Andrew Gardner: The Alexis Serna of the FCS 2008 Season

Let's be honest. It takes God-given skill and wit to make extra points and field goals accurately.

It takes even more God-given skill and wit and/or none thereof to miss extra points and field goals. Especially extra points.

In football, extra points are so easy to miss, you won't even know you've missed until you see the officials wave their hands sideways to confirm of your ineptitude as a kicker.

The Football Bowl Subdivision is known for having notable chokers in the kicking game, the most notorious to date being Alexis Serna of Oregon State.

But if you think Alexis's futility in making extra points was bad enough to envision the lovable loser getting hazed at a local frat house in Corvallis as punishment, you ain't seen nothin' yet.

Today's game between Football Championship Subdivision No. 3-ranked Cal Poly (who will be awaiting their assignment in the 16-team tournament tomorrow) and struggling Big Ten power Wisconsin at the Camp Randall Stadium in Madison will not be remembered for the Badgers' 36-35 victory in overtime and the reliable legs of one P.J. Hill.

This contest will be remembered for this mere fact, this cruel reality: that Andrew Gardner, the kicker for the Mustangs, possesses an uncanny ability to dare to be stupid in missing extra points. Gardner exhibits this talent so precisely and with grandiose clutch that even Serna may be enviable of.

Nothing could be more defining of Gardner's role as the goat that sparked a million Mustang howls of "I Can't Watch This" with his three missed extra points.

Oh sure, he made a 35-yard field goal and converted two extra conversions, but he made three missed extra points that can make any person in San Luis Obispo howl like the wolves in the canyons. Like the wind in the willows.

His first missed conversion was with 8:42 remaining in the second quarter, but they weren't as venomous as his second and third attempts.  With 8:12 remaining in regulation, he missed an extra point that would have made it 30-21 Mustangs.

The Badgers would have needed to win the onside kick after making the 2-point conversion on the touchdown. And the third missed extra point, in the first overtime period, left the door wide open for Philip Welch, Gardner's counterpart donning the red and white for Wisconsin to show him how a conversion should be done.

Broken hearts wear green and gold, and the one doing the heart breaking wears the number 94.

It's misses like Gardner's three-and-out that may not bode well for Cal Poly in the first round of the tournament. In fact, don't be surprised if Weird Al Yankovic, an alumnus of Cal Poly, considers singing the praises of Andrew Gardner's failures.

Because while Serna will be remembered for his chokes against LSU, he's not the only kicker in the college game to blow it with style. Perhaps, as the Mustangs head back on the flight to California, a certain payer on their special teams unit will be singing to the strains of "Why Does This Always Happen to Me?" with his head bowed.

And the reason is all too obvious. Andrew Gardner will be remembered as the Alexis Serna of Division I FCS football in the 2008 season.