Titans Close a Should-Have-Been-Better Year at UOP

University of the Pacific football Coach Bob Cope thinks his team has been just a few plays away from going 8-1. The Tigers are 4-5.

Cal State Fullerton Coach Gene Murphy is convinced his team is better than 2-9, but that’s what it says in the standings.

Perhaps Cope and Murphy will get together and swap sob stories before their teams line up for a Pacific Coast Athletic Assn. game today at 2 p.m. in Pacific Memorial Stadium at Stockton. They could compare injury lists and reminisce about August, when they were both brimming with optimism.

Today’s game represents a chance for both teams to salvage something from the rubble of thoroughly disappointing seasons. For the Titans, this is the last chance. Fullerton won one game in September, one in October and has only this last game of its regular season to meet its monthly quota. The Titans also need a victory to avoid finishing with their worst record ever.

UOP, meanwhile, needs victories today and again in its season finale against Cal State Long Beach Nov. 29 to finish with its first winning season since 1977. Cope entered the season feeling he had the best team he has had since coming to Stockton in 1983. But that was before injuries fractured his wishbone offense and significantly damaged his defense. Since the season began, 12 UOP starters have suffered season-ending injuries.

In its fourth game of the season, UOP beat Minnesota, 24-20, at Minneapolis. The following week, the Tigers lost at home to UC Davis, a Division II school, and they haven’t been the same since. They have lost four of their last five games, including last week’s 14-10 defeat by Utah State that Cope called “as disappointing a loss as I’ve ever been associated with.”

Said Murphy: “This is a funny game. Here’s a team that beat a team that’s third in the Big Ten, and that loss may cost Minnesota a chance at a bowl game. Then they lose the next week to UC Davis.”

Murphy is still smarting from last week’s 48-24 loss to conference-leading San Jose State. The Titans fell behind, 28-0, midway through the second quarter and began seeing the familiar signs of defeat. “I’m not saying our kids gave up,” Murphy said, “but I think they did say, ‘Here we go again.”’

Fullerton running back Rick Calhoun was held to 19 yards for the second time in his last three games, and needs a big game today to hold off San Jose State’s Kenny Jackson in the race for the PCAA rushing title. Calhoun is one of 12 Fullerton seniors playing their last college game today. Titan Notes

The Titans haven’t finished with fewer than three victories in a season since 1975, when they were 2-9. . . . UOP has a 6-5 lead in the series with Fullerton, but the Titans have won the last three meetings. . . . UOP Athletic Director Carl Miller is the same AD who hired Gene Murphy to his first collegiate head coaching position at North Dakota. “He’s always been a very good friend,” Murphy said. . . . During his weekly luncheon earlier this week, Murphy thanked members of the Titan Athletic Foundation for coming out in the good times and the bad this season. “I can say good times, because two is plural,” he said. . . . Fullerton linebacker coach Kirk Harmon is a former UOP player and assistant coach. Steve Towne, UOP running back coach, served as an assistant to Jim Coletta at Fullerton in 1976. . . . Sophomore Keith Bowman, a reserve running back for Fullerton, has been moved to backup cornerback to give the Titans some needed depth in the secondary.