AVALANCHE-JOURNAL
If there was even a hint of arrogance in the Red Raiders' successful 1976 football team, it couldn't be detected - then or now.
Although it was one of the greatest teams in the history of Texas Tech, there were no visible I'm-the-greatest players around to muddle the strategy. And the strategy was to strike down all opposing teams, beginning with mighty Colorado, favored to win the season's opening game.
Head coach Steve Sloan and his team moved onto Colorado's defenses like a highly trained invasion shock force on Sept. 11, 1976, in Lubbock. Then the Tech defense ate Colorado's offense alive.
But the thing that stands out 34 years later was the matter-of-fact recap of a game that must have produced an almost irrepresssible exhilaration among players and coaches alike. That, and the fact that each deferred to the other for accomplishing the victory.
Thomas Howard was a linebacker for the team that dismayed Colorado. And though he intercepted two passes, made 11 tackles and assisted in six others, he had little to say about the 24-7 rout of what was considered a superior team.
Writing for the Avalanche-Journal, Don Henry recounted that Howard had fewer words than dry spots about his torso following the game.
"After one of the greatest defensive performances seen in Jones stadium in history, the Tech linebacker was very noncommittal. Not much to say, except the defense was good, and the raider coaches deserved the credit for devising the plans to stop the Buffaloes."
Sloan did have some words to say:
"I can't remember one player ever playing that well. He was our leader, too, our captain this week."
Henry wrote, "Almost to a man, the defense lauded the coaches, at the same time they were passing the bouquets to teammates. The secondary, which came up with five interceptions, lauded the down linemen, and the down linemen in turn praised the secondary."
Even today, Howard, now living in Lubbock after a career in the NFL, recalls it only analytically:
"The game I had the best statistical game was the first one. We played Colorado. I think I had a couple of interceptions, probably led the team in that particular game in tackles. But the thing that was important ... Bill Parcells was our linebacker coach. Coach Carlen was there for two years for me, and I had two years with Coach Sloan. So, during that time you have to adjust to a new coaching staff. But one thing I did, I appreciated the importance of getting out of the gate. And I just thought Coach Sloan and Coach Parcells really had us ready to play that first game."
Rodney Allison, then a quarterback and now alive and well in Lubbock after a college football coaching career that included head coach at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, recalls that 1976 at Tech was exciting. He was named MVP for the Southwest Conference.
"That season to me - and I've heard a lot of people say that - was kind of what it was like here two years ago when they had Crabtree and the great win against Texas and all that. It was really unbelievable, because we kind of got on a roll and got going. I'm not sure we were a great team ... at the start I don't think we were a great team, but I think we developed - we got confidence."
Sloan, now retired and living in Orlando, said in a phone interview, "We were fortunate that year and we had a lot of good players. We had an extraordinary amount of speed. In college football, speed makes a big difference, because you can make more big plays. Rodney was real fast. He made a lot of plays with his feet as well as throwing the ball."
Allison has two major memories from the season: "As big as the win was over Texas at the time, which was really special, I also remember as much about Darrell Royal being in his last season at Texas, and how good they were. They had Earl Campbell, who may be one of the top players who ever played at Texas. But it was just a great game, up and down, back and forth. We scored a touchdown close to the end to go ahead, then we had to make a great defensive stand in the last minutes of the game.
"It was all just very spectacular. And I will never forget ... maybe that day, that crowd, was like the crowd that was here when Tech played Texas two years ago - it was just electric in the stadium. Everything worked together. But that was a great moment, and for the old-timers like me it was probably one of the great wins that I have ever been involved with."
After Tech, Allison played in Canada, but he recalls it with characteristic honesty: "I didn't make it. I got cut - I wasn't good enough. And I came back here and was a GA - graduate assistant - coach for a year.
"Then Jerry Moore came in and took the head job and hired me. I think I was 24, and that was my first coaching job. I coached at Tech for four years, then I went to Duke with Steve Sloan. Steve was the head coach, and stayed there three years, then went to Southern Mississippi and stayed five years as quarterback coach."
Allison coached at Auburn and Clemson Universities before his six years as head coach at Chattanooga.
Has he stayed close friends with Sloan?
"He was the best man at my wedding. My son is named Sloan. He is still my best friend to this day."
The team of' '76 lost only to Houston that year, 27-19, and in the Astro-Bluebonnett Bowl, to Nebraska, 27-24. It shared the Southwest Conference Championship title with Houston for the year.
Howard remembers the Dec. 31 game with Nebraska: "I thought we had a bad call and a couple of injuries where one of our front line guys missed a couple of plays, and they took advantage of it. But it was a team that was accustomed to winning, accustomed to playing in big games. So, we can't take anything away from those guys."
Howard has an answer for the question about what it takes to make a winning season: "First of all you have to have good coaching; and you have to have some talent to work with."
Sloan said from the coach's standpoint, "You can call the plays and you can call the defenses, but the players have to execute big plays and execute the defense calls. In the kicking games, you can do different things. We had a good kicking game - Brian Hall was the kicker. So, it all comes down to players executing the game play."
Allison conducted much of his coaching with a teaching approach. "Coaching to me is teaching. It's no different from the classroom. You have them all week, and I think most coaches are like that now. You've got to put them in an environment where they can learn. That's all it is."
Howard, who spent seven years with the Kansas City Chiefs and two years with the St. Louis Rams after playing at Tech, now is handing off his football talent to the next generation. His son, also named Thomas, is a linebacker for the Oakland Raiders.
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