Can't wait for New Year's? To some its just a start

Sporting News, The, Dec 4, 1995 by Ivan Maisel

Most of college football will spend the next month focusing on the relative strengths of Nebraska and Florida. Is the Cornhuskers' running game the earthbound equivalent of the Gators' passing? Can Tom Osborne become the first coach since Paul Bryant to win consecutive national championships? Who throws harder -- Tommie Frazier with a football or Steve Spurrier with a visor?

Nebraska and Florida may provide the only sense of normalcy available in a season that begs for explanation. Northwestern is going to the Rose Bowl. Miami and Alabama are begging the NCAA to let them stay home from a bowl game. The Heisman Trophy continues to ask players for a ride home only to be left at the curb. It's understandable if you feel disoriented. Don't worry -- the season will be over soon.

On several campuses, the season can't end fast enough and not for the reason you think. At Clemson and Arizona State, at Kansas and Miami, this season hasn't been nearly a good as next season promises to be. Those four schools can't wait for next fall.

The Tigers look especially promising. They never really dropped far -- Ken Hatfield did win 32 games in four years there -- but second-year coach Tommy West has placed Clemson within sight of Danny Ford-like success. After losing a 19-17 heartbreaker to Georgia, Clemson won its last five games. In doing so, the Tigers re-established their running game with tailback Raymond Priester (1,286 yards) and fullback Emory Smith.

Clemson also reclaimed its defensive tradition. Freshman linebacker Anthony Simmons went from high school to All-atlantic Coast Conference first team, making 142 tackles along the way. Although Virginia is the school that felled the giant this season, Clemson may be the one that closes the gap between Florida State and the rest of the league.

Arizona State lost in the closing seconds to arch-rival Arizona, 31-28, and may have cost itself a bowl bid. But the Sun Devils won four in a row before that, and in Jake Plummer they will have the best passing quarterback west of Gainesville, Fla. Kansas will end a magical year in paradise, playing UCLA in the Aloha Bowl. With 37 players returning from the first two teams, the Jayhawks figure to maintain the success that vaulted them into a tie for second in the Big Eight. Unfortunately, the league's top four teams will be bunched together next season in the Big 12 North.

The biggest question pertaining to Kansas is whether Coach Glen Mason will return after eight seasons. He has built a foundation in Lawrence, but his life there is in the midst of change. Mason is recently divorced, and a son will graduate from high school in 1996. Figure his name to come up in the next four weeks, when coaching jobs become available. Given that he is from New Jersey, he will be linked to an opening at Rutgers, if in fact Doug Graber is let go.

No team made as much progress from September to December as did Miami (and that includes Northwestern, which started out well). After a 1-3 start, the Hurricanes won their last seven, including the 35-24 defeat of Syracuse last week made possible by a stirring second-half comeback. Coach Butch Davis loses a handful of seniors, most notably punter Mike Crissy and kicker Dane Prewitt. The question, however, is whether they have played their last game.

With an NCAA penalty pending, Miami President Edward T. Foote III has expressed the opinion that perhaps the Hurricanes should stay on the sideline this New Year's Day to put an expected bowl sanction behind them. Athletic Director Paul Dee repeated it Saturday night: "We'd consider taking it sooner than later."

The problem is that Miami doesn't expect to hear from the NCAA Infractions Committee this week. (Alabama, waiting to hear from the Infractions Appeals Committee, is more optimistic. School officials want to get their penalty out of the way, too.) Once the bowl invitations are made Sunday, it would take a lot of fortitude to say no. Beating Syracuse made the Hurricanes eligible for the Orange Bowl, the last one in their home stadium in the centennial year of the city of Miami.

Quad wrangle

When Oregon opened the season September 5 against Utah, Joshua Smith sat in his home in Colorado Springs, Colo., by his own admission, "watching cartoons." When the Ducks ended the season Saturday, Smith kicked four field goals to account for all their points in a 12-10 defeat of Oregon State. Oregon wouldn't be in the Cotton Bowl without the freshman walk-on.

When kicker Matt Belden pulled a quadriceps muscle kicking off against the Utes, Oregon Coach Mike Bellotti put out an all-points bulletin for a kicker. Smith, a punter on a winless high school team a year ago, wasn't scheduled to report until later in September, when school began. After getting a call on a Monday, he packed and left. Smith got only as far as the Portland, Ore., airport, where he slept until he could get a ride the next day to Eugene.

Smith played against Illinois that Saturday with teammates who didn't know him. They know now. After making 2 of his first 6 field-goal attempts, he made 9 of his last 10, including kicks from 32, 20, 29 and 35 yards last Saturday. The next night, the Oregon coaches named Smith the winner of the Len Casanova Award, which goes to the outstanding freshman. Matt Belden, meet Wally Pipp.