Crim: College football, Hall of Fame closers, baseball playoffs and QU basketball on the mind

Notes, quotes and great thoughts from a sports weekend that, for the first time in a month, did not include my alma mater turning a winnable college football game into an excruciating loss:

OK, so Missouri was on a bye. No game, no angst. Surely the Tigers won’t lose on Saturday to Vanderbilt, the only team projected to finish below them in the SEC East, will they? Of course, Missouri still has conference games remaining against South Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee and Arkansas, and will likely need to win at least two of those to gain bowl eligibility, no easy task.

Speaking of the sixth-ranked Vols, their 52-49 victory over No. 3 Alabama was an instant classic. A knuckle-balled field goal from 40 yards out as time expired from Chase McGrath enabled them to end a 15-game losing streak against the Crimson Tide.

Josh Heupel’s up-tempo, high-octane offense is fun to watch. (Mizzou fans no doubt remember he was the team’s offensive coordinator and quarterback coach in 2016 and 2017 before getting his first head coaching job at, ahem, Central Florida.)

Tennessee quarterback Hendon Hooker threw for 385 yards and five touchdowns — all to Jalin Hyatt — in putting up the most points against Alabama since Sewanee posted 54 in 1907. Crimson Tide quarterback Bryce Young was equally impressive, throwing for 455 yards and two scores, and seemingly had his team on the verge of coming all the way back from an 18-point, first-half deficit.

In retrospect, do you think the Crimson Tide would have liked to have called a couple of running plays in the final minute to make the Vols burn their final two timeouts and perhaps improve their field position before attempting an unsuccessful field goal try from 50 yards out with 21 seconds left?

Alabama was undone by its lack of discipline, getting flagged 17 times for 130 yards, the most in the Nick Saban era, according to ESPN. A late scoop-and-score by the Crimson Tide was offset by an earlier muffed punt that led to a Tennessee touchdown.

It begs the question: A week after barely surviving underachieving Texas A&M, is Alabama still an elite team or a team with an elite coach and quarterback?

Circle your calendar for Nov. 5 when Tennessee plays top-ranked Georgia.

Illini making college football fans take note

Don’t look now, but Illinois is 6-1. If the Illini can beat Nebraska on the road and Michigan State and Purdue at home, which is certainly doable, it would set the stage for a meaningful matchup against Michigan Nov. 19 in Ann Arbor. Who would have thunk it?

Hall of Fame reliever passes away

Hall of Famer Bruce Sutter died last week at the age of 69. He arguably was the best reliever in baseball from 1977-84, recording 250 of his 300 career saves for the Cubs and Cardinals, a time when closers were often called on to pitch two or more innings to close out a game.

In fact, Sutter worked more than one inning for 188 of his saves. (It was later in the 1980s that Tony LaRussa created Dennis Eckersley and the one-inning closer with the Oakland Athletics.)

Rick Hummel of the St. Louis-Post Dispatch chronicled how Sutter signed with the Cubs in 1972 but suffered a pinched nerve in his elbow. He had surgery at his own expense during the offseason and didn’t tell the team because he was afraid he would be released, Hummel wrote.

He spent 1973 season with the Quincy Cubs in the Class A Midwest League and met pitching coach Fred Martin, who suggested Sutter take advantage of his large hands and try to throw the split-fingered pitch.

According to Hummel, Sutter didn’t master the pitch at first. That prompted Quincy manager Walt Dixon to report to the Cubs’ player development staff, “When Bruce Sutter is ready for the big leagues, that’s the day the Communists take over.”

Yeah, nobody remembers Walt Dixon. However, St. Louis fans will always remember Sutter’s strikeout of Milwaukee’s Gorman Thomas to close out the 1982 World Series — on an 84 mile-per-hour fastball, no less, instead of his signature splitter — to give the team its first title since 1967.

“To me, Bruce is the best there ever was,” former St. Louis manager Whitey Herzog told the Post-Dispatch. “From my time in the big leagues from 1956 until I retired in 1990, the most dominant relief pitcher I’d ever seen was Sutter.”

Sutter left the Cardinals for Atlanta after recording 45 saves during the 1984 season. Herzog recalled how Sutter came to him during the winter meetings to tell him about the Braves’ offer, but that he wanted to stay in St. Louis. All he wanted was a partial no-trade clause, which he said Herzog could draw up.

Herzog told the Post-Dispatch the idea was nixed by August Busch III, who was in charge of the Anheuser-Busch brewery and the club at that point.

“That’s when I heard that Anheuser-Busch didn’t really give a damn about winning,” Herzog said. “Little August hated baseball and didn’t want to pay him any money. So, Sutter’s gone.”

Of course, Herzog went to a “bullpen by committee” the next year and reached the World Series for the second time in four seasons — only to be undone by umpire Don Denkinger and a slow-moving tarp machine that kept rookie Vince Coleman on the bench and off the basepaths.

NL’s top teams eliminated

The two best teams in the National League — the Dodgers and Braves — won’t be meeting in the championship series. Despite combining for 212 victories during the regular season, they were bounced by two wild card teams, the Padres and Phillies, in the division round.

Cardinals fans must wonder how the postseason might have played out had the team not blown a 2-0 lead with one out in the top of the ninth inning in the first game of its series against Philadelphia — the first time in 94 postseason games St. Louis failed to hold a lead of two runs or more in the final frame.

Instead, the six-run outburst against the St. Louis bullpen seemed to ignite the Phillies’ offense. They went on to bludgeon Atlanta, the defending World Series champion, 17-4 in the final two games in Philadelphia.

For those scoring at home, the Phillies finished 14 games behind the 101-win Braves in the NL East during the regular season and were the last team to qualify for the playoffs — thanks to expansion. Meanwhile, the Padres finished 22 games behind the 111-win Dodgers in the NL West.

Los Angeles has won 91 or more games every year since 2013, except for the pandemic-shortened season, and has topped 100 victories four times in winning nine NL West titles. Yet, despite a bloated payroll, it has managed only one World Series championship.

Hawkins era 2.0 needs time to develop too

The second Steve Hawkins basketball era began with the opening of practice at Quincy University. I covered a big chunk of his first stint with the Hawks when serving as sports editor of the Quincy Herald-Whig in the 1990s.

Hawkins was 8-20 his first season after being hired late to replace Brad Dunn, but he recruited the likes of David Langley, Lavaughn Williams, Reggie Bell and Rashad Hall from his native California. That, coupled with hometown recruits Tom Lepper and Andy Waggoner and a host of others, made the Hawks must-see.

Here’s hoping he can rekindle that magic in the rugged Great Lakes Valley Conference. He got a raw deal after devoting 20 years to Division I Western Michigan, but Hawkins is a quality guy and coach, and this is an opportunity to restart and perhaps finish his coaching career on his own terms.

Late in his inaugural season with QU during the 1991-92 season, with the Hawks mired in a losing streak, I wrote a column with the headline, “Give Hawkins proper time to build a program.” I noted that making a knee-jerk change after a dismal season and hiring a fifth coach in eight years would not be blueprint for success, that the young coach needed a chance to build his program.

I’m reminded from time to time that he didn’t realize he could be on a hot seat until reading that piece on a Sunday morning. However, that was not the intent. Rather, it was to quiet an impatient QU fan base accustomed to winning that had not yet gotten to know the young California kid.

Hawkins got his time and built a winner.

Fast forward a generation. Give him time and the proper support, and odds are he will do so again. History has a tendency of repeating itself.