Texas Players Look To Send Off Mack Brown In Style With Alamo Bowl Win
SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS (CBSNewYork) -- Texas wants to send off coach Mack Brown a winner after 16 seasons of success. The Longhorns' head coach is 10-4 in bowl games at Texas, and hasn't lost one since the 2009 national championship game to Alabama.
Brown led the Longhorns to a 2005 national title. He announced earlier in December that he would be stepping down after the Alamo Bowl.
First-year Oregon coach Mark Helfrich can ease the sting of not getting the Ducks to a fifth consecutive BCS game by finishing with an 11-win season.
KEY MATCHUP
Oregon QB Marcus Mariota vs. the Texas defense. Mariota has put up nearly 4,000 yards of total offense and needs only two scores to break Joey Harrington's school record for total touchdowns. That's hardly far-fetched against the Longhorns, which fired its defensive coordinator early in the season and gave up 30 points in a season-ending loss to Baylor with the Big 12 title on the line.
THE LINE
No. 10 Oregon (10-2) vs. Texas (8-4), 6:45 p.m. EST.
Line: Oregon by 10 ½
Series Record: Sixth meeting, Texas leads 4-1.
PLAYERS TO WATCH
Texas: QB Case McCoy. The senior never had the passing chops of his older brother but can capture an Alamo Bowl win just as Colt McCoy did in 2006.
Oregon: CB Ifo Ekpre-Olumu: A possible first-round NFL draft pick, the junior might be playing his final game after being Oregon's second-leading tackler this season.
FACTS & FIGURES
Injuries took a major toll on the Longhorns this season, and now they'll be without more big names because of academic issues. WR Daje Johnson, OL Kennedy Estelle and RB Jalen Overstreet have been ruled ineligible. ...Longtime Oregon defensive coordinator Nick Aliotti will retire after the game and end 38 years in coaching. ...Texas won the Alamo Bowl last year but without McCoy, who was suspended for a violation of team rules ...Oregon will be without starting TE Pharaoh Brown, who was suspended for the bowl game for taking part in a snowball fight on campus earlier this month that got out of hand. ...All four of Texas' victories against Oregon came prior to 1972. The last time these teams met was the 2000 Holiday Bowl that the Ducks won 35-30.
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