Pawlawski Is a Bear Essential : College football: Quarterback does more than talk a good game in leading Cal to a 3-0 start.

This is the way it looked from the Cal sideline at Arizona Stadium in Tucson on Sept. 21:

First and 10 for the Golden Bears at the Cal three-yard line. Only one timeout left and 2:02 remaining in the game. Arizona leading, 21-20. About 80 yards to go for a semi-comfortable field-goal attempt. A first-year kicker waiting in the wings.

In other words, bleak.

This is the way it sounded inside the Cal huddle, quarterback Mike Pawlawski presiding:

“We can’t let these . . . stop us!” he said. “They’re not a good enough . . . team. We’re better than this team. We’re better than whoever we play. We’ve got to kick their . . . . We’ve got to bring them down!”

Wide receiver Brian Treggs was in the huddle that night. He remembers feeling Pawlawski’s rage, and understanding the repercussions should the Golden Bears fail to score.

“If we didn’t do it,” he said, “we definitely were going to have a problem with him after the game.”

Eighty-two yards later, Cal did as it was told. Pawlawski, the guy once called “the worst Pac-10 recruit of 1986,” completed passes of 18, 11 and 36 yards. Running back Russell White did the rest, moving the ball to the Arizona 15, where, with three seconds remaining, Doug Brien kicked the game-winning 33-yard field goal, giving Cal a 3-0 record and a No. 20 ranking in the Associated Press poll. It was the first time since 1977 that the University of California’s football team had earned such recognition.

This week, the Golden Bears have inched up to No. 18 and face UCLA in the Rose Bowl on Saturday. Counting the moments is none other than Pawlawski, who lives for this sort of pressure.

Need proof? On Pawlawski’s Cal freshman questionnaire, he listed a last-minute, 8-7 victory over Valencia High as his most memorable athletic experience. No wonder he relished the situation at Arizona several weeks ago.

“That’s when he is at his fullest,” said Cal Coach Bruce Snyder, who calls Pawlawski the best two-minute drill quarterback he has ever been associated with.

If you’re looking for reasons to explain the recent Cal resurgence, Pawlawski--after Snyder, of course--isn’t a bad place to start. At times more ornery than Yosemite Sam, as combative as Jim McMahon and as confident as Deion Sanders, Pawlawski finds himself in charge of an undefeated team and atop the weekly NCAA rankings for quarterback efficiency, which should come as a surprise to those who predicted he would never take a snap.

There, ahead of the likes of Florida State’s Casey Weldon, Houston’s David Klingler and Brigham Young’s Ty Detmer, is the one and only Pawlawski, whose four-letter vocabulary would send Teamsters running for earplugs. Then again, what do you expect from a former defensive back who volunteered for Cal special team duty, who refuses to slide when scrambling, who predicts great things for himself, who would gladly mix it up with the first person who threatened a Cal teammate, and who once administered an obscenity-laden on-field lecture to massive Washington defensive tackle Steve Emtman? Emtman, one of the finest defensive players in the country and capable of inflicting considerable physical pain on opponents, especially 205-pound quarterbacks, couldn’t believe his ears.

The exchange came during last season’s game against the Huskies. It was quick and to the point.

Emtman: “You (chicken), we’re going to kick your . . . “

Pawlawski: “You fat . . . . You’ve never been (much) and you’re never going to be (much).”

Or words to that effect.

“He says whatever is on his mind,” Treggs said. “He has no shame.”

Of course, Pawlawski, the ultimate competitor, said he loves the way Emtman works during a game. “A hell of a player,” said Pawlawski, who doesn’t disburse compliments lightly.

The same can now be said of Pawlawski, who has made the successful transition from hair-brained freshman dolt to seasoned senior rebel. All it took was five years, fate and Pawlawski’s special knack of refusing to fail.

Actually, it was by pure accident that Pawlawski earned a scholarship offer from Cal. A defensive back during his first three seasons at Fullerton’s Troy High, Pawlawski was moved to quarterback for his final season. Prolific, he wasn’t. He completed about half of his passes and threw almost as many interceptions (11) as he did touchdown passes (14).

“I’m not sure, based on his stats, that Mike would have been recruited by a Pac-10 team,” Snyder said.

This is where fate stepped in. One night at a Troy game, former Ram offensive lineman Russ Bolinger, who was moonlighting as a color commentator for the cable television broadcasts, became intrigued by Pawlawski’s unpolished but effective method of leading a team. Bolinger called Snyder, an assistant Ram coach who had just been hired by Cal, and offered an enthusiastic scouting report.

“There is a player you have to recruit,” Bolinger said. “This guy can play.”

“OK, right,” Snyder said.

So Snyder had Troy coaches send him some game film of Pawlawski. By the time he finished watching the highlights, Snyder knew Bolinger was right. Soon thereafter, he offered Pawlawski a scholarship. “You could tell on film that he really liked the activity,” Snyder said.

What you couldn’t tell was how much Pawlawski liked to say exactly what was on his mind. Back then, there was no governor switch on his emotions. Everything went directly from his brain to his mouth to a reporter’s notebook.

For instance, it was Pawlawski who arrived on campus and immediately said he would supplant Troy Taylor as the starter. An amused Snyder recalls thinking, “Well, I just don’t think that’s going to happen.”

And it didn’t. Pawlawski sat in 1987. He saw little action in 1988 and not much more in 1989. Things got so desperate for Pawlawski that he asked to be put on special teams.

“Hey, it was really hard going from superstar to nobody,” he said. “I just told them, ‘If I’m not going to play (quarterback), let me move to where I can help the team.’ ”

It was also Pawlawski who once called the student newspaper at Oregon, “the Daily Quack.” It was Pawlawski who last season mocked victorious Miami players for bad post-touchdown dancing technique. And it was the ultra-competitive Pawlawski who, after barreling into Arizona defensive back Darryl Lewis last year, yelled, “Get up, baby!”

Of course, 1990 was the same season Pawlawski won the starting position and began to assert himself in his very vocal way. By season’s end, he had led the Golden Bears to their first bowl victory in 54 years--over Wyoming, 17-15, in the Copper Bowl.

Pawlawski is no wallflower, but he also isn’t the overbearing potty mouth that he sometimes seems to be. “I’m not cocky,” he said. “I’m just very sure of myself.”

That he is. Ask about last year’s so-called quarterback competition with the heralded Perry Klein, and Pawlawski simply rolls his eyes.

“ He thought he was going to win the job,” Pawlawski says.

In Pawlawski-speak, that means he would rather kiss Emtman than lose his starting job to the younger Klein.

Ask about his standing in the conference, and he announces, “As a whole package, I think I’m as good as anybody in the Pac-10.”

Who would argue? At last look, Pawlawski had completed 71% of his passes--49 of 69--for 702 yards and nine touchdowns with three interceptions. Six of the scoring passes came against Pacific, the same game that Pawlawski turned to Heisman Trophy candidate White and jokingly said: “You ain’t getting (the Heisman). I’m taking it from you.”

Said White: “You can have it, Money.”

Truth be known, Pawlawski would rather see Cal win than earn an improbable Heisman. He would rather earn the respect of his teammates, too, which is why he savors those last-minute pressure situations. Or why he laughed the hardest when underclassmen savaged him in a training camp comedy skit this summer. Or why he credits his coaches, his girlfriend and even the Cal student body for making football fun again.

“I always knew I had it in me,” he said. “This doesn’t shock me. I can be better than this. I will be better than this. I will keep improving.”

Brash? Sure he is. But with Pawlawski, it’s part of his charm.