which will be released in the wee hours Friday.

Heck, how about New Hampshire? The Wildcats beat Army, which beat Louisiana Tech, which beat Mississippi State, which beat Vanderbilt, which beat Mississippi, which handed the No. 1 Gators their only loss.

No wonder college fans from President-elect Barack Obama on down want to see a playoff system.

"I think at some point in time it might happen," Florida coach Urban Meyer said Wednesday. "I didn't believe that a few years ago, but I feel now the discussion is out of control. I can't imagine any guy that enjoys football not discussing that wherever he's at. So I imagine at some point that might happen now."

As to whether it should be a tournament for four, eight or 16 teams, that's someone else's department.

"It's not my job to figure that out," Meyer said. "I think it would be hard. I don't know how you do it."

Echoed Stoops: "That's not for me to do. They're all good football teams; everyone realizes that. So again, that's for you guys to choose."

There's plenty of time to think about it. The BCS' latest TV deal with ESPN ensures there won't be a playoff until at least 2014.

Meanwhile, there's a pretty attractive game brewing at Dolphin Stadium between 12-1 teams.

The winner gets the glistening crystal prize. That could come in handy for the Gators - they won the trophy two years ago, but a recruit accidentally bumped into it in April, shattering the $30,000 football. Fortunately for them, it was insured.

Tim Tebow was a freshman backing up Chris Leak when Florida stomped Ohio State for the title. Tebow won the Heisman last season and now will try to add a second title.

The Rambo-style quarterback will soon explore his NFL options, deciding whether to enter the draft or return for his senior season. Tebow is not exactly elegant with his left-handed tosses, and some scouts project he'll wind up as a tight end in the pros.

"I'll hear something about Tim's throwing motion or the NFL is looking for - I sometimes get confused," Meyer said. "Do they want a guy that's going to lead a team to win games? I don't know if there's any better than Tim."

Tebow drew the most first-place votes in the Heisman balloting last month, but finished third overall. Oklahoma quarterback Sam Bradford took home the trophy - he said his parents now have it somewhere in their house.

Bradford, a sophomore, also has submitted paperwork to the NFL's advisory board to see how highly he could get picked in the draft. Tebow and Bradford expect to make their decisions a few days after the big game.

While Florida boasts great speed, the second-ranked Sooners operate at a blink-of-the-eye pace. They set a modern record for points this season, averaging 54 a game.

With their linemen, receivers and backs rushing downfield, their no-huddle offense often leaves opponents gasping and disorganized. Teams are allowed 40 seconds to run a play; Oklahoma tries to snap the ball in half that time.

Given more than a month to prepare, Meyer said it's still hard to simulate what the Sooners do.

"You don't understand you have substitution limitations because of tempo, you have the fatigue factor and you have the chaos factor where you like to line up," he said.

Oklahoma has lost four straight BCS games, including two for the national title. Down here in Gator country, both teams got in early shots this week.

Sooners cornerback Dominique Franks went first, saying Tebow would be nothing more than the fourth-best quarterback in the Big 12. The next day, Florida linebacker Brandon Spikes called Big 12 defenses "a joke."

Usually, teams try to avoid giving their opponents something to tack up on the bulletin board. This time, Meyer seemed more than fine with the barbs. His team was a four-point favorite, and he wanted to avoid any chance of complacency.

"If I had my druthers, I'd rather coach a very mean, angry, nasty, upset team," he said. "I have to get to that point."

Meyer, Stoops taking fast track to greatness

MIAMI - Urban Meyer was about 8 years old when he knew he wanted to be a football coach.

Bob Stoops is the son of a coach, so you might say coaching is in his genes.

Now, at relatively young ages, Meyer and Stoops have risen to the top of their profession. Their salaries top $3 million dollars per year. Their teams have won more than 80 percent of their games.

They're both on the fast track to the Hall of Fame, and one will take another giant step in that direction Thursday night, when Stoops' Oklahoma Sooners and Meyer's Florida Gators play in the BCS national championship game.

The winning coach will have two national titles on his resume before he turns 50. With so much success so soon - and no signs of slowing down - Meyer and Stoops could be racking up victories for decades to come.

They could even become this generation's Joe Paterno and Bobby Bowden, the winningest coaches in major college history. At 82 and 79 respectively, they're each within 20 wins of 400 career victories.

Or maybe not.

"There will be no chance I'm doing this in my 70s or 80s," the 44-year-old Meyer said Wednesday in his final news conference before the championship game.

The 48-year-old Stoops laughed off the idea, too.

