ROSE BOWL / DAILY REPORT : MICHIGAN : A Busy Day, Then Lights Out Until 1993

This will be a busy social day for Coach Gary Moeller and his Wolverines as they approach Friday’s game.

Moeller will start with a news conference at the Tournament House with Washington’s Don James, then go to the Kiwanis Kickoff Luncheon with his team’s three captains, quarterback Elvis Grbac, safety Corwin Brown and defensive tackle-outside linebacker Chris Hutchinson.

They will join the team for a walk-through practice at the Rose Bowl--which is closed not only to the media and friends, but even to parents--in early afternoon and then bus to Century City for a 3 p.m. pep rally at the Century Plaza.

The team will stay in an unnamed Los Angeles hotel tonight with lights out at 10 p.m., even though it is New Year’s Eve.

Buster Stanley, Michigan’s 273-pound defensive tackle, said his favorite thing about coming to the Rose Bowl game is Lawry’s Beef Bowl, where the players get to gorge themselves on prime rib.

“I just love to eat,” Stanley said.

Two members of the 94-player Michigan squad are from Los Angeles. Zack Freedman, a junior safety from Brentwood, and Jared Lancer, