Rice bowl win both historic and reflective of senior accomplishments

By Casey Michel     1/8/09 6:00pm

It was a reverse. During the third quarter of the Texas Bowl, Chase Clement sent a lateral, short and sweet, at Jarett Dillard's chest. The All-Everything receiver took the pass as the Western Michigan defense began to swarm, ready to cement a loss of yards. But Dillard, more often known for class than cleverness, wheeled and flicked the ball back to Clement, wide-eyed and wide-open, who popped into the end-zone to give Rice a 30-0 lead.

Clement and Dillard, just as you'd expect. On their own wavelength, at a different speed, combining for their NCAA-record 51st touchdown conversion. But this flea-flicker saw their roles switched, for it was Dillard as the gunslinger and Clement as the crafty catcher.

Is there anything these two can't do?

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Actually, expand that thought - is there anything this team can't do?

Three years ago, Rice football was lower than a Flo Rida groupie, sitting pretty at 1-10 under then-coach Ken Hatfield. The next year Todd Graham returned Rice to the postseason for the first time since the 1961 Bluebonnet Bowl, but an injured Clement, ruing a snapped collarbone, watched Troy State tear up the Owls in the R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl. Enter David Bailiff out of Texas State, himself a complete unknown - an ESPN host tempted his analysts to "guess who the Rice coach is" only to watch them all fail - and a 3-9 season seemed to force us back to college football purgatory.

As the 2008 campaign dawned, expectations were tempered, outlooks were middling, and our confidence was shakier than my great aunt Ida. It's not as if you could blame the fans, or even the team. Rice football has had such a culture of ineptitude that moving beyond counting victories on one hand was considered miraculous. Injuries seemed to decimate us more than others, and outside of James Casey, the Owls looked like Calista Flockhart against the likes of Texas and Florida State.

If that weren't enough, Hurricane Ike made sure to wash out a few days of much-needed rest for a team just looking for some footing.

It seemed everything was against them. No one's had it this hard since, well, the men's basketball team last season.

But as you, me and, yes, even some ESPN analysts saw this season, the Owls slipped on their glass cleats, picked apart their competition and burned more records than Godzilla in a Virgin Music store.

All those previous disturbances, all those infuriating obstacles, were nothing but building blocks, ties that bound the team and their talents into one.

For a team that's overcome so much, I'm almost ashamed that I thought the Texas Bowl would be a close contest.

On December 30, everything was clicking. Clement picked apart the stringy Western Michigan defense, landing a remarkable 30 of his 44 passes safely into the hands of his teammates. Dillard and Casey were the scariest tandem since Bonnie and Clyde, while junior wide receiver Toren Dixon - who finished with eight catches, 58 yards, and an all-important fourth-down conversion - continued to show why Dillard's looming departure may not hurt as much as we thought. And junior running back C.J. Ugokwe, whose broad shoulders carried a ground game all year, bludgeoned his way to 54 yards on 17 carries, illustrating that our running game will survive until Sam McGuffie takes the reins.

Meanwhile, the defense - long the ugly stepchild to our beautiful offense - was spectacular to the point of redundancy. Time and again, Rice kicked sand in the Broncos' eyes whenever they tried to climb from their hole, forcing four four-and-outs and snagging a pair of interceptions along the way. And while the Owls' bid at their first shutout in 13 years failed late in the fourth quarter, Western Michigan required seven red-zone plays and a questionable penalty just to score their first points.

Heck, even though the Broncos' marching band had a better touchdown jig, the MOB held itself to a higher standard than usual.

Rice dominated in every sense of the word. With a spectacular venue, an energized fan base and a coach who's staying put, Rice football may have never been higher than when those final Texas Bowl seconds ticked into oblivion.

Now back to the question of Clement and Dillard. After the Texas Bowl triumph, complete with Clement's ten-gallon MVP trophy, these two can't come back for one more round, one more game or one more shot at the Longhorns. Their time at Rice has come to a bittersweet end, and where they land in the NFL is up to better football minds than mine.

These two came into Rice unheralded, undersized and nearly unheard of. Now, they leave as the most remarkable duo the program has ever seen.

I'd say that that's quite the reversal, wouldn't you?

Casey Michel is a Brown College junior and former sports editor.

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