"I don't know if I'll make it to 60," he said.

Meyer is 82-17 (.828) in eight seasons as a head coach with Bowling Green, Utah and the Gators. He's 43-9 since taking over a Florida program in 2005 that had taken a downward turn after Steve Spurrier left.

When the Ol' Ball Coach surprisingly decided to try the NFL in 2002, Florida athletic director Jeremy Foley reached out to Stoops, the Gators' former defensive coordinator, to come back Gainesville.

Stoops had only been at Oklahoma for three seasons. Like Meyer later did with Florida, he had won a national title in his second season with the Sooners - restoring pride to a football program that had long been searching for a Barry Switzer replacement.

When the Gators came calling, the chance to follow Spurrier, a mentor and good friend, piqued Stoops' interest, but that was about it.

"I don't think he was ever close to taking the job," Foley said.

Foley ended up hiring Ron Zook and the Gators fell from their place at the top of the Southeastern Conference.

Zook was fired in 2004 and Florida hired Meyer away from Utah, where he had just led the Utes to an undefeated season using his spread offense.

Before he took the job, Meyer spoke to Stoops to get the scoop on Florida. The two weren't close, but both were from Ohio, in their 40s and married with three kids. Meyer figured Stoops would have a similar perspective.

"Everything I've heard about Bob Stoops is why I entrusted a phone call to him four or five years ago, not because the relationship was that tight, it was just because I kind of admired what he did," Meyer said.

Stoops, who still says he has a little Gator in him, gave Meyer the thumbs up.

In five years, Meyer went from landing his first head coaching job in the Mid-American Conference to taking over one of the elite programs in the Southeastern Conference.

In 2006, his Gators beat Ohio State in the BCS title game to complete a meteoric rise for a kid who became intrigued with coaching as a boy going to Cincinnati Bearcats games with his father.

"I did not have goals set out, by this time I want to do this, this, this and this," Meyer said. "I wanted to coach football, and I knew that at a very early age."

Stoops' father was a teacher and defensive coordinator at Cardinal Mooney High School in Youngstown, Ohio, for 28 years. Ron Stoops died of a heart attack in 1988 on the sideline during a game. He was 54.

"You know my Dad died young, so I can't say that he gave me any real particular direct advice as far as coaching. But I took his example, I believe, as a man, as a father, as a husband, in how you live, in not letting wins and loses, not letting the game define you and what really matters in life," Bob Stoops said.

In the football world, Stoops is defined by winning.

He is 109-23 (.826) in his 10 years at Oklahoma. If the Sooners beat Florida, Stoops will move ahead of Meyer and have the second-best winning percentage among active major college coaches. Southern California's Pete Carroll is tops at .854.

A victory against Meyer would also restore some of the luster that's come off Stoops' reputation recently. He was dubbed Big Game Bob early in his career for winning his first two BCS bowls and dominating the rivalry with Texas.

After losing his last two trips to the BCS title game, and four consecutive BCS bowls overall, even some Sooners fans have wondered if Stoops has lost his magic touch.

Meyer is now where Stoops was before the BCS losses. Another title would put Meyer and Florida on equal - or very close to equal - footing with USC, the current gold standard in the sport.

Carroll is one of 16 coaches to win at least two Associated Press national titles, along with Bowden and Paterno. Alabama great Bear Bryant has the most with five.

Either Meyer or Stoops can become the 17th, and first to win two BCS titles.

"Well, it's very humbling when you start thinking of all great head coaches out there and all the great staffs," Meyer said about the potential milestone. "Other than that, I just worry about third down and 6 and make sure our punt team is ready to go."

-- Ralph D. Russo

OU's Alexander won't let stabbing define season

MIAMI - Frank Alexander's career at Oklahoma nearly ended before it got started.

Hours after making his debut for the Sooners on Aug. 31, Alexander was stabbed in the right arm during a private party at a nightclub east of campus. In a flash, he was hospitalized.

"I had high expectations about playing this year. I just wanted to go out there and just have a smooth season. It got took away from me after the first game," said Alexander, a 6-foot-4 defensive end from Baton Rouge, La. "The whole time I was down, I was just thinking about, ‘Maybe if I wouldn't have went, I would have still been playing.'

"That had just been beating me down and beating me down. And then when I got back and got the opportunity, I just wanted to go out and do something with it."

After a month of healing, Alexander did more than just salvage the rest of his season. He made his first career start against Texas A&M, which came a month after he had returned to the field against Texas. As injuries depleted the Oklahoma front line, he became a pivotal player for the second-ranked Sooners (12-1) in their run to the BCS title game Thursday night against No. 1 Florida (12-1).

