After the Southeastern game, Joe Burrow mentioned that he wasn’t a person who slides to avoid taking a hit. He took so far to say that “You can book it, I’m not sliding.” After that statement, we knew that the former Ohio State Buckeye wasn’t afraid of taking hits by some of the vaunted SEC defenses that he faced in his first season with the LSU Tigers.
What we saw on Tuesday afternoon was even more impressive. Burrow had an incredibly rough start for LSU in the PlayStation Fiesta Bowl going 2-for-6 in the first two drives which included a pick six that made it 14-3 about halfway through the first quarter. That pick six was helped by a big hit on the Tigers quarterback by Joey Connors that left him in a heap. When he got up, he had a cut on the side of his neck and at first glance, it seemed like Burrow might be sitting out for at least a couple of plays to gather himself and be able to execute against a UCF defense that had stymied the Tigers at this point of the ballgame.
Joe Burrow had a cut on his neck after that big blindside block on the interception return pic.twitter.com/3nMK1GpJk3
— RedditCFB (@RedditCFB) January 1, 2019
Look back at the first paragraph at this article and you’ll understand that he wasn’t leaving the ballgame unless he was carted off the field. From that point on, Burrow turned it up to another level, playing like a man possessed. The first play from scrimmage was a 15 yard pass to Stephen Sullivan followed up by an 11 yard run to get the Tigers deep into enemy territory. That was a statement from Burrow that he wasn’t about to back down from the challenge that the UCF Knights brought to the table.
After that questionable hit by Connors, he went off on the Knights secondary going 19-of-28 for 363 yards and four touchdowns on the way to a 40-22 win on New Year’s Day. Keep in mind that this was a team that heading into the Texas A&M game hadn’t thrown for a touchdown since the win over Ole Miss. This was an offense that we haven’t seen in a while and it really showed what Burrow and the rest of this Tigers offense is capable of in 2019, especially with the additions at running back and the offensive line.
-Clint Domingue