The Texas Tech-A&M football rivalry has spilled over into the NFL with the Dallas Cowboys drafting Texas A&M quarterback Stephen McGee.

"I'm happy for Stephen McGee," Texas Tech head coach Mike Leach told The Dallas Morning News. "The Dallas Cowboys like him more than his coaches at A&M did."

Huh?

What coaches? Former head coach Dennis Franchione and offensive coordinator Les Koenning, Jr.? Or current head coach Mike Sherman along with offensive coordinator Nolan Cromwell and quarterbacks coach Tom Rossley?

Or did Leach mean to insult both staffs?

You'd think someone who graduated from Pepperdine University School of Law would be a little more specific. Then again, Leach probably said exactly what he meant to. Leach had to be miffed that his record-setting quarterback, Graham Harrell, wasn't drafted. That's what his comments were really about.

Leach has been upset for some time that Harrell -- like all of the other quarterbacks he's had in Lubbock over the years -- hasn't received his due.

"I guess leading the nation in passing is not everything it's cracked up to be," Leach said last year at the Big 12 Media Days. "Those other folks -- they have something more important to emphasize."

Those other things are physical tools, which are apparently the reason 32 NFL teams passed on Harrell (6-foot-2, 223 pounds).

Many also believe Leach is the real star of Tech's wide-open offense, not the quarterbacks who have simply been his puppets.

So even though Harrell passed for 4,747 yards in the regular season with only seven interceptions for a 10-1 team last season, he wasn't invited to the Heisman Trophy award dinner.

"If Graham is not invited to the Heisman, they ought to quit giving out the award," Leach said at the time. "It is a shameless example of politics ruling over performance. The other guys are deserving, but he has earned a place alongside them."

Harrell was a distant fourth in the Heisman voting.

The Heisman is a great award, but it's just that. That disappointment was mild compared to this past weekend. Playing in the NFL is every player's dream.

Harrell had to watch 11 other quarterbacks get drafted over the weekend. It had to be extremely painful to see Dallas pick McGee. Harrell grew up a pass away from Texas Stadium as an all-stater at Ennis High School.

Leach cleverly gave his guy some props when asked about McGee.

Indirectly he asked why A&M didn't win more with a guy good enough to be drafted in the fourth round by the Dallas Cowboys while Leach worked with someone not good enough to be even drafted?

Tech was 45-18 in Harrell's five years, including a 26-14 Big 12 record. A&M was 32-29 in McGee's five years, including a 19-21 league record.

The Aggies' lackluster results certainly weren't McGee's fault, and Leach knows that. But ripping A&M's coaching staff -- past or present -- to make a point is wrong on so many fronts.

Franchione has been taken to task for making McGee run the option, and rightfully so. But Franchione believed the way he used McGee was the best way to win, and you can't fault the former coach for what he believed in.

Sherman fully expected McGee to flourish in his West Coast offense last season. Sherman also became just as big a believer in McGee's character and talent as Franchione had been. Sherman said at his season-ending informal get-together with the media that McGee would be drafted, probably as high as the third round. That was before McGee's stock shot up at the East-West Shrine Game practices and the NFL scouting combine.

Come to think about it, Leach is right. None of the A&M coaches liked McGee -- they loved him.

McGee and the Aggies could have the last laugh, though. McGee wearing a Dallas Cowboys uniform while standing at midfield inside Dallas' new stadium should be a pretty good recruiting poster.

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Sherman didn't let Leach's comments slide, which will earn him big points with the Aggies.

"I don't understand Coach Leach's comments about Stephen McGee," Sherman told The Dallas Morning News. "He was named our starter until he got injured. I've always believed in Stephen's character and I've always believed in his talent, and I always will. I see him having an outstanding NFL career.

"Coach Leach is in no position to comment about my relationship with Stephen McGee."

McGee, not surprisingly, praised his Aggie coaches.

"I don't know where that comment came from or who it was directed at," McGee said. "But I am shocked because my time at A&M was very special to me. Obviously I got injured, and many people think that Coach Sherman benched me. That's just not true.

"If I had a son today and he was a college quarterback, I would send him to Coach Sherman or Coach Fran without any doubt, without any question, first and foremost.

"My time at A&M had some ups and downs, bumps and bruises. But I am so thankful for the time and proud to be an Aggie."

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Leach didn't confine his remarks to the Aggie coaches.

Tech star wide receiver Michael Crabtree had been projected as a possible top five pick, but was taken 10th by San Francisco. Some say Crabtree dropped because of a bad-attitude label given to him by Cleveland Browns head coach Eric Mangini.

"Crabtree as a receiver has been more successful than that guy has been as a coach," Leach told San Francisco reporters during a teleconference. "I think he took it upon himself to figure that in a few minutes he had all the expertise on the subject of Michael Crabtree that he needed. And so we'll see how those non-divas up there in Cleveland do this year."

Leach might want to change his tune. Harrell has agreed to attend the Cleveland Browns rookie minicamp this weekend, hoping to earn a free-agent contract.

It might not be wise for Harrell to tell Mangini "that's the way we did it at Tech under Coach Leach."

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How good would Texas Tech have been if Leach had signed Lampasas' Keith Null in 2004 instead of Harrell?

Null is the record-setting quarterback from West Texas A&M who was drafted in the sixth round by St. Louis.

Null was 385-of-562 passing (68.5 percent) for 5,097 yards with 48 TDs and 15 interceptions for the 11-2 Buffaloes last season. He had a 167.54 passing efficiency.

Harrell was 406-of-568 passing (71.5 percent) for 4,747 yards with 41 TDs and seven interceptions. He had a passing efficiency of 163.04.

The 6-4, 220-pound Null is a late-bloomer. He redshirted in 2004 and threw only 84 passes in his next two years before rewriting the record books in the Lone Star Conference.

Competition in the LSC doesn't compare to the Big 12, but the NFL scouts like Null's physical attributes.

"He had a heck of a game in the Cactus Bowl [a Division II all-star game]," St. Louis general manager Billy Devaney said. "We try to measure him against better competition, and it's not the Senior Bowl but it's still pretty good draftable players."

Null didn't even make the state's Top 100 prospects by Rivals.com out of high school. McGee was rated 11th and Harrell 24th. The state's other top quarterbacks in 2004 were Grand Prairie's Rhett Bomar (No. 2), North Shore's Robbie Reid (No. 6), Brownwood's Kirby Freeman (No. 16), Calallen's Jordan Chambless (No. 70), Houston Washington's Joseph Fields (No. 73), Bay City's Scott Elliott (No. 80) and Arlington Grace Prep's David Ramirez (No. 86).

Null was the next-to-last quarterback taken in the draft, the 196th overall pick. Purdue's Curtis Painter was the 201st pick by Indianapolis. Bomar went in the fifth round to the New York Giants. Fresno State's Tom Brandstater, who played at Kyle Field a couple of years ago, went to the Denver Broncos in the fifth round.

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Leach hasn't had a breakthrough quarterback at the next level at Tech.

Kliff Kingsbury is in charge of quality control at the University of Houston. B.J. Symons is with the Tampa Bay Storm of the Arena Football League and Sonny Cumbie was with the AFL's Los Angeles Avengers, a team that folded last week. And Cody Hodges is out of football.

Maybe the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal needs to call Sherman, a former NFL head coach and general manager, and ask him why Leach's quarterbacks can't make it at the next level.

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A&M defensive end Michael Bennett, expected to be a late-round pick, was among six free agents signing with Seattle. Aggie cornerback Danny Gorrer, who wasn't expected to be drafted, signed with New Orleans.

Robert Cessna's e-mail address is robert.cessna@theeagle.com.