In 1966 Game, Bruins Found a Super Sub in Norman Dow

Take heart, USC fans:

It hasn’t been determined yet if a case of the measles will keep Rodney Peete out of Saturday’s game against UCLA, but 22 years ago UCLA challenged USC without its star quarterback, Gary Beban, and beat the favored Trojans, 14-7, in the 1966 game.

Norman Dow filled in for Beban, who had broken his ankle the previous week against Stanford, and directed 2 second-half touchdown drives for a 7 1/2-point underdog.

He scored the first on a 5-yard run and then, after USC had pulled even late in the third quarter, he set up the second with a 26-yard run and a 13-yard pass to Ray Armstrong. Cornell Champion scored for the Bruins on a 21-yard run with 6 minutes 20 seconds left.

Dow ran for a team-high 82 yards and completed 2 of 8 passes for 30 yards.

“It was the greatest 60 minutes of my life,” said Dow, who was nicknamed Avis by his teammates because of his status as the Bruins’ No. 2 quarterback.

The 6-foot, 175-pound senior played only 2 minutes as a sophomore, about 28 minutes as a junior and had played only sparingly in 3 games in his last season before facing USC. As a senior, including the USC game, he completed 12 of 22 passes for 152 yards and 1 touchdown.

“I lived with the pressure ever since Beban was hurt,” Dow said after the game. “I couldn’t leave my room (because) people would be there to wish me luck. I felt like a walking ghost. But then all the nervousness vanished when the game started. The pressure didn’t get to me at all. It was a new world.”

The victory completed a 9-1 season for UCLA, but USC, in a vote of conference athletic directors, was named to represent the Athletic Assn. of Western Universities in the Rose Bowl.

USC was routed by Notre Dame the week after the UCLA game, 51-0, and lost again to Purdue in the Rose Bowl game, 14-13, finishing with a 7-4 record.