The B12 (XII) Forum, home of the 'Front Porch, y'all' at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

I can't even read stuff like that.  To me that game just stopped-- got completely suspended-- the moment Colt went down.  And it never resumed.  We were all sitting there in stunned disbelief.  The rest of the game was like a dream.  A really bad dream.  

I'm not exaggerating at all.

That describes my view exactly

I resist saying thats why we lost but had he not been injured the game was definitely winnable

It was definitely winnable.  A freshman backup QB with almost zero live game experience had the Horns within 3 points, with 3 minutes left to go, and possession of the ball.  

The thing is Colt was not injury prone which made it even harder to take

Texas chose to ride with a superstar player for the entire season. They came within 50 minutes of game time from pulling it off. Texas wins that game 45-20 or something if Colt stays healthy. Alabama wasn't built to play our type of offense (it won A&M a Heisman later).

I'm sure Alabama suffered their own critical injuries throughout the season. You play the game with the team you have. While it was the ugliest of bad beats, backup QB was the weak link, and it broke there.

12 years later, that game sure seems like a turning point. That was Mack's last great team. And Mack has not yet been suitably replaced. The verdict is still out on Sarkesian.
It happens sometimes. What is widely considered to have been Bud Wilkinson's last great team was the 1962 squad. He went 8-2 in the regular season (starting out with a narrow win over Syracuse and narrow losses to Notre Dame and Texas, then steamrolling through the Big 8) and then got smoked 17-0 by Alabama in the Orange Bowl. 1963 was an 8-2 year, but that team was not as good as the previous year's. Then Bud retired. OU only had one really good year (1967) for the rest of the '60s, and finished the period 1958-1970 going 1-12 against Texas. Bud wasn't suitably replaced until Switzer took over after the 1972 season.

It wasn't even a debilitating injury per se. A perfect bump between the shoulder blades happened to clip a nerve responsible for his throwing arm. Never seen this injury repeated anywhere.

To paraphrase Ron Washington, "Sometime, that's how football go".
Alabama is a better football team than Texas, and should win tomorrow. However, I'll watch because (a) I'm a fan and (b) Texas doesn't have to be a better football team. They just have to be better tomorrow for that one game.

I get it. Colt played football very physically.  For Colt it was an additive deal. Years and years of hard hitting football. It finally caught up to him at a bad time. Mack lived and died by his QBs, for better or worse. When his QBs stopped being superstars he ceased being a superstar. He did what he did with essentially 4 QB’s for his entire tenure at Texas. Major, Simms, Vince, and Colt. 

all head coaches do in both college and the pros

Saban got away with game-manager QBs for quite awhile. Matt Mauk at LSU. A.J. McCarron at Bama. That type of guy. Good, but not great.

Texas giving Bama all they can handle. Ewers looks to be the real deal. Not sure what his injury status is or if he’s coming back. Looked like a clean hit ( late but not malicious).