U. of Miami Coach’s Silver Lining Has a Cloud : New Man on the Job Must Live Up to a Stellar Record

New University of Miami football Coach Dennis Erickson may be good at his job, but he expects to have a hard time proving it this season.

“What people are going to say, in the situation I’m in, is if we win, we’re supposed to. If we lose, I screwed up,” Erickson said.

That’s the drawback in taking charge of a program that over the last six years has a 63-10 record, the best in the nation. Coach Jimmy Johnson, who departed for the Dallas Cowboys in February, left the Hurricanes with nowhere to go but down.

But Erickson--50-31-1 in seven years at Idaho, Wyoming and Washington State--decided that the chance to coach a perennial national championship contender was too good to pass up. And so far, he has no complaints about the high expectations surrounding him.

“The press has been great. The boosters have been great. They always are when you’re undefeated,” Erickson said.

Best Class

The Hurricanes should stay undefeated for a while. Their first six opponents won only 22 of 68 games last year. And Johnson did not leave the cupboard bare: His final recruiting class was his best, and 12 starters return from a team that last year came within a two-point conversion of winning Miami’s second straight national title.

Johnson did take with him All-American quarterback Steve Walsh, who decided to skip his senior season and joined the Cowboys via the supplemental NFL draft. Walsh will also be replaced by an Erickson--junior Craig, no relation to the new coach.

Erickson threw eight touchdown passes in two years as Walsh’s understudy.

“He has the talent to be as good as anybody I’ve been around,” said Dennis Erickson, who last year coached the nation’s leading passer, Timm Rosenbach. “How Craig does really is going to have a lot to do with how we play offensively.”

The coach has made some changes in the playbook. The new offense will spread the field with motion and a variety of formations, including many with a one-back set. But the emphasis at Miami, which has produced four NFL quarterbacks in the 1980s, will remain on the pass.

‘Throw the Football First’

“We’re going to throw the football first and run it second,” the coach said.

To run it, the Hurricanes have Leonard Conley and Shannon Crowell, who rushed for a combined 716 yards last year. To catch it, they have wide receivers Dale Dawkins and Randall Hill and tight ends Rob Chudzinski and Randy Bethel, who among them caught 18 touchdown passes.

The defense will be strongest in the line, with six returning regulars: tackles Russell Maryland, Jimmie Jones and Cortez Kennedy and ends Greg Mark, Willis Peguese and Shane Curry.

Also back is outside linebacker Maurice Crum, a second-team All-American for a defense that allowed only 10 points and 242 yards per game last year. Both figures were second in the nation.

The season probably will boil down to two dates--Oct. 28, when the Hurricanes visit Florida State, and Nov. 25, when Notre Dame visits Miami. A 31-30 loss at South Bend last year cost the Hurricanes the national championship.