AZTEC UPDATE : NOTEBOOK / SCOTT MILLER : Harrison Sees His Confidence Rise Along with Team’s Fortunes

One thing that San Diego State receiver Merten Harris doesn’t lack this season is confidence.

Asked what he will remember the most about this season, Harris replied: “Winning this conference championship that we’re going to win.”

Harris, referring to Saturday’s SDSU-Brigham Young game, has done an about-face from last season. In 1990, he dropped two passes at BYU, then dropped a kickoff and slipped on the SDSU 1-yard line on another kickoff against Wyoming. After that, he was banished to the bench for the season’s final six games.

“I lost confidence,” Harris said. “I got down on myself when I made the mistakes, and I couldn’t come back from it.

“When I’d drop a pass, I couldn’t catch the next pass, I couldn’t focus at practice, and I couldn’t deal with the criticism I was hearing.”

This year, Harris, a senior from Detroit, is a starter and will be a key player in Saturday’s game. He is SDSU’s second-leading receiver with 28 receptions for 448 yards--an average of 16 yards a catch. He has two touchdown receptions.

He hasn’t forgotten last year, Wyoming or BYU. He had his best game against Wyoming, catching five passes for 112 yards.

Now, here comes BYU.

“I’m looking forward to this game,” Harris said. “It will be something I’m looking forward to a whole, whole lot.”

SDSU officials announced Thursday that more than 58,000 tickets have been sold for the game Saturday. The sudden ticket crunch doesn’t sit too well with SDSU quarterback David Lowery, who is attempting to round some up some for family and friends from his hometown of Mission Viejo.

“I usually try to get as many extra (complimentary tickets) as I can from other players, but I can’t get any more,” said Lowery, who has 16 tickets so far. “I’m pretty stressed out right now.”

Lowery was looking for six more.

An estimated 200 men and women from different SDSU fraternity and sororities--including Lowery’s Sigma Chi fraternity--showed up at practice Thursday long enough to walk all the way around the field once and shout some SDSU chants.

“They were chanting ‘SDSU’ and ‘Beat BYU’,” senior receiver Patrick Rowe said. “Never have I seen that here. I think it was great. It shows us how much the students are behind us. It was a great feeling to have them come out to practice and give us that extra urge to win.”

As if BYU week wasn’t tough enough, Lowery has a bunch of school work due. He said he is working on two papers and has a couple of tests coming up.

“It’s hard,” he said. “You’re sitting there having to do a lot of research and just thinking about BYU.”

Asked if, during the quarterback battle with Cree Morris this fall, he ever thought he would be in the position he is in this week, Lowery turned the tables on reporters.

“Did you guys ever think you’d be writing about a week like this, about a sold-out Jack Murphy Stadium on Nov. 16?” he said. “I think this surprised a lot of people.”