He’s Finding a Home Away From Home : Football: Cowboys’ Emmitt Smith left college--and family--to play pro football. Now he says there are no regrets.

Emmitt Smith is a long way from home for the first time in his life, he doesn’t much like his own cooking, there’s nobody to just sit down and talk to, and now he’s beginning to wonder about the one thing that has always made him feel secure.

Smith, a first-round draft pick by the Dallas Cowboys this year, always has felt most comfortable with a football under his arm and a linebacker to elude. And he showed up for the Cowboys’ minicamp this spring pretty sure of two things: One, he would rather be home with his family in the house behind his grandparents’ place in Pensacola, Fla. Two, he would have a successful career as a professional running back.

Ten games into the season, it appears he was on target. He has rushed for 468 yards, ranking him seventh in the conference and second in the NFL among rookies behind Phoenix’s Johnny Johnson, who has 698.

That’s a decent debut, especially considering Smith didn’t sign until Sept. 4, missing all of training camp and the preseason. And then there’s the 3-7 Cowboys’ habit of falling behind early, which has forced them to pass.

Still, Smith is perplexed--and a bit perturbed--by the Dallas coaches’ willingness to abandon the game plan. He says they told him he was supposed to rush for 100 yards Sunday night against the 49ers. It was a team goal. Smith carried six times for 40 yards--a 6.7-yard-per-rush average--before leaving in the third quarter with a bruised wrist.

“They said they needed this and that,” Smith told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram after the game, “but I don’t see any running back at this level gaining 100 yards on six carries. That’s asking a little too much.”

The Cowboys fell behind early again--they trailed, 14-3, in the second quarter and eventually lost, 24-6--and had just 13 offensive plays in the second half. But Smith believes Dallas could have put together some drives by sticking to its plan and grinding out a few first downs on the ground.

The 49ers didn’t exactly stuff the run, either. Dallas rushed for only 78 yards but did it in just 15 carries, a 5.2-yard average. At that pace, you shouldn’t have to worry about third downs, but the Cowboys got only one in ten third-down tries. Quarterback Troy Aikman passed eight times and ran twice.

Smith likes the odds better when he carries the ball. The Cowboys have given it to him on third down 17 times. Twelve times, he’s brought a first down back to the huddle.

“I felt like there were times in the game, when the game was still close, where I could’ve carried the ball a lot more than I did,” Smith said. “We were running good. We should have kept going to it and could have kept their offense on the bench and put the ball in the end zone.

“I just felt like we were doing pretty good on the ground and I didn’t understand why we went away from it, that’s all. I’m not really upset about it. I just think right now we’re still looking for a definite identity and, at this point in time, we need to quit searching and start doing whatever it takes to win, no matter if it’s passing the ball or running the ball or what.”

Coach Jimmy Johnson can relate. There’s nothing he would rather see Sunday than a 100-yard rushing performance from Smith, who says his wrist is “fine” and won’t hamper his performance against the Rams.

But in the past two games, the Cowboys’ total point production has been provided by kicker Ken Willis, who has made five field goals.

“I have the same frustrations,” Johnson said. “Some games, we’ve not had the football long enough to get everyone involved. (Against the 49ers), nobody got to touch it as many times as they’d like to touch it.”

These are the times that Emmitt J. Smith III remembers that nothing comes all that easy.

He grew up in an inner-city, government housing project in Pensacola, but his mother, father, three brothers and two sisters were a close family that hung together in tough times. He says his decision to leave the University of Florida for the NFL after his junior year was difficult, primarily because it meant leaving home.

“I was 20 at the time and had never been out on my own.” Smith said. “It was a big step, something I was more afraid of than anything. Right now, to this day, I still haven’t adjusted to it.

“You have to get used to being by yourself, not having no one right next door you can sit down and chat with all the time. I came out here not knowing anybody at all except a few cousins. And also trying to learn a new system. It’s a whole new ballgame.”

Making the transition on the field has been less of a problem. Some said Smith was too small--he’s 5 feet 9 and 199 pounds--but that didn’t faze him. He has been playing with the big boys all his life.

Heck, sometimes toying with them.

When he was 12, his team played a team that included players as old as 16. Smith got beat up a little in the first half but scored three touchdowns in the second, carrying his team to an 18-6 victory.

As a freshman at Florida, he set a school single-game rushing record in his first start, running for 224 yards against Alabama in Birmingham. Four games later, in his seventh game, he surpassed the 1,000-yard mark earlier than any player in the history of college football.

So the progression to NFL rookie sensation seemed most natural. Having experienced both the highs and lows of life in the big leagues, however, Smith finds himself wondering what might have been.

He would have been a prime candidate to win the Heisman Trophy had he stayed in school. In 1987, he became the second freshman in history to finish in the top 10 in the balloting.

“I do sit at home, and I wonder, and I ask myself if I had stayed in school would I have won the Heisman?” he said. “Or, if I stayed in school, would I have gotten hurt? If I stayed in school would Florida be doing as good as they’re doing now, or could we be undefeated? I ask myself questions like that all the time, and we’ll never know the answer.

“Right now, I’m happy where I’m at, and I don’t regret anything. But I think if I’d stayed and been healthy all year, with the season they’re having and the style of offense they’re running, I think I could have been the Heisman Trophy winner.”

Sweet dreams, but Smith knows he must now concentrate on making his mark in the NFL and salvaging what he considers a disappointing season for the Cowboys.

“It’s been difficult,” he said. “I expected things to be better than what they are now. It’s been real frustrating for the whole offense. We’ve had the potential since day one, but we’ve been looking to come around since day one.

“We’ve showed in some games the capability of putting points on the board. We’ve showed the ability to come back and win it in the fourth quarter. We’ve showed the ability to have a well-rounded attack in some games. We’re just inconsistent.

“I think it will all come together soon. I just hope it happens before the season is over.”

It may be a while for the Cowboys, but Smith has already arrived.

Smith already has more career yards for Dallas than any of his teammates.

He had 121 yards in 23 carries in the Cowboys’ first victory over Tampa Bay Oct 7.

Since then, Dallas has lost four of five games, and you can bet the Rams are hoping they don’t rediscover their running game Sunday.

Six carries sounds just about right to them.