Ok... we did not take this one...but we added some words to it!

Some other photos we took in Orlando...

USC scores on last play of first half...

GAMECOCKS WIN...MOST USC WINS IN ONE SEASON!! GO COCKS!

FINAL SCORE: USC 30 - Nebraska 13
ESPN GAME RECAP
http://scores.espn.go.com/ncf/boxscore?gameId=320022579

Some Alshon photos...

Are you at the Capital One Bowl? The Cock-A-Booster is...

Here are some photos we have taken... (click images to enlarge)

If you are at the game and are able to take some good photos send them to cockabooster@gmail.com .  We will try to post them next week.

Long-term success over short-term gimmicks. Every time!

I admit it.  Steve Spurrier has been right the whole time he’s been at Carolina.  We are building a program, brick by brick, the right way and for the long haul.  When you do that, and when you are in a real conference and face the schedules we face every year, it won’t be a smooth ascent.  Under this Coach, the bumps have been easier to take and it is one fun ride.

It would have been a massive task to build a winner in Columbia no matter what.  We don’t have the extra luxuries other SEC schools enjoy.  LSU and Georgia are the only real programs in their states so they have a built-in recruiting base that should make it impossible to lose.  Win less than 10 games in a regular season in Athens or Baton Rouge and the Coach should be fired on the spot.  Period.  Also, we don’t have the history or reputation of an Alabama, Tennessee or Florida.

   

We are held to a much higher standard on NCAA rules and regulations than any other school in the country.  We get raked over the coals on things like tutoring and market rates on empty hotel rooms during an economic downturn.  Other schools allow their players to beat the daylights out of women and drink down booster cash like water and the NCAA ignores it.   

We do not play in a conference where a drunk baboon with a pet starfish can fall rear-end backwards into 10 wins every season.  And as an added bonus, anytime a school in our conference has to get the “short end” of the stick (like the 1-year schedule for adding new teams) we are the ones who always get the shaft.  Not sometimes mind you.  Always.   You get the idea.  We are not coddled and helped along on our path. 

I can tell you without a doubt it’s worth it.  I love where the Gamecock football program is and where we are headed.  Finally!  Yes, the road will continue to be rough and bumpy.  Nobody wants us to succeed!  Heck, we’ve been through this before.  My parents to this day talk about the resistance Frank McGuire got from the North Carolina schools when he was building his hoops program in Columbia.  At this point, what our football team is going through is NOTHING compared to those days. 

Go back and read the old ACC tales from the Gamecock side.  (Start with Bob Fulton’s book as opposed to the tarheel state hack who writes in Columbia now to make us angry and get his jollies)  The actual details of what went on during the rise to the top of the ACC are jaw-dropping.  You will read about players being dunked in effigy at Wake Forest, Duke and North Carolina conspiring to keep the #1 recruit in the nation out of Columbia, other coaches instigating fights on our court, teams holding the ball incessantly, our Coach’s special needs son being made fun of and many others. 

You will particularly enjoy the tale of the 1970 ACC tournament, where we were the #1 seed.  Our players and coaches showed up to watch some of the early games in street clothes and unassumingly walked into the arena.  The collective group of other fan bases mercilessly booed our players who were just sitting there until they were asked to leave because it was distracting attention from the game being played.    

I’m sorry if any of you were hoping that as we started actually causing discomfort in the SEC that we were going to be hugged and celebrated.  Not a chance.  The recent girly hissy fit and meltdown in Athens are just the tip of the iceberg on the backlash we face moving forward.  The days of folks coming to Columbia, picking up their easy win, telling us how neat the Cockabooses are and going home happy are over.  Basically, the reaction to the Alabama win last year in Columbia was as close to a “nice” reaction as we’ll ever get.  I hope we enjoyed it.  That was our “pat on the head, nice job” moment.  Wait until we REALLY tip the apple cart over on the powers-that-be in the conference. 

"Everyone calm down...I got this!"

It is this intangible that makes winning at South Carolina consistently so different, so difficult and such a challenge.  It’s something Frank McGuire understood and Steve Spurrier did as well.  And what a RUSH to actually do it!  It’s so much better to be hated.  It really is, and it’s why I say we should just sit back and enjoy the ride.  Let the other schools talk all day about what happened during the Carter and Reagan years.  Let the other schools have the history and the coddling.  Take the past.  I like what we have going on (really), and wouldn’t trade places with anyone. 

So here’s a toast to 2012 and beating those Nebraska Cornhuskers for 11 wins!  But win or lose, what a season!  10 wins, 2 losses, and zero “moral victories.”  Most importantly perhaps…no one likes it but us.  Awesome! It’s a great time to be a Gamecock! 

Happy New Year from the Cockabooster!  J

Happy New Year!

BOWL SPECIAL: The Cock-A-Booster's Crystal Ball says...

No, it’s not all of them, but here is a random selection from the bowl buffet!

Music City Bowl
MISSISSIPPI STATE vs. WAKE FOREST

The Cigarette Preachers from Winston-Salem are hoping for a Music City revival this week, and they plan to neuter the Starkville K9s as part of the service.  Dan Mullen’s puppies are not ready to be sacrificed on a pigskin altar, and they plan to do more than bark.  The Gold and Black Billy Grahams should leave this one with a happy ending in the collection plate.  The Cock-A-Booster’s crystal ball says... Wake Forest by 1.

