Armstrong Closes Out Career on Sunny Side : Quarterback: Unfulfilled at West Point, the former Agoura High passer is finishing his career at UC Santa Barbara in a good frame of mind. He has passed for 1,583 yards in his past six games.

Steve Armstrong always seems to save the best for last.

Faced with a fourth-and-13 situation on the last play of his high school career, he threw a 27-yard touchdown pass and then kicked the extra point to give Agoura High a Southern Section championship in 1984. Now a senior at UC Santa Barbara, Armstrong has led the Gauchos to a school-record six-game winning streak with a stunning display of sustained excellence.

A symphony building to a crescendo, Armstrong has passed for 184, 152, 296, 214, 312 and 425 yards in the six games since he moved into the starting lineup.

“That championship game in high school, and this winning streak will be some of my better memories,” said Armstrong, whose quarterback rating is a glossy 149.0 during the past six games. “I’m playing well, and it’s a lot of fun. I have some good memories. All good things have to come to an end, unfortunately.”

His totals in the past two games, a 51-3 victory over the University of San Diego and a 59-0 win against Menlo College, are virtually a season in themselves. Despite playing only three quarters in each blowout, Armstrong completed 52 of 73 passes for 747 yards and eight touchdowns with no interceptions.

He set a school single-half record with 272 first-half yards against San Diego and broke the school single-game yardage mark against Menlo. “We don’t have the talent to cope with him,” Menlo Coach Ray Solari said. “I would say he’s got a good name for his talents, Armstrong, strong-arm, it ties right in.”

The Gauchos (7-2) will end their season this afternoon in a 1:30 homecoming game against Azusa Pacific, giving Armstrong, a history major, one more chance to scribble his name across the pages of the Santa Barbara history books.

With 17 touchdowns, he has tied the Santa Barbara single-season record and he is only 210 yards, a quarter of work at his rate, shy of the yardage record. Armstrong (6-feet-2, 212 pounds) has compiled these numbers without playing a down in the first two games and playing briefly in the third against San Francisco State.

The Gauchos had left their pride in San Francisco after a 32-14 loss dropped them to 1-2, and Coach Rick Candaele went back to basics the next week of practice. He told his team to get physical, benched junior quarterback Mike Curtius and installed Armstrong.

Both of Armstrong’s previous seasons had been cut short by injuries. He had been first team briefly during the preseason before an arm injury forced him to miss a week and a half of workouts.

“He didn’t get disappointed; I think our players respected him for that,” Candaele said. “We also decided Steve Armstrong was the guy who could give us the composure and leadership we needed.”

That week, Armstrong threw three touchdown passes and Santa Barbara defeated Cal Lutheran, 24-21. Since then, the Gauchos (7-2) have outscored their opponents, 191-39. “That was the turning point of our season,” Candaele said. “He’s gotten better every week. Our turnaround isn’t just Steve Armstrong, but he’s one of (the factors).”

Jim Sterbick, Santa Barbara’s offensive coordinator and a former graduate assistant at Washington State, has modeled the Gaucho offense after the system former WSU Coach Dennis Erickson used with Timm Rosenbach last season. In 1988, Armstrong started twice and passed for 406 yards, but he has steadily grown in the new system. “Our offense is a lot simpler. I feel a lot more comfortable with it,” said Armstrong, who watches an hour of film every day at 8 a.m. “I’ve also been able to able to read defenses a lot better.”

The offense uses multiple receivers to spread the field, which also opens up Santa Barbara’s one-back running attack.

“The best thing he has going for him is great understanding of our offense,” Candaele said. “He doesn’t make the big mistakes that put your team in the hole.”

His judgment has not always been so astute. After graduating from Agoura, he threw himself into a situation that almost ended his college career.

Armstrong matriculated to West Point, but after two and a half weeks of football practice, he was cut. Army had recruited nine quarterbacks, and there wasn’t much room for a strong-armed Californian in Army’s wishbone offense.

“I think I went there for all the wrong reasons, which was football,” said Armstrong, who had been told that Army had only recruited three quarterbacks. “I thought it would be more like a regular college.”

Armstrong then spent a year at Moorpark College but was again caught in a quarterback numbers crunch. After sharing time with Steve Haddad and Dan Nagelmann, who started several games at Cal Lutheran this season, Armstrong moved on to Santa Barbara.

A year and a half removed from West Point, Armstrong was back in his element in sunny Isla Vista.

“The places are totally opposite,” Armstrong said. “Here, there’s a very good social life, lots of parties, that kind of thing. At West Point, there were no parties.”

After Armstrong graduates at the end of the quarter, he may taste la dolce vita of professional sports in Italy, following the lead of former UCSB basketball player Brian Shaw. Steve Marks, a UCSB football assistant, also plays and coaches football during the winter in Italy and has expressed interest in recruiting Armstrong.

“I wouldn’t be making quite as much money (as Shaw),” said Armstrong, who has wanted to travel to Europe after graduation. “If this would work out, it would make it a lot easier.”