"He gets in there and does a couple of knucklehead things, but he'll fall into some things and really make some good things happen. I think he's got a tremendous, tremendous future if he keeps progressing like he has," defensive coordinator Brent Venables said.

"He's been a real blessing for us, having some injuries there and not being real deep."

Venables compared Alexander's start to former middle linebacker Curtis Lofton's string of game-changing takeaways for Oklahoma last season en route to the Big 12 championship.

Alexander had a fumble recovery against Texas Tech and then returned a fumble for a rare defensive 2-point conversion against Oklahoma State that kept the Cowboys from tying the game. He followed that up with a career-best six tackles in and 1½ sacks the Big 12 championship win against Missouri that sent the Sooners to Miami.

"I didn't ever think I'd be in this situation," Alexander said. "It's just like a dream come true, getting the chance to play for a national championship."

The dream became a nightmare early on Aug. 31. Police reported that guns, knives and tire irons were used in a brawl at the Sooner Knights club around 2:30 a.m., about four hours after the Sooners' season-opening 57-2 blowout of Chattanooga. Alexander, who made his first career tackle in that game, and Ray Willis, a freshman guard on the Oklahoma basketball team, were stabbed in the melee.

"It's kind of scary a little bit when a player's like that and they're in a hospital, when you get stabbed like that," defensive end Jeremy Beal said.

Alexander felt he had been granted a second chance and set out to make the most of it. He continued to do work in the weight room and kept himself in playing shape at the urging of his teammates.

As it turned out, the Sooners needed him. Auston English, the Big 12's sacks leader a season ago, sprained his knee and missed the last two games of the regular season and the Big 12 title game. Backup Alan Davis also was sidelined by a knee injury.

That left the Sooners, already shorthanded after senior John Williams decided to end his career following a series of injuries, without many options at defensive end.

"He just came through and when he got back, he's been a heck of a player for us," said Beal, an all-Big 12 selection who leads the team with 8½ sacks. "Getting pressure on the QB, helping stop the run, he's been coming through. He stepped up for us when Auston went down."

-- Jeff Latzke

Florida's Pouncey twins rebound from dad's tragedy

MIAMI - Mike and Maurkice Pouncey got a frantic phone call from their mother in late November. She was freaking out, crying so hard she couldn't explain the situation.

The Pouncey twins knew something was wrong. Way wrong. The Florida offensive linemen managed to get enough information from her to realize they needed to jump in their car and go home.

The two-hour drive to Lakeland was the most uncomfortable of their lives. The waiting. The wondering. The worrying. All the twins could do was make call after call to friends and relatives, trying everything to find out something.

Eventually, they pieced it all together.

Their stepfather, Rob Webster, had been involved in a bizarre railcar accident at work. He lost more than half his right leg and enough blood for it to be considered a life-threatening injury.

"It shocked me because I thought things like that don't happen to good people," Mike Pouncey said.

Webster's recovery has been slow, but not slow enough to keep him from being in the stands when the top-ranked Gators play No. 2 Oklahoma in the Bowl Championship Series national title game against Oklahoma on Thursday night. His return also should provide motivation for Florida, which rallied around Webster and his sons the last six weeks.

"He's going to want us to play hard and play for him," Maurkice Pouncey said. "I can't wait for it."

Webster's injury happened Nov. 24, five days before Florida played rival Florida State in Tallahassee. He was working at a feeding mill, loading railcars for transport, when his leg got wedged between a car and the track.

He was rushed to a local hospital, but doctors were unable to reattach his limb. Webster has started rehabilitation, but still has months to go before getting fitted with a prosthetic leg from the thigh down. In the meantime, he's supposed to be using a wheelchair, but he often prefers a walker.

"As long as he's happy, we're happy," Mike Pouncey said. "He's doing a lot better."

So are the Pounceys, the 6-foot-5, 312-pound sophomores who have started ever game this season.

Florida coach Urban Meyer, defensive coordinator Charlie Strong and offensive coordinator Steve Addazio traveled to Lakeland to be with the twins and their family. The mothers of a couple teammates also stopped by.

The team had white bracelets made with the initials "RW" etched in blue. Players and coaches wore them against the Seminoles five days after the accident, and many will have them on against the Sooners.

"It was something we wanted to do," tight end Tate Casey said. "It was our way of showing support."

