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Friday, December 13, 2002
Notebook: Gibson relishing the Heup
By Marc Connolly
BCSfootball.com
MIAMI -- So what if he nearly won the Heisman Trophy last month? FSU rover Derrick Gibson and his partner-in-crime at free safety, Chris Hope, welcome Josh Heupel and his aerial heroics.
|  | | Rover Derrick Gibson will be an important part of FSU's defensive schemes. |
"He's not the toughest (we've faced)," says Hope. "He's very mobile, but he's not a Michael Vick or a Woodrow Dantzler that can run and throw. We have some kind of mindset where he's wanting to throw the ball all the time. He's not the best quarterback we've faced, but maybe the most smart."
It sure beats chasing around Vick all night like Gibson did in last year's Nokia Sugar Bowl.
"Vick was scrambling all the time so it was very difficult," says Gibson, who stuffed Va. Tech's quarterback on the Hokies' opening drive and forced a fumble at the FSU 4. "With Heupel, we just want to make him move around in the pocket and make mistakes with the football."
When Heupel does make a rare mistake, it's usually by launching downfield in hopes that one of his receivers will win a jump ball. Since Gibson is free to roam from his rover position to find the football, expect to see No. 6 around the ball all night. As FSU faithful have learned, he usually makes the play.
Hope and Gibson came out of high school as the top cornerback and safety in the nation. After only one season of being a starting tandem at safety, the redshirt junior will miss the absence of Gibson more than anyone will next season.
"It's been a great opportunity to play with him," says the 6-foot-2, 195-pound Hope. "I wish he could stay and play with me some more. I've learned so much from him. We can both run and cover at that same time, and play physical, so we're a lot alike."
Gibson has totaled 71 tackles, two interceptions, seven passes deflected, three fumbles forced and three recovered this year. At 6-2, 207, he's big enough to clog the middle against the run, yet has the athletic ability of a corner to put a damper on many teams' passing attacks.
"His aggressiveness and the speed he has is unbelievable," says Hope. "With the experience he has, he knows where to be and how to put himself in the best position to make big plays. It's going to be hard for them (Oklahoma) to beat a guy like him."
Gibson says he's ready for anything Heupel and the inventive Oklahoma offensive coordinator Mark Mangino throw at him. He says he's overly prepared for them since he's played similar offenses against Clemson and Florida. What he talks most about these days is what it would mean to win back-to-back championships, which would give him bragging rights over his good friend Samari Rolle, a former Seminole standout and current Pro Bowl corner with Tennessee.
"If someone ever told me when I got here that I'd play for a national championship three out of four years, I'd say they were lying," says Gibson, an All-ACC performer.
He hopes his performance in this game, his last for the Garnet and Gold, will also help his draft status this spring.
"Everyone in America wants to go in the first round, but if I go in the first three rounds, I'll be all right," says the Miami native. "I already play in a pro type of system, as the scouts know."
No partying for Heupel
Not that anyone expected Oklahoma's quarterback to make a mockery of himself on South Beach on New Year's Eve, but to stay in the team's hotel and study film all night? Even Mangino was surprised when his son, Tommy, gave him a message late on Sunday night.
"He said, 'Hey, Josh Heupel is looking for you. He's down there watching tape and he has some questions, and he wants to talk to you about the script,'" says Mangino. "I said, the heck with New Year's Eve, I'm gonna get down there. So I went down there and sat with him. We talked about our game plan again. Questions he had I answered, and we talked about different looks and different audibles.
"Half the hotel was running around with party hats on and blowing horns, and Josh is in there watching tape and taking notes. I left him about 11 o'clock or so, and he was still there and his notebook looked like it wasn't filled up yet with notes. That's not fake. That's not a show ? I've never been around a player who prepared himself like Josh Heupel."
Much to the media's dismay, Heupel's preparation spilled over to Monday.
"He has a certain routine that he goes through two days before the game, we talked it over with him, and he wanted to stick to that routine," said quarterbacks coach Chuck Long. "And you get to the point where you're 12-0, you don't want to upset the apple cart."
Said Mangino, "That's a personal thing that Josh likes to do, the way he prepares himself. Some of it requires film study? And some of those things that he does are just personal habits of his."
The question must be asked: Does he miss classes every Thursday to do this?
Once a 'Nole-hater, always a 'Nole-hater
Though this is his first head coaching job, Oklahoma's Bob Stoops knows what it's like to stand on a sideline across from Bobby Bowden, having served as Steve Spurrier's defensive coordinator at Florida from 1996-98. He's done it when a national championship was on the line, too, in the 1997 Sugar Bowl when the Gators rode Heisman winner Danny Wuerffel in a 52-20 spanking. So of course he's drawing on that experience, considering FSU is fueled by its usual strong points: devastating defensive ends, endless speed at the wide receiver position, a spread offense tactician at QB and big-play guys in the secondary.
"I have a familiarity with them and an idea of their philosophies of what they like to and how they approach their game plan," said Stoops. "It does benefit you in many ways."
Being a part of that national championship four years ago has also paid dividends in how he approached the month off since winning the Big XII title on Dec. 2 in Kansas City.
"It does give me an idea how to go about our practices, how to prepare, how to handle the media and the attention given to the game, but still remain focused on what you need to do to win the football game," said Stoops. "So I feel very at home in the environment."
Still close confidants, Stoops has been in contact with Spurrier this week as they both prepare for games with national championship implications.
"We've spoken quite a few times," said the 40-year-old coach. "He has some ideas, but he's not much on telling you a whole lot. He knows we have our own game plan and we know what we have to do. He's been encouraging and he feels good about it. I know he feels good about his game too."
Bracketing
Monday's edition of the Sun-Sentinel contains a mock playoff bracket pitting the top 16 teams against each other based on their BCS rankings. In the quarterfinals to be played on Jan. 1, they somehow have Florida getting by Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl by a 24-20 margin due to the Stun 'n' Done defense. Washington edged Texas in the Citrus; Miami beat Oregon State in the Holiday Bowl, and FSU downed Nebraska in the Cotton Bowl. Next Washington outlasted Florida in a shootout and Florida State beat Miami 30-17 in the Rose and Sugar Bowl, respectively. Finally, they pick FSU as a 42-20 winner over Washington in an Orange Bowl game played on Jan. 21.
Somehow, you get the feeling Hurricane fans would still be protesting.
Breakfast of Champions
In case you missed it, the ESPN GameDay crew -- Chris Fowler, Lee Corso and Kirk Herbstreit -- poured themselves bowls of Boomer Spooner cereal to start their New Year's Day coverage from South Beach.
Marc Connolly is a senior writer for ABC Sports Online.
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