Senior Bowl : Okoye Scores 4 Touchdowns; South Wins

MOBILE, Ala. — Christian Okoye, a Little All-American from Azusa Pacific, set a Senior Bowl scoring record with four touchdowns and enhanced his position among NFL scouts Saturday as the South edged the North, 42-38.

“Even I got excited,” South Coach Don Shula of the Miami Dolphins said of the highest-scoring game in Senior Bowl history.

“Coming from the NAIA to the Senior Bowl, I had a lot to learn,” Okoye said. “I thought I did what I had to do to impress the scouts.”

Okoye, who led the NAIA last season in rushing with 1,680 yards and 21 touchdowns, said he wants to play professional football. But if he fails to make it, he wants to throw the discus for his native Nigeria in the 1988 Olympic Games at Seoul, South Korea.

Okoye’s first three scores came on one-yard runs, and he later put the game out of reach with a six-yard touchdown with 1:06 left.

Okoye, who didn’t like football when he first saw a game, finished with 47 yards in 13 carries. His 4 touchdowns broke the record of three held by Jimmy DuBose of Florida (1976) and Jewerl Thomas of San Jose State (1980).

Okoye, a 244-pounder who had never seen a football until he arrived at the California school on a track scholarship in 1982, scored his first two touchdowns within a span of four minutes after third-quarter pass interceptions by Johnny Holland of Texas A&M; and John Little of Georgia.

Okoye’s second score gave the South a 28-24 lead, but the North regained the lead, 31-28, on a six-yard run by Dana Wright of Findlay with 2:32 left in the third.

The South then drove 80 yards to its winning score that came on Okoye’s one-yard run with 13:11 left in the game, which was played in intermittent light showers.

After Okoye’s third touchdown, a North comeback effort failed when Miller was intercepted by Britton Cooper of Alabama.

The South, leading 35-31, got Okoye’s fourth touchdown after the North failed to convert on two straight attempts to get one yard at its 35, turning the ball over on downs.

The South’s other touchdowns came on a 10-yard pass from Mike Shula of Alabama to Rod Bernstine of Texas A&M; and on a 47-yard scamper by Mississippi State’s Don Smith, voted the game’s most valuable player, after catching a screen pass from Cody Carlson of Baylor.

Oregon’s Chris Miller threw two touchdown passes in the first half to help the North to a 24-14 lead, an 8-yarder to Paul Jokisch of Michigan and a 22-yarder to Jon Embree of Colorado.

Greg Davis of The Citadel kicked a 22-yard field goal in the first quarter, and Michigan’s Jim Harbaugh competed a 40-yard pass play to Embree for a touchdown five seconds before halftime.

Miller connected with Jokisch on a 31-yard scoring pass with 20 seconds remaining, and, after the North recovered the on-side kickoff, Miller threw incomplete twice at the end of the game.

The total of 80 points for the two teams was the highest in the 38-year history of the play-for-pay college all-star game.