The Pounceys considered skipping the game, staying in Lakeland and helping out with their father's side business, a lawn care service. But they knew the man they called "dad," the one who taught them all about football from an early age, wanted them to play. And play they did. They played with the kind of passion that inspired everyone around them.

With Mike Pouncey lining up at right guard and his brother at center, the Gators ran for 317 yards and three touchdowns in a 45-15 rout in heavy rain. Quarterback Tim Tebow also threw for three scores and was sacked just once by Florida State's vaunted defense.

The Pounceys are hoping for similar success against Oklahoma. What they might be looking forward to most is their pregame phone call from their stepfather, the one they get before every game, the one in which Webster yells, "What time is it?" And the twins respond in unison, "Game time!"

It will be a much more enjoyable phone call than the one they got from mom in November.

-- Mark Long

Injured UF tight end sits, would pass on NFL again

MIAMI - Florida tight end Corneilus Ingram passed up a chance to go to the NFL after last season to return to school for his senior year.

Ingram hasn't played a down for the Gators this season. He blew out his left knee in early August and needed reconstructive surgery.

There was some speculation about Ingram trying to play in the BCS championship game against Oklahoma, but it turned out to be just that. Still, Ingram has been with the team.

"He spoke at our senior tackle last night," coach Urban Meyer said during his Wednesday news conference, "there wasn't a dry eye in the group, and he told us and coach (Charlie) Strong and everybody involved in his life if he had to do it again he wouldn't change one thing. He would make the decision to come back and get a degree from the University of Florida."

Ingram had 34 receptions for 508 yards and seven TDs last season and 2008 was expected to be a breakout year for him.

"I'd play him a lot if it was the right thing to do," Meyer said. "H not going to play because he's three months out from ACL surgery and that wouldn't be the right thing to do."

TEBOW NAMESAKE

He may be Tim Tebow's youngest fan, his father definitely admires the Florida quarterback.

Logan Tebow Bradley was born Tuesday morning at Morton Plant Hospital in Clearwater, Fla. His father, Tom Bradley, is a big fan of the Gators. He told WTSP TV he wanted to honor the quarterback and decided to give his newborn son the middle name Tebow. Plus, he said, it could be a sign of a third national championship for the team.

No. 1 Florida plays No. 2 Oklahoma in the Bowl Championship Series national title game Thursday night.

Mom Nicole picked the first name.

ICE COLD

Oklahoma fullback Matt Clapp has a unique way of preparing for games. He takes an ice bath.

His high school coach suggested it to Clapp during his sophomore year. So he gave it a shot.

"I tested it out and that night I had rushed for 200-something yards, like four or five touchdowns, played a great game on defense. Ever since then I did it before every game," he said.

So how does it feel?

"You go numb," said Clapp, who has caught three touchdown passes and often gets used as an H-back or tight end. "It definitely rejuvenates you.

"After I get out, I do a bunch of stretching and I'm good to go."

TEBOW'S FLAWS

Tim Tebow's kryptonite is roller coasters. Planes, bumpy roads and anything else that causes motion sickness would do the trick, too.

"I do get motion sickness," Tebow said this week. "No roller coasters. I actually did that before we played Michigan because people were so nice. They were like, ‘Please come,' so I rode and all night it was bad."

Did you lose your lunch?

"Many times," he said.

Tebow also got nauseous during a 20-minute ride from the Heisman Trophy ceremony to the hotel where he conducted interviews. When Florida officials asked for a few extra minutes so Tebow could collect himself, Heisman officials thought it was because the defending winner was upset he finished third in balloting.

There are other things Tebow struggles with, too.

"Probably not cleaning up my room is the thing. Or singing. I always sing and it's terrible," he said.

Even though Tebow's tone deaf, he still belts out a few tunes in the shower and in the car. His favorite music is country, but his favorite singer is Frank Sinatra.

His favorite song?

"Send in the Clowns. That's a good song."

LANDRY'S LAST

After the rest of his teammates had already left the practice field at Barry University, Landry Jones was still out working.

The former Parade All-American from Artesia, N.M., would figure to be the front-runner in a competition to be Oklahoma's starting quarterback if Heisman Trophy winner Sam Bradford leaves after his sophomore season to enter the NFL draft.

But quarterbacks coach Josh Heupel said not to read anything into Jones getting some extra work. Heupel said he used to ask Jones if he wanted to hang around for extra practice, but the freshman has been taking the initiative lately.

"That's the way he typically is," Heupel said. "He's a hard-working kid who wants to get better and find a way to improve every day."

-- Ralph D. Russo