ROSE BOWL: MICHIGAN 22, USC 14 : Michigan Doesn’t Suffer a Brown-Out in This Rose Bowl

As Michigan fans counted down the final seconds of the 1989 Rose Bowl Monday, Demetrius Brown took the final snap and fell down.

Then the Wolverine quarterback jumped so high you thought he was never going to come down.

Brown lofted the ball into the air and pulled it back into his left arm, cradling it like a father holding a newborn baby.

“I’m going to give it to Bo,” Brown said, after Michigan presented Schembechler with a 22-14 victory over USC.

Brown ran through a gantlet of outstretched hands as he jogged into a tunnel leading to the locker room. It was a moment of jubilation and vindication.

Although Brown doesn’t easily display his emotions, he cracked a smile as proudly ran off the field.

“Am I happy?” Brown asked. “Yes. This is the Rose Bowl. Everybody felt we couldn’t do it, but we proved them wrong.”

A loner, he planned to celebrate the biggest victory of his career alone.

“I’m in pain because I hurt my back in the third quarter,” Brown said. “I’m going to go rest my tailbone.”

Brown helped Michigan ease the pain of losing 7 of its previous 8 Rose Bowl appearances.

After a poor start, Brown bounced back to lead the Wolverines to 3 second-half touchdowns as Michigan overcame a 14-3 halftime deficit.

Although he completed his first 4 passes, Brown misfired on 5 consecutive throws as Michigan’s offense got out of sync in the first half. He overthrew receivers and saw perfectly thrown passes dropped.

Faced with a similar situation in the 1987 season, Brown tried to force his passes into double and triple coverage and wound up throwing a school-record 16 interceptions.

A year of experience and losing his starting job to Michael Taylor has helped him understand himself and the Michigan offense. Brown maintained his poise against the Trojans.

When Taylor went down with an injury late this season, Brown went back into the lineup and helped the Wolverines win the Big Ten title.

“The biggest problem Demetrius had was that they allowed him to do too much because of his abilities,” said Mark Messner, Michigan’s All-American defensive tackle. “He tried to force things. But he’s a tremendous talent and (an) underrated quarterback.”

Although Brown was overshadowed by Rodney Peete going into the game, Brown was more consistent than USC’s All-American quarterback in the Rose Bowl.

Brown completed 11 of 24 passes for 144 yards and 1 touchdown, contrasted with Peete’s 15 of 21 passes for 158 yards with 2 interceptions and 0 touchdowns.

“Demetrius had a great game,” split end Greg McMurtry said. “He came out and got us in the right plays and did everything he had to do to win that game.”

Said Gary Moeller, Michigan’s offensive coordinator: “I’m really proud of Demetrius. He was the guy everybody expected to throw an interception and he didn’t.”

Brown set the tone for Michigan’s second-half comeback on the last series of the first half when he drove the Wolverines from their own 31 to the USC 16 in just 1 minute 8 seconds.

Brown rifled a pass to John Kolesar to get Michigan to midfield and followed with a 23-yard strike to Derrick Walker to the Trojan 16.

Although the clock ran out on the Wolverines, the drive re-established Brown’s confidence and that of Michigan.

“It wasn’t so much that Demetrius had a bad first half, because everyone had a bad first half,” offensive tackle Mike Husar said. “We knew we were getting beat in the first half, and we weren’t going to let it happen in the second half.”

Brown directed Michigan on a 70-yard touchdown march on the first possession of the second half, keeping the Trojan defense off-balance as he deftly mixed the plays sent in by Schembechler with some calls of his own.

Seeing an opening in the Trojan defense, Brown called an audible, and the Wolverines ran a flanker reverse to Kolesar for 16 yards.

“The way Kolesar wanted to play this game we had to give him the ball as much as we could, and he probably should have been given the ball more,” Brown said.

Brown wouldn’t admit to calling the reverse at the line of scrimmage.

“He’s not going to tell you,” Schembechler said. “He’s very well trained.”

Brown set up the touchdown with a 22-yard scramble to the USC 6. He then completed a 6-yard touchdown pass play to Chris Calloway for Michigan’s first touchdown.

After Brown’s passing softened up USC’s defense, the Wolverines went to fullback Leroy Hoard, who did most of the work when Michigan drove 92 yards to score the go-ahead touchdown on the first play of the fourth quarter.

Although Hoard was named the player of the game after rushing for 142 yards and 2 touchdowns, he shared the credit with Brown.

“Demetrius has really grown a lot,” Hoard said. “He made a couple of mistakes but he hung in there.”