Picture yourself as Ventrell Jenkins, a 6-foot-2, 285-pound defensive tackle from Kentucky who’s been working all afternoon to help his Wildcat teammates defeat East Carolina in the 2008 Liberty Bowl. The score is tied at 19 -19 and there are exactly 3:02 left in the fourth quarter.
Suddenly East Carolina running back Norman Whitley fumbles in the backfield and the ball ends up in your hands with daylight in front of you. You take off for your dear life, hoping to be faster than you think you are. A chasing player has an angle on you and, in a desperate attempt to avoid being stopped, you give him a stiff arm (removing his mouth guard) and you stalk the rest of the way to score on a comeback. 56 yards.
The next thing you know, your teammates are piling you up in the end zone. Kentucky now leads 25-19 and their Wildcats are on pace to win their third straight bowl game victory with coach Rich Brooks looking happier than a skunk eating cabbage. Not even the late, great Paul “Bear” Bryant won 3 straight bowl games when he was coaching the Kentucky Wildcats.
Kentucky held on with 2:56 remaining, stopping East Carolina and running out the clock to maintain their 25-19 lead. Jenkins ended up being MVP by using an offensive move on his historic 56-yard touchdown return by a defensive tackle not known as a speedster. This is why we love college football and why we watch bowl games. You couldn’t write a more unlikely script and make it happen.
Skip Holtz and his East Carolina Pirates had just won their first Conference USA championship title and defeated Virginia Tech and West Virginia, two BCS conference teams, before the Liberty Bowl on Friday (1-2- 09). The Pirates finished the year with a 9-5 mark.
Kentucky was just a 6-6 team going to the Liberty Bowl, but it wasn’t exactly an all-out push, losing to Alabama by 3 points on the road and South Carolina by 7 at home. Florida then crushed the Wildcats 63-5 and Kentucky would lose its last 3 games to Georgia, Vanderbilt, and Tennessee. But in soccer, you can’t predict how the ball will bounce; sometimes lady luck calls, even for a wildcat.
After trailing 16–3 at the half, senior wide receiver Dave Jones recovered the ensuing kickoff for a Liberty Bowl record 99-yard touchdown return, and the Pirates came alive. Two possessions later, backup quarterback Mike Hartline found second-year wide receiver Kyrus Lanxter for a 19-yard TD throw.
The Pirates would make a field goal in the third quarter, but that was it. Kentucky outscored East Carolina 22-3 in the second half. The Wildcat defense limited East Carolina to just 3 of 19 third-down conversions.
Neither team had a running game. Hartline, a sophomore who was filling in for injured freshman starter Randall Cobb, was 19 of 31 for 204 yards. If you’re a Kentucky Wildcat fan, statistics mean little and victory means everything.
“We’re not where we want to be yet,” said coach Rich Brooks, “but the last 30 minutes were some of the best football I’ve ever seen.” Go ahead and sprout a little Rich, your guys made it happen. From time to time, the ball will bounce in your direction and when it does, you need to make the most of it.
Say thank you for your good fortune, Coach Brooks, and put an extra steak on Ventrell Jenkins’ plate at the next team potluck. And, oh ya, don’t worry about Ventrell’s time in the 40s; he has a secret weapon, a vicious straight arm and a high step that would match a runner during show time.
Copyright © 2009 Ed Bagley
