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No storybook ending for Price PASADENA, Calif. - It doesn't really matter now whether departing head coach Mike Price was a distraction as Washington State prepared for the Rose Bowl. It doesn't really matter now whether he should have excused himself and left immediately for his new job at the University of Alabama. All that matters is that Washington State played its worst game of a remarkable season on one of college football's biggest stages. The Mike Price era went out with a whimper, diminished by a final game that turned out to be very lame. All the good things Price has done at WSU, the respect he brought to a program at a place where many said it would be impossible to win, was undermined by one stinker of a final chapter. The final score was 34-14 Oklahoma, but even Price admits that's probably not an accurate indicator of just how one-sided this game turned out to be. "It probably wasn't one of the better games in my career," Price admitted, trying to keep his emotions in check at the postgame news conference. "I've never been shut out before, but it was close tonight. The score is probably a little deceiving. Our offense was just off all game long." Price, who was booed by WSU fans when his picture and a graphic of his record were illuminated on the big screen at the Rose Bowl early in the game, said he had no remorse for the way his head coaching career ended at Washington State. "I think I handled things in a way that was the most appropriate and I don't really care what anybody else thinks," Price said. "The supporters have been wonderful. The players have been wonderful. Some of the fans haven't been so wonderful, but they're fans, not supporters. I'm sure I'll take my share of criticism, but the game is played between the lines." WSU had its lowest offensive production of the season in falling to 1-3 in Rose Bowl games. The Cougars mustered only 243 yards of offense, a victim more of its own poor execution than anything Oklahoma's defense did. Senior quarterback Jason Gesser said his final game may have been his most frustrating. Gesser, playing at only 80 percent because of a high ankle sprain, completed only 17 of 34 passes and had two interceptions. He wasn't nearly as good as he was in this same stadium a few weeks ago when he passed WSU to a win over UCLA on one leg in a game that earned the Cougs a share of the Pac-10 championship and gave WSU an opportunity to return to Pasadena. He left that game with a rose between his teeth. He left this one was a taste in his mouth that wasn't nearly as sweet. "It was just one thing after another today," Gesser said. "It was difficult because we kept beating ourselves. We kept making mistakes. We were looking at ourselves on the sidelines and wondering when it was ever going to end." It didn't until the fourth quarter and Oklahoma had an insurmountable 27-0 lead. "It just seemed that whenever we did something right, something went wrong," Gesser said. "It's really hard to do that, especially when you're playing against a great defense. It's hard to block and make big plays when you're constantly shooting yourself in the foot." Much like the triple-overtime Apple Cup loss to Washington, Gesser was pressured all game long. When he did have time to throw, he found the receivers open. "It wasn't their secondary at all," Gesser said. "When we wanted to throw the ball, we could. They didn't do anything we didn't expect. The bottom line is that we didn't execute." It was an ignoble and emotional ending for both Price and Gesser, two key reasons WSU had one of its best football seasons in its history. "I've been biting my lip for two weeks," Price said. "I've given this program 14 years of my life and I think things are better off now because of those 14 years. I had a chance for my dream to come true today and have a storybook ending. We just came up short." Gesser said the bottom line was that it was just a tough way to finish his career. "It hit me hard in the locker room after the game," Gesser said. "You want to remember your last game with a smile, not like this, not like tonight." | ||||||||||
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