Bradford comes to DeMarco's defense
10/17/2008 9:28:26 AM
You want to know the story with Oklahoma's running game, you'll have to wait one more day. John Hoover will break it down in the Saturday edition of your friendly Tulsa World. Do yourself a favor and read it before the 2:30 kickoff against Kansas.
All I know is DeMarco Murray had seven carries for six yards against Texas. His longest run since the Chattanooga opener is 14 yards. He hasn't cracked a double-digit gain, rushing, over the last three games.
No one knows exactly what's going on with the once-electric Sooner tailback. Just that something is, in fact, going on.
In the meantime, if you're a teammate and captain and you're facing a crowd of reporters all wanting answers, you say something reasonable.
I give you Sam Bradford, after practice Tuesday night:
"I talked to DeMarco for a little bit after the (Texas) game. I just told him to be patient. He's a great player. Chris Brown is a great player. Mossis (Madu), they're all great players. We all know what they're capable of.
"I think probably the worst thing for us an offense to do is try to force things. We just need to let things come. They're gonna come. We need to just get in our rhythm and find a way to run the ball when it comes time...
"I don't know how much (Murray) pays attention to it. Obviously he's probably hard on himself right now because he realizes he's really close to breaking some big runs. It's not all on him, either. Sometimes people think our running game is not working because of our running backs. That's not it at all. It's all 11 guys. It takes every position. It's something that as an entire offense we have to get better at.
"I don't think he needs to hold his head down or anything, he just needs to keep running hard and playing well.
"I haven't seen a whole lot of change in DeMarco. I don't think he's taking it that hard. He's still practicing very hard. He had a great practice yesterday. I thought he ran extremely hard. I think he realizes that if he keeps working the way he has in the past, things are going to come to him."
-- Guerin Emig
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