Assessing The Florida Bowl Game Hangover

You've heard the line hundreds of times with college football: a bowl game is a reward for a good season.

But there's no reward to qualifying for a bowl and then losing that game. It just makes for a long eight months until you get a chance to redeem yourselves.

So here's a few thoughts on where these teams head now until our collective amnesia sets in before the 2009 season begins.

Clemson

This is now Dabo Swinney's program and the task of finishing up what was left of Tommy Bowden's last team is done.

He already has new assistant coaches on his staff and The Mobile Press-Register is one of many media outlets reporting Alabama assistant Kevin Steele will be the Tigers new defensive coordinator.

The Gator Bowl showed Clemson may want to return to playing physical football, but taking on the program that has long personified the definition of physical football showed just how far the Tigers need to travel.

Well, maybe not on defense. Clemson got terrific performances from true freshmen linemen Da'Quan Bowers and Brandon Thompson and will return at least eight starters on defense.

However, the offense will have to undergo more than a personality transplant. The patch-worked offense line needs a makeover in the weight room and on the field. James Davis and C.J. Spiller were limited to 43 yards combined on the ground by the Cornhuskers.

Clemson could do little except throw the ball, but they couldn't make enough plays in the passing game to offset watching Cullen Harper being forced to run for his life to throw the ball away. That's when the Huskers weren't dropping Harper for 42 yards in losses.

Harper, Davis, Aaron Kelly and Tyler Grisham are gone. C.J. Spiller can't be any better than 50/50 to come back instead of entering the NFL Draft.

So those highly touted recruits we've been hearing about are going to have to take over when the 2009 season starts. None has more riding on his shoulders than former Byrnes HS standout Willy Korn at quarterback.

Korn has thrown about 50 passes in his career and has already suffered two injuries. He hurt his shoulder against Furman in 2007 and didn't play another snap. Korn had surgery in late November this year to repair three partial tears and remove bone fragments from the shoulder.

I'm not saying Willy is injury-prone or lacks durability, but that's what he has to show after two years in the program.

The Tigers won't have big expectations entering 2009, but considering how many observers thought they would be a Top Ten team in 2008 (for reasons that escaped me even before they played Alabama) lower expectations might be a good thing.

This year's Gator Bowl proved to be an exciting event as the Nebraska Cornhuskers rallied from behind to beat the Clemson Tigers 26-21. Catch some of the key moments from the CBS Sports game coverage here.

USC

Win or lose The Outback Bowl, the Gamecocks had to come out of their trip to Tampa with at least the knowledge that they had settled on a quarterback for 2009.

Stephen Garcia didn't come close to answering that question. After four turnovers in the first half against Iowa, Steve Spurrier yanked the Tampa native and went with Chris Smelley.

The same Chris Smelley who threw four interceptions against Clemson.

It's way too early to write off Garcia as a flop. Garcia's seat time has been limited by his own discipline problems which cost him two spring practices and a summer on campus.

As Al McGuire always said, "the best thing about freshmen is that they become sophomores."

But that's just one part of a problem that has seen back-to-back Spurrier teams collapse down the stretch.

The 2007 losing streak was longer, but the 2008-09 trio of whippings - by a combined score of 118-30 at the hands of Florida, Clemson and Iowa - will linger well past the start of another excellent Ray Tanner-led baseball season.

I don't think another highly touted recruiting class - that is supposedly underway - will be enough. Then again, we're talking about Gamecock fans. Optimism is in their DNA.

I've read some of the message board rants by names like USCBatGirl21 and gamecockincamden that are riding the HBC pretty hard.

Spurrier's Fun-And-Gun offense, dubbed the Cock 'N' Fire in Columbia, has led to this Shock and Awe.

In the past four seasons, USC has one bowl victory over Houston.