Bowden Has a Good Laugh Over Fight

Florida State Coach Bobby Bowden could only chuckle after hearing about Wednesday’s pre-Sugar Bowl scrap between Florida and Miami players in New Orleans.

Last year, at the Sugar Bowl, Bowden took some heat for the behavior of some of his players, kicker Sebastian Janikowski in particular, who was not reprimanded for a curfew violation.

Bowden invoked his “Warsaw Rule” with Janikowski and allowed the Polish kicker to play in Florida State’s national title win over Virginia Tech.

“Well, it happens to other people besides you, you know,” Bowden said Friday of the Florida-Miami spat. “That’s kind of the feeling you get.”

Bowden says he doesn’t anticipate any problems with his players as they prepare for Wednesday’s Orange Bowl game against Oklahoma.

“As long as my kids can’t find a Bourbon Street,” Bowden quipped. “Is there a Bourbon Street here? If there is, it’s off limits.”

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Florida State lost 11 touchdowns and 1,340 receiving yards when leading pass catcher Marvin “Snoop” Minnis was suspended from the game for academic reasons, but there are still plenty of yards left to spread around.

Seminole receivers caught 290 passes for 4,608 yards this season, and Bowden does not expect much drop-off in production.

“We’ve never been a team that goes out and plays two receivers,” he said. “That’s not us. We’re going to play six, seven, so when we lose a guy, we just take one of these guys and move him over there.”

Although Minnis is out, Florida State will welcome the return of Robert Morgan, who sat out the last three games because of a broken toe. Morgan has 19 catches for 366 yards and three touchdowns this season.

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Oklahoma is 12-0, ranked No. 1 in the BCS, defeated three top-five schools and is a 12-point underdog to Florida State?

“If those oddsmakers were determining our fate, we would be 7-4, 8-3 right now, and we’re not,” Oklahoma Coach Bob Stoops said.

Stoops said he would not use the point-spread difference as a motivational tactic.

“What’s to use?” he said. “Why? We’re competing for the national championship.”

Of course, Bowden expects Stoops to take every psychological advantage.

“You have to do that,” Bowden said. “It will challenge the kids. They don’t like it. They don’t like us being favored. I don’t know if I’m that happy about it either.”