LSU Makes White Pay a Big Price

Oklahoma quarterback Jason White may not have known what was about to hit him Sunday night, but Louisiana State defensive end Marquise Hill gave him a pretty good idea early on in the Sugar Bowl.

“He’s Mr. Heisman and we wanted to go at him all night,” said Hill, who had one of the Tigers’ five sacks and helped harass White into a miserable 13-for-37 passing performance for 102 yards and two interceptions. “That’s a big award if you win it, and you’re going to pay for it.

“I said to him, ‘Excuse me, Mr. Heisman. I’m going to be coming at you all night.’ He just nodded his head at me. I think our conference is the hardest, and Jason White wasn’t anything we hadn’t seen before.”

LSU came at White with its array of blitzes, and when the Tigers didn’t sack the Sooner quarterback, they usually hit him as he released the ball. White was chased out of the pocket many times and had to throw into double coverage often.

“We saw that he has played against a lot of teams that didn’t put pressure on him and hit him in the mouth,” LSU defensive back Corey Webster said. “We just wanted to get after him like Kansas State did [in a 35-7 victory in the Big 12 championship game on Dec. 6].”

LSU linebacker Lionel Turner sacked White twice for a loss of 26 yards to go along with his nine tackles, and Hill, tackle Chad Lavalais and end Marcus Spears each had one sack.

“We might have rattled White,” Lavalais said. “I can’t assume we did, but maybe his receivers weren’t always getting open, maybe his line wasn’t always doing a good job protecting. But we did a good job getting after him.”

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Though two strong defensive stands in the final three minutes prevented Oklahoma from scoring the tying touchdown Sunday night, LSU Coach Nick Saban thought the key to the Tiger victory came in the second quarter.

Oklahoma had blocked a punt and recovered at the LSU two-yard line, and three plays later, the Sooners scored to tie the score at 7-7.

But the Tigers went 80 yards in nine plays in only 3 minutes 14 seconds on their next possession, Justin Vincent scoring on a 17-yard run to give them a 14-7 lead 4:21 before halftime.

“That changed the momentum back our way,” Saban said. “It’s been like that all year. They block a punt and score a touchdown, we answer the bell with an 80-yard touchdown drive. We fumble a snap [at the Oklahoma two-yard line in the first quarter] and we intercept a pass two plays later. When something bad happens in a game, it means nothing to us. We won a national championship because we overcome adversity.”

No player embodied that kind of resiliency better than Hill, who needed two bags of intravenous fluids at halftime.

“I was cramping up and was having a hard time, but I knew I had to come out and give it everything I had,” Hill said.