SDSU Has 15 More Tries to Get This Thing Right

The University of Miami has a wide receiver nicknamed Pee Wee who stands 6-feet-1 and weighs 180 pounds. San Diego State covered him Saturday evening with a guy who stands 5-6 and weighs 160 pounds and isn’t nicknamed Pee Wee.

That tells you a lot about these teams and the game they played in the Orange Bowl.

Miami’s idea of little is more along the lines of what San Diego State would consider big. Consequently, Miami’s football program is just that much further along than San Diego State’s. Miami indeed is where SDSU wants to be.

That Miami was a 42-6 winner was absolutely no surprise. If San Diego State had won this football game, the shock hereabouts would have been enough to light the state of Florida for 10 years.

But from San Diego State’s perspective, this game was nothing about which to be embarrassed. A 42-6 loss is nothing to feel good about, but this 42-6 loss was nothing to feel bad about.

“I’m not pleased with the overall results,” said John Wesselman, a senior defensive back, “but a lot of people thought it would be a lot worse.”

A whole lot worse.

In fact, there was a time Saturday when it looked like it might be a lot worse. Miami had a 28-0 lead after the first 17 minutes 18 seconds. Headlines such as The Massacre in Miami were coming to mind.

“We kept coming when it looked like it might get out of hand,” Wesselman said. “It was looking like they might get up over 100 or something.”

SDSU’s kids did keep coming. They did not roll over and let the Hurricanes blow them into the Bermuda Triangle. They never threatened to make a game of it, to be sure, but they did not let Miami make a farce of it, either.

What the Aztecs did was settle down defensively and turn up some heat. Craig Erickson, an outstanding quarterback befitting Miami’s recent history at the position, would throw five interceptions and be sacked four times. The Hurricanes were stopped on seven consecutive possessions between 28-0 and when they finally got off 28 with a touchdown in the fourth period.

“The last 2 1/2 quarters were close,” said Fred Miller, SDSU’s athletic director. “There were two different football games out there.”

Indeed, Miami had a 14-6 advantage over the last 42:42. That’s respectable football.

San Diego State’s problem was that it won’t see a defense like Miami’s unless maybe it scrimmages the Chargers. In truth, that may have been the best way to prepare for this game. SDSU went into the game with the No. 4 offense in the country, but Miami had the No. 1 defense. You know what they say about good pitching stopping good hitting. They say it for a reason.

Offense was the Aztecs’ forte, yet they managed to hold onto the ball for longer than two minutes only three times in 18 possessions, and one of those was for only 2:23. They redefined the term two-minute drill.

“Our defense played a great game,” said quarterback Dan McGwire, “but our offense couldn’t get anything going.”

But this program is getting something going. A loss to Miami is an understandable way of having a five-game winning streak stopped, but it does not detract from the fact that this team, at 6-4-1, is assured of a winning record regardless of what happens next week against Brigham Young . . . and don’t be surprised if SDSU beats BYU.

Al Luginbill, the head coach, seemed dispirited by the game, but his boss wasn’t.

“I feel Al’s one or two recruiting classes from competing straight up and down at this level,” Miller said, “and that’s our goal. I don’t feel bad at all right now. Our direction is set.”

This game was an indication that the Aztecs have a ways to go, but everyone knew that.

“We played tough part of the second quarter, all of the third quarter and part of the fourth quarter,” said Wesselman, who had two interceptions during that span, “but we have to get to the level where we can play Miami like that for four quarters. That’s where Coach Luginbill wants to get, and he’ll get there. I’m just sorry I’m a senior, and I won’t be here when it happens.”

Another senior, wide receiver Monty Gilbreath, also looked down that road he won’t be traveling.

“I know people were looking at this game like a measuring stick,” he said, “but it’s kind of hard to do that because we really didn’t play to our full potential. I definitely look down the road and see San Diego State competing with Miami, but I’m a senior, and I won’t get another shot.”

There will be plenty of opportunities for the university, if not for Wesselman and Gilbreath. This was the first of a 16-game series, with Game 2 scheduled for San Diego on Dec. 1, 1990.

Maybe, just maybe, when these two teams square off in 1999, it will be billed as a showdown between The Team of the ‘80s and The Team of the ‘90s . . . Miami vs. San Diego State. It does seem unlikely, but who would have thought in 1979 that Miami would be where it is today?