Bye to the 'bone

Sporting News, The, Oct 3, 1994 by Michael Bradley

Bellard was excited about his discovery, but he had to persuade Coach Darrell Royal to use it. So, he taught a few former Texas players the offense and ran it for Royal that summer. "I played quarterback, because I was the only one who knew what he had to do," Bellard says. It wasn't a tough sell. The formation reminded Royal of the old split-T offense he used to run as an All-America quarterback under Bud Wilkinson at Oklahoma and appealed to his own triple-option background -- Royal had coached the veer while an assistant at Tulsa in the early '50s.

"It's a good, sound method of running the ball, and it damn near causes people to commit everything to stopping the running game," Royal says. "It opens up great throwing opportunities. The quarterbacks who are good at it are blacksmith types. They can't be running the ball out of bounds."

The wishbone's debut was inauspicious. Texas tied Houston in the 1968 opener and lost to Texas Tech in Week 2. The Longhorns then won 30 consecutive games, and captured national titles in 1969 and '70. Street, fullback Steve Worster and halfback Jim Bertelsen practically ran over opponents, amassing huge point totals and controlling the clock. Royal couldn't think of a name for the offense himself (he wanted to call it the Y-Formation) so it took a sportswriter, Houston writer Mickey Herskowitz, to come up with one of the most charming terms in college football.

Royal and Bellard were generous with their discovery. Texas practices were open to the public, and coaches came from all over to learn about the wishbone. Bellard remembers a two-week visit from UCLA's Pepper Rodgers before the 1972 season. "By Christmas, old Pepper had written a book about the offense," Bellard says. In 1973, UCLA's wishbone led the nation in rushing.

In 1970, Oklahoma became a wishbone convert. Stung by a loss to Oregon State in the third game of the season and faced with an open week before Texas, Sooners Coach Chuck Fairbanks adopted the three-back offense. Oklahoma was blasted, 41-9, by the Longhorns that season but finished 11-1 in 1971, including a 48-27 rout of Texas. Alabama went with the 'bone in 1971, following a 6-5 campaign in 1969 and a 6-5-1 record in '70. In its first year using the offense, Alabama finished 11-1.

When Barry Switzer took over for Fairbanks (who toyed with installing the wishbone as coach of the Partiots) in 1973, he began a ground-based reign of terror that resulted in three national titles, six national rushing championships, 12 Big Eight crowns and 157 victories in 16 seasons. During Switzer's tenure, the Sooners unleashed a parade of All-America halfbacks, including Joe Washington, Elvis Peacock and Billy Sims, and featured a passel of triple-option maestros like Steve Davis, Thomas Lott, J.C. Watts and Jamelle Holieway.

But just as it was Oklahoma that had led the way during the wishbone's boom time, it was the Sooners who contributed heavily to its demise. In its 20-14 loss to Miami in the 1988 Orange Bowl, Oklahoma was held to 179 yards rushing. In an instant, people forgot about the Sooners leading the country in six offensive categories and focused on the wishbone's inability to thrive against Jimmy Johnson's quick defense.