To those of you who haven’t noticed the recent and major change in attitude toward the Virginia Tech football program, welcome back from the planet Zork. Frankly, the whole thing pretty much blows my mind. Here I’ve been trying most of the year to figure out where all the negative stuff was coming from and before I caught up, it moved on.

This may be a stupid time to admit it, but, honestly, I dismissed with a chuckle the smattering of early season reports which had "Virginia Tech" and "national championship" in the same sentence. And I think anyone who saw the gift from Arkansas required for Tennessee’s national championship last year would do the same. This ain’t just about talent, folks.

But as Tech continued to win and this championship thing became more plausible, I moved – without actually realizing it – to the "Hey, This is Neat - We’re the Cinderella team" stage. You know, the part where Americans root for the underdog. The "poor boy/girl who grows up to be president" thing. We’ll be a refreshing change from the same old, standard fare. Welcomed with open arms. Yea, right.

What we actually got was a boat load of vitriolic diatribe accusing Virginia Tech of perpetrating a giant fraud against true and loyal football fans everywhere. Pretenders, rather than contenders, which threatened to destroy the future of college football, unravel the fabric of American life, pollute the planet, initiate global atomic warfare, and some really bad stuff, too.

But not to worry. Saint Kramer and his band of BCS angles would soon answer the SOS, rescue our cherished institution of college football, and give Tech its comeuppance. Take that, you dogs.

I’m not proud to admit it, but repeatedly reading this load of crapola really bothered me. I guess I don’t like being the bad guy, or something. Anyway, I began to wonder exactly what it was that Tech had done to get folks so upset. By what dastardly deed had we so threatened world peace and tranquility? I really thought about this a lot, and I may be a little slow on the uptake, but it finally came to me.

Tech won some football games. All of them in fact. Oh, the shame of it! Hide your face. Burn your degree. Claim to be a UVa grad - OK, a little overboard with that one, but you get the point. Tech won some bloody football games, for crying out loud! And our detractors were expecting us to do exactly what?

Believe it or not, this realization made me feel a lot better. If that’s the problem, those folks can just kiss my royal whatever. Let them talk. We take care of business and it all works out. Take your attitude and contemplate a seriously shaded environment. And another thing – Hey, where’d you go?

They left. Disappeared. Have you seen the turnaround? In Chicago, St. Petersburg, San Diego. Suddenly we ARE the Cinderella team. We "passed every test"; "deserve the shot". A travesty if we don’t get it. It’s the BCS that’s taking heavy incoming. Where did this come from?

Honestly, I don’t know and don’t care. And even though I know those other guys will be back if Tech doesn’t go 12-0, I don’t care about that either. Sugar Bowl, Orange Bowl, which ever bowl. Let’s enjoy it. The team and coaches have worked their royal whatevers off to earn it. And I think the fans helped some, too. Thanks for listening. I feel much better.

The meeting between Tech and Florida State in the Sugar Bowl (I'm in a positive frame of mind) undoubtedly will lead to a complete dissection of the Florida State team and season over the next several weeks. I'd like to kick this off by asking for some help in understanding what, to me, was one of the weirdest happenings in a pretty weird college football season - the ending to the Florida State-Clemson / Bowden Bowl game back in late October. Maybe I wasn't paying close enough attention. Or maybe my Weird-O-Meter was overly primed by the earlier announcement from the crack ESPN broadcast team that the entire Florida State offensive line came down with the stomach flu DURING HALFTIME! Huh?

I also recognize that, like all Hokie fans back then, I was rooting like crazy for Clemson to pull off the upset and help the Hokies move up in the rankings. Perhaps this colored my reaction. Certainly, the complete absence of comment from our esteemed national sports media seems to suggest I saw something different - maybe something that wasn't there.

But, somehow I expected more from son-Bowden at the end. After all, he's a gambler. He pulled a couple of trick plays earlier in the game and seemed to have things really going his way. Clemson was "hanging around", which, as every true football fan knows, is the stuff really good upsets are made of. So what happened at the end? Let's go to the instant replay:

Clemson's down by 3 with just under a minute left. They have a fourth and about one at the FSU 26. The obvious question is whether to go for the first down or try the field goal. Decisions, decisions. What to do.

On the "go for it" side, there's the fact that Clemson's offense had been at least OK during the game (126 rushing yards, 3.4 per attempt; 139 yards on 11 for 26 passing, 5.3 per attempt), and it was only one crummy yard. Success means the chance for a touchdown and a MAJOR upset, or at worst, a shorter field goal try later. The down side is FSU stacks the line, covers all receivers, stuffs the play, and Clemson suffers a 3-point loss.

On the "kick the field goal" side - and here's my problem - I can't find anything. Son-Bowden is looking at a 43-yard attempt. As I remember the crack ESPN broadcast team numbers, the Clemson kicker had attempted only six field goals at that point in the season and hit only four (a check of the Clemson football site after the game showed the "team" as 6 for 12 on field goals, but this ain't any better sports fans). His longest made on the season was 43 yards - Hey, just like this one - but not so fast, my friend. This one's into the wind which had been pretty stiff, at least during parts of the game. Success means overtime and we do it all over again. The down side is a wounded duck that makes the end zone, albeit not between the uprights. Clemson suffers a 3-point loss.

So, do the numbers. A run/pass to pick up 1/3 to 1/5 of what you have already done on-average during the game, or rely on a kicker, who had missed between 1/3 and 1/2 of his attempts, to match his longest kick of the season into a stiff breeze. Seemed like a no-brainer to me. Like passing on Jack Kevorkian as your family health care provider or heading for the same express check-out lane as Peter Warrick. But, again, maybe I missed something.

As we all know, son-Bowden went with his kicker whose wounded duck made the end zone, albeit not between the uprights. Clemson suffers a 3-point loss.

My first reaction was to wonder what happened to the gambler in son-Bowden? (Truthfully, that was my second reaction. Good manners, and the fact that this is a family site, prevent me from relating my first one). Of course, you could argue that son-Bowden actually did gamble, did take the long-shot - but the one with no real payoff - and that makes even less sense.

In an effort to help us understand this perplexing decision, other-son/brother-Bowden/terry offered the following definitive analysis for ABC Sports: "I believe you need to have all the relevant facts and information to make that call, from the kicker to the consistency of the offense over the past few quarters in order to determine the best option. That is definitely one of those calls that would create a reaction …" Huh?

I think part of my problem is that I keep hearing son-Bowden's pre-game comment about how poppa-Bowden said he (son-Bowden) should "lose close". Interesting. Probably a joke. Likely I just missed something.