Les Miles eats grass to make himself one with the field, to ensure that football karma favors the bold. But on Saturday afternoon in Little Rock, Ark. there was no natural grass, just field turf.
Perhaps as a result, Miles' vaunted karma vanished. And Bobby Petrino did the incredible, he out Les Miles'd Les Miles. With seven seconds remaining in the first half, Petrino elected to call his own miracle, a pass from the Razorbacks own 20. Surely, that play wouldn't or couldn't result in a touchdown, right? Not when all LSU had to do was tackle the receiver in the field of play. Uh oh.
Two LSU defensive backs collided and Arkansas wide receiver Cobi Hamilton outran pursuers for an 80-yard score that would give the Razorbacks a lead they would never relinquish.
In the process the Razorbacks may well have punched their ticket for the Sugar Bowl, so long as Auburn beats South Carolina in the SEC Championship Game next Saturday . If South Carolina beats Auburn, then the SEC bowl picture is thrown into a messy situation and Arkansas would head to the Capital One or the Cotton Bowl.
But for Razorbacks fans who dreamed of an SEC West championship, a 10-2 season is welcoming relief. It wasn't easy but the Razorbacks bounced back from a disappointing beginning and finished the season undefeated against all teams outside the state of Alabama.
LSU a day that began with Miles needing one of his vaunted Milacles to catapult his Tigers into the BCS title picture, ended in disappointment, a second SEC loss that will leave a bitter taste -- maybe like grass? -- in the mouths of bayou revelers.
On the national level, LSU will fall from its No. 5 position in the BCS standings -- the Tigers were the highest ranked one-loss team -- while Stanford and Wisconsin will now be jostling on the periphery of the BCS title game. Will a one-loss team get a shot at the title? It seems unlikely. But with the way upsets arrived this weekend, who knows?
For Arkansas, despite CBS' contention, this was no upset. The Razorbacks were the better team and are playing better football than any team not located in Auburn, Ala.
With a 10-2 record Arkansas notched its best season since the 1980s, a beautifully pungent and fresh slop for long suffering hog callers. Now Arkansas will turn into Auburn fans, lest the first Sugar Bowl for the Hogs since 1979 slip away in an SEC championship game upset.
Woooo Pig Sooie indeed.
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