{"id":4371,"date":"2014-01-03T01:33:32","date_gmt":"2014-01-03T01:33:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/highplainsblogger.wordpress.com\/?p=4371"},"modified":"2014-01-03T01:33:32","modified_gmt":"2014-01-03T01:33:32","slug":"mack-brown-shows-class-in-final-defeat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=4371","title":{"rendered":"Mack Brown shows class in final defeat"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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My interest in the 2013 college football season ended when the Oregon-Texas game at the Alamo Bowl concluded on Dec. 30.<\/p>\n

The Ducks won big, 30-7, which made me — a native Oregonian — quite happy indeed.<\/p>\n

But the moments after the game left me feeling sad that Mack Brown had coached his final game for the University of Texas Longhorns. <\/p>\n

I’ve lived in Texas for nearly 30 years now, but never have become a big fan of college football here. Then came Mack Brown to the Lone Star State 16 years ago. He ran up some big numbers while rescuing a football program that had hit the skids. He won a national championship. His teams won about 75 percent of all the games they played during his time in Austin. <\/p>\n

It wasn’t good enough, though, to suit many Texas boosters, alumni and the faithful who insist that they win every time they take the field.<\/p>\n

The end of the Alamo Bowl showed why Coach Brown is such a classy individual and a gentleman.<\/p>\n

He embraced Oregon coach Mark Helfrich in the middle of the field. He then whispered something into Helfrich’s ear and I was struck by the way he held a folder in front of his mouth to shield whatever he was telling the opposing coach from the TV camera’s prying eyes. Whatever it was, it must have been intensely personal. <\/p>\n

Then the defeated coach talked to many of the Oregon players, congratulating them, patting them on the back, the shoulders, the head — maybe even a few backsides. <\/p>\n

Coach Brown could have skulked off the field. He could have reacted differently. He left the field with his head held high — and his reputation as a gentleman burnished to a fine shine.<\/p>\n\n

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My interest in the 2013 college football season ended when the Oregon-Texas game at the Alamo Bowl concluded on Dec. 30. The Ducks won big, 30-7, which made me — a native Oregonian — quite happy indeed. But the moments after the game left me feeling sad that Mack Brown had coached his final game … Continue reading Mack Brown shows class in final defeat<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[230,2850,2911,3440,4657],"class_list":["post-4371","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-alamo-bowl","tag-mack-brown","tag-mark-helfrich","tag-oregon-ducks","tag-texas-longhorns"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4371","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4371"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4371\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4371"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4371"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4371"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}