Cornish, UCLA’s Best Lineman, Wants to Be Best Dressed

To Frank Cornish, starting center on the UCLA football team, those shops that specialize in outsized men’s clothing are little more than warehouses for polyester and out-of-date fashions.

“All those plaids and bell bottoms,” he said, contemptuously.

But, for now, he has no choice.

Someday, though, the 6-foot 4 1/2-inch, 265-pound junior would like to open his own line of, shall we say, brawny boutiques, stocking nothing but designer items for the big and beefy.

For, while offensive linemen are usually starved for attention, Cornish doesn’t want to demand it by dressing like Lt. Norman Buntz, the fashion failure of television’s “Hill Street Blues.”

“I enjoy dressing nice,” he said.

Cornish dresses for success in blue and gold nylon mesh each Saturday in the fall. His coaches call him the Bruins’ best offensive lineman and rate him at least on par with his more decorated contemporaries in the Pacific 10 Conference, Andy Sinclair of Stanford and Joe Tofflemire of Arizona.

A starter at guard for the last four games of the 1986 season after Jim Alexander broke his hand, Cornish was moved to center in the spring of 1987 and started all 12 games there for the Bruins last season, earning recognition as a first-team sophomore All-American.

Steve Axman, who coaches the Bruin guards and centers, calls Cornish “an excellent technique blocker” and lists the lineman’s major attributes as strength, quickness, explosiveness and agility.

“All his fundamentals are sound,” Axman said. “And he has an excellent knowledge of offensive line play. He has an excellent perception of offense and of blocking needs, so he rarely makes a mistake.”

In Axman’s opinion, Cornish is the Bruins’ most complete offensive lineman.

“The center position today requires a person who has strength and bulk and yet is extremely quick and nimble,” Axman said. “So, really, it’s like he’s a combination of other positions.

“People can play tackle because they’re big and strong. They can play guard because they’re quick and agile. But the center position requires all of those things.”

Cornish came to UCLA from Chicago, where his mother, Gloria, quickly dissuaded him from pursuing his boyhood dream of becoming a jockey.

“I told him, ‘Son, you are the size of the average jockey now and you’re 4 years old,’ ” Gloria said. “ ‘People want winning jockeys. Your horse would never come in.’ ”

Gloria Cornish had a feeling that her only child, as big as a jockey before he even started school, might someday grow to be as big as a horse. His father, also Frank Cornish, was a defensive lineman for the Chicago Bears and the Miami Dolphins.

Cornish’s parents separated when he was 3 and were divorced before he was 6. His mother, an English teacher at Chicago’s Metropolitan High School, reared him alone.

Finding clothes to fit him, she said, was always a problem. Consequently, Cornish developed an interest in owning his own store at an early age.

“We’d go shopping and he’d get disgusted,” she said. “It was always a problem that he couldn’t wear the trendy stuff that kids wear.

“He’d tell me, ‘The little man won’t be able to buy anything in my store. I don’t even want any little men in my store.’ ”

Not that he is mean-spirited.

To the contrary, Cornish seems to have a knack for disarming friends and strangers with his gregarious personality and for saying the right thing to defuse a tense situation.

“He’s extremely good-natured, kind of the court jester of the offensive line,” Axman said. “He really likes to laugh and really helps keep the line loose.”

Said Cornish: “Whenever the opportunity’s there to crack a good joke, I’ll take it. I don’t sit around and wait. I mean, you’ve got to make it through practice. Blocking that sled all day is kind of monotonous. You get a good laugh going and everybody’s a little more vibrant.”

Of course, Cornish doesn’t always play the role of cut-up.

“He has a great ability to sense when the line needs somebody to take charge,” Axman said. “He kind of grabs them by the throat, threatens their life and says, ‘Let’s go.’ ”

Cornish hopes to bring the same type of intensity to the clothing business. He worked as a salesman this summer at a big man’s clothing store in Beverly Hills.

“I was tired of working those ditch-digging jobs,” he said. “That’s not me at all. I never intend to do anything like that. Not to put it down, but I see myself sitting behind a desk one day, running a business.”

And wearing his own line of designer clothes, of course.

“Definitely,” he said. “Nobody’s getting smaller. The whole world is growing.”

If Cornish has his way, the clothing industry will keep up.

Bruin Notes

On a mostly uninspiring day for the Bruins’ offense, quarterback Troy Aikman completed 8 of 12 passes for 45 yards in a scrimmage Saturday at the Rose Bowl.

“We want to do well against the defense,” said Aikman, who was sacked twice, “but at the same time, we’d be a little concerned if we marched up and down the field.”

Junior quarterback Tom Caragher completed 3 of 6 passes for 60 yards, including a 48-yard touchdown pass to junior split end David Keating. Freshman Bret Johnson was 6 of 11 for 54 yards, including a 13-yard touchdown pass to freshman tight end Tom Lassalette.

Fullback Mark Estwick gained 26 yards in 8 carries and tailback Eric Ball gained 23 yards in 8 carries.

At Aikman’s request, UCLA will limit media access to the senior quarterback. “It’s just been too hectic for him,” Coach Terry Donahue said. “He can’t just continuously meet with people. He’s a nice kid. He says yes to everybody. So, consequently, he just has to devote too much time to the media instead of concentrating on what he has to do. It’s time for him to be a good football player, or people aren’t going to want to talk to him.” . . . UCLA has printed 220,000 schedule posters featuring Aikman, who is billed as “College Football’s Top Gun.” On the back is the warning: “This poster may not be given to a high school or junior college student, or displayed publicly at a high school or junior college campus. To do so would be a violation of current NCAA rules.”

The Bruins are practicing on an intramural field because the sod on their regular practice field did not re-knit properly after a new drainage system was installed last spring. “It was a major screw-up on somebody’s part,” Donahue said. “I’m not sure who. It’s like trying to catch shifting sand.” Donahue said the Bruins are behind schedule in preparation for their Sept. 3 opener against San Diego State because the poor quality of the field has resulted in several minor ankle and foot injuries. The regular field won’t be available to the Bruins for at least another month, Donahue said. . . . Senior Steve Mehr, who was a defensive tackle, and sophomore Randy Austin, who was an inside linebacker, have been moved to tight end.