Colt McCoy is the face of the ‘07 Longhorns
Longhorn fans, here’s your team leader for 2007:
He’s Colt McCoy, the 20-year-old sophomore quarterback entering his second year as a starter.
The everyman’s kid brother, the one who hasn’t touched a drop of Dr Pepper or any other carbonated beverage since junior high, topped all expectations a year ago. Now, he could be the reason the fourth-ranked Longhorns can win big in 2007.
“He is trying to get perfection with everything he does,” said Texas coach Mack Brown. “He is just so much more confident and such a great leader.”
It does seem appropriate that the milk-drinking McCoy is the de facto bell cow of the 2007 Longhorns, a team that Brown has tagged as his youngest in the decade he’s been at Texas.
The official depth chart for Saturday’s season-opener won’t be released until Monday morning. But judging by the comments made by Brown and his staff during preseason, at least 20 freshmen and sophomores will figure in the 44-player, two-deep plans.
None will have a bigger role than McCoy, but fellow sophomores, such as tight end Jermichael Finley, linebacker Rod Muckelroy and cornerback Deon Beasley, could be stars by season’s end.
Brown likes to quote coach Darrell Royal when talking about the makeup of his team. The freshmen want to play, he says. The sophomores desire to be stars. The juniors want to win. And the seniors will do anything to make the victories happen.
Brown said he’s tried to manage his team differently this August. With so many younger players, he’s even had to go over simple logistics, from pregame meals to changing where the team enters Royal-Memorial Stadium on game days.
Overall, “they’ve done everything right,” Brown said. “We have pushed them really hard, and we’ve probably hit more in the spring and in the fall because of the younger guys. They’re tired and worn out, but they want to be good.”
The youth will be complemented by a blend of older players. They’ve mentored the youngsters throughout the summer. And they’ll have a big impact as well, as they seek to improve on a disappointing 10-3 season.
“We have a bunch of guys out there ready to work who have very high goals for the team and who are all about the team,” said junior receiver Quan Cosby, who gave up pro baseball three years ago. “It has been a very inspiring camp.”
Tony Hills, a senior offensive tackle, was laughing earlier in the month that his team didn’t really have many “characters.” Everyone is more low-key, he said.
For Hills and senior receiver Limas Sweed, the game of choice is the always-controversial dominoes. Their games do get competitive, though; trash talk is exchanged.
The older Longhorns are known to be bookish, as well as athletically gifted. Twelve are set to graduate in December. Center Dallas Griffin already earned his degree in the spring and is in graduate school.
Charismatic safety Drew Kelson is bilingual, and he’s hosting an Internet show for the team’s Web site. Last month, he interviewed Frank Okam, asking the defensive tackle in Spanish if he’d like to play chess the next day. Okam answered the question in French.
Linebacker Robert Killebrew also is a budding Internet star. He’s hosting a cooking show for the team’s site.
Brown prefers the smarter, well-rounded athletes, he said, because they usually perform better on the field. Last season, 18 of the 22 starters earned higher grade point averages than their backups.
For every young superstar-to-be on the team, there is a Rashad Bobino, an undersized middle linebacker whom no one can knock out of the starting lineup, or a Brandon Foster, a senior who has waited three seasons for a starting spot. He’s hoping his 4.3-second time in the 40-yard dash will cement his chances at cornerback.
Other possible candidates to be the face of this team?
There are Sweed and Cosby, part of a deep receiving corps. Hills, the former tight end, is an award candidate as well.
Most believe Finley, who caught eight passes in the Alamo Bowl, can dominate. Tailback Jamaal Charles also has drawn raves, as he enters the season knowing he no longer has to share carries.
Then there’s Okam and defensive tackle Derek Lokey. Both are taking the law school admissions test this fall and graduating in December.
Lokey, a newlywed, is returning to the lineup after missing five games when he broke his leg just before halftime of last year’s Nebraska win. Brown and others thought he was OK at the time, given that he pushed himself off the artificial turf and walked unaided to the sideline. But Lokey, the strongest Longhorn, with a bench press of 515 pounds, just thought it would be a sign of weakness to ride a cart to the locker room. Now, he’s also going to be the team’s short-yardage fullback, and he’s dropping hints that he’d like to carry the ball near the goal line.
Okam, Lokey’s best buddy on the line, also was hobbled through much of last season with a bad knee. He put off surgery until January and gutted out the rest of the season because with Lokey already down, he didn’t want to leave the team in a lurch.
Privately, coaches are projecting that Okam, Lokey and junior Roy Miller may be the best defensive tackles they’ve had here — high praise, given the Longhorns’ perennial strength at the position.
Okam seems to share a goal with McCoy and several of his teammates.
“Perfection,” he says. “Now I’m not saying that I’m going to be perfect, but the least I can do every time I go out and put on those pads is to try to be perfect.”
Originally posted by AAS