COLLEGE FOOTBALL / BOWL REPORT : BLOCKBUSTER : Stanford, Walsh Left in the Dark

Stanford Coach Bill Walsh got a look, or perhaps a squint, at what life at the college bowl level can be like. Walsh, in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., for Friday’s matchup against Penn State in the Blockbuster Bowl, was surprised at the lighting at St. Thomas Aquinas High, his practice facility.

“The lights weren’t as bright as Madison Square Garden,” Walsh jokingly told the Miami Herald. “I coached in high school, and we had about eight or nine more bulbs facing the field.”

Walsh was able to find an upside, though: “The less light you have, the faster you look. Everyone looks like they are going a mile a minute.”

Penn State Coach Joe Paterno was doing his best Lou Holtz imitation when describing his team’s post-Christmas practices. “We were terrible. . . . We looked so slow.”

Perhaps one reason for the low-energy workouts was that Paterno allowed his team to arrive in Ft. Lauderdale by whatever manner they chose. Usually the team goes to games by charter airplane, but this time each player was given a stipend for transportation.

Do you suppose some of the players might have doubled, tripled or quadrupled up and come by car, thus saving the travel money for other purposes? Naw, they would never do that.