 

Chick-Fil-A Bowl

VIRGINIA vs. AUBURN

The Horsemen from Monticello gallop into Atlanta this weekend, hoping to run their lances through the felines from the plains.  The War Eagle Meow-men have been declawed all year and are already looking to 2012.  So if they aren’t careful, you could be hearing “eat more kitten” just west of The Varsity when this one is done.    The Cock-A-Booster’s crystal ball says... (in a tight one) Auburn by 2.

 

Outback Bowl

MICHIGAN STATE vs. GEORGIA

The Red Clay Hounds paw into Ybor City this weekend, hoping to sink their overrated jowls into some green infantrymen from East Lansing.  The gladiators don’t want to be in Tampa, but choked away their chance at a conference title.  Over in Alpo-Land, the puppies have not beaten anyone this fall with more than 7 wins.  Sometimes the good money follows lucky over good.  The Cock-A-Booster’s crystal ball says...Jawja by 6.

 Gator Bowl

OHIO STATE vs. FLORIDA

The Urban Meyer Bowl takes place in Jacksonville this weekend, and the Gainesville Chompers will be ready to strike.  They better, because the shells will be tough to crack on the great river nuts from Columbus.  The Citrus Reptiles haven’t been their usual ferocious self of late, but they have the home bog and all the motivation in the world.   The Cock-A-Booster’s crystal ball says...Florida by 5.

Orange Bowl

MOO U vs. WEST VIRGINIA

The battle for fewest branches on a family tree will happen in Miami this year, as the Pickens County felines take on some moonshining alpinists from Morgantown.   This one is like Kathy Bates and Roseanne Barr fighting over who is the sexier Miss Universe contestant.   Since “neither” is not an option, I’ll choose the delusionary cousin-maters over the gun-toting sister-kissers.  After much duress and torment, the Cock-A-Booster’s crystal ball says...Moo U by 11.

Capital One Bowl

SOUTH CAROLINA vs. NEBRASKA

The Richland County Roosters will be in Disney World this weekend, hoping the Citrus Bowl ride is more like Space Mountain than It’s a Small World.  The Red Farmers from Lincoln have ideas of their own and they plan to do some plowing on I-4 before the day is done.  The Head Ball Coach may seem like Eeyore most of the time, but he wants this one like Pooh wants honey.  The Cock-a-booster’s crystal ball says... South Carolina by 7.

 BCS National Championship Game

LSU vs. ALABAMA

The Ivory Tusks from the Birmingham suburbs trample down to Bourbon Street next week, hoping to extract a little pigskin revenge.  The Cajun Cats took down the Houndstooth Herd up in Tuscaloosa before, largely because Elephants’ feet  can’t kick field goals.  The Mad Hatter is known for his White Hat Houdini miracles but hoping for lightning to strike again is just too much.  The Cock-A-Booster’s crystal ball says...Alabama by 4.

MOO U News: Pete Yannity “de-friends” Will Merritt and Dabo Swinney on Facebook & Twitter

THIS IS A "FAKE" STORY - DO NOT TAKE IT TOO SERIOUS!

AUTHOR: RUSTY CRANKSHAFT --

Clemson’s radio voice Pete Yannity has long been known as an oasis of sanity in the orange insane asylum in Pickens County.   But Yannity says he is tired of pretending he really likes his colleague Will Merritt or Coach Dabo Swinney any longer.  “I just can’t take them anymore.  Watching these guys drinking turpentine, eating paste and chewing on bus seats during football season and when we travel to away games is one thing.  But I don’t have to put up with their lunacy on my twitter page.”  

Merritt and Swinney responded to the news by singing the theme from The Flintstones and breaking root beer bottles on each other’s heads. 

MOO U News:West Virginia Football Coach, Mountaineer fan trigger Swinney hissey fit and meltdown

THIS IS A "FAKE" STORY - DO NOT TAKE IT TOO SERIOUS!

AUTHOR: RUSTY CRANKSHAFT --

The radio announcer for the West Virginia Mountaineers, Tony Caridi, said on a sports show last week that Clemson and West Virginia hadn’t played each other in over two decades since meeting in a bowl game in 1989.  In response, Clemson’s psychotic football coach immediately attributed the quote to Mountaineer Head Coach Dana Holgorsen and went on a rant about the two programs’ histories.

 

“He’s right!  That’s what I would tell Dana although I am disappointed to hear him say that.  The two teams haven’t played in a while, and no upcoming bowl game is going to change that.  My children and grandchildren won’t live to see the day when we do play them on a regular basis.  If he wants to say we don’t play that much that’s fine but I am going to stick up for my team.  That’s why everyone means West Vancouver University when they say WVU and Appalachian State when they say Mountaineers.”  When it was pointed out to Swinney that Holgorsen hadn’t actually said the “offensive” quote, Swinney remained defiant and red-faced.  “I haven’t heard any retractions!”  Dabo shot us the bird when we pointed out that it was impossible to retract a statement that someone had not made.  “Tweet that” was the closest thing we could get to a coherent response. 

  

In other Yabo Dabo Doo Doo news, the Tiger football Coach has completely lost it about a letter that supposedly was mailed to Swinney from a random West Virginia fan ahead of the bowl game.  No one has actually seen the letter, and the text in it mysteriously changes everytime the coach talks about it.  But it gave him a chance to go off on one of his patented tirades and gin up the fan base. This latest media stunt was needed due to the poor ticket sales to the Orange Bowl, which was a worst case draw for the host game.  

In response to this latest bout with insanity, USC’s Gamecock Board of Trustees sent a letter to Clemson asking that Dabo immediately be given a lifetime contract at Clemson.