How can a college football team lose with dignity?
Don’t ask Georgia State coach Trent Miles, whose Panthers will take on Alabama on Saturday in Tuscaloosa.
Yes, Alabama is the No. 1 team in college football, the back-to-back defending BCS champs.
Yes, Georgia State arguably is the worst, 0-4 with a few good quarters sprinkled into a mostly not-so-good souffle of a first FBS season.
But, when you are trying to a change a culture to where everything should be done as perfectly as possible, as Miles is attempting to do, how do you approach this game knowing that even playing perfectly may still result in a lopsided loss?
“We’re competitors, and we want to go play,” Miles said. “I wish we could play in that environment every year. We have a chance to go prepare ourselves and play on a stage that they all want to see themselves, and have a chance to go see where they are at and see where they are at on that type of stage.”
Asked different versions of how the Panthers plan to approach the game this week, with the underlying implication that a rout is imminent because Alabama’s players will be bigger, faster and mostly more skilled, Miles has answered with a similar theme: “We aren’t worried about ourselves. We can only control what we do.”
Miles has smartly deflected the question because the task of even trying to stay close will be monumental. And no one wants to be embarrassed to the point of risking injury or having to use a running clock at some point in the second half, which has occurred at least twice this season.
So how should Miles approach Saturday? Should he go “Braveheart” or banker and take the $700,000 and run?
Mike Bellotti, a former Oregon coach and current ESPN analyst, said Miles shouldn’t have any problem motivating the players.
“You are playing someone that the whole nation is watching,” he said. “‘If we beat them, it puts you in history,’ (should be the message).”
The Panthers have had two weeks of good practices coming off an overtime loss to Jacksonville State. Miles said his team should always have good practices, no matter the opponent.
“You have to be a pretty good salesperson and optimist, if you are the underdog,” Bellotti said. “(You say to the players) ‘Here’s the plan, here’s how we are going to do it. We will try to improve.’”
Once the game starts, Bellotti and former Colorado coach Dan Hawkins said the Panthers should focus on the cliche of winning one play at a time and avoiding mistakes that lead to big plays. Georgia State coordinator Jesse Minter has hammered that theme for the past two weeks.
But if the Panthers can somehow keep it close, Bellotti said it may scare Alabama a little bit and fire up Georgia State even more.
In its short history, Georgia State has played some of its better games against BCS competition. The Panthers stayed close to West Virginia earlier this season before the Mountaineers pulled away in the second half. Still, Georgia State is 0-4 against FBS-level competition.
But what if they can’t keep it close?
Former Oklahoma coach Barry Switzer, who often was on the good end of these payday games, recently complained that too often the underdogs don’t come in with a plan once they start to lose. The last thing Miles needs is for his team to take a step back mentally. Some of the players are still in a delicate place with focus and concentration, as evidenced by the lifeless performance in the second week against Chattanooga.
A rout Saturday could have far-reaching implications. Avoiding that mental mousetrap should start in the days before the game.
If the Crimson Tide get a big lead, Hawkins, who is an analyst for ESPN, said the Panthers should avoid slow-developing plays where their players are put into harm’s way. Call running plays to avoid quarterback hits and the clock from stopping.
“Let’s keep the clock moving and not put guys at risk for the rest of the season,” he said.
As Bellotti also said, you don’t want losing to Alabama to cause more losses down the road because key players suffered injuries. One of the factors that could affect possible injuries is visiting teams don’t take their full complement of players, so coaches don’t have a large pool of players to choose from if they decide to rest starters.
And if Georgia State were to win the plays, keep it close and somehow win, it would be one of the greatest upsets in college football history, if not sports history.
“You’ve heard of ‘Any Given Sunday,” Bellotti asked. “This would be ‘Any Given Saturday.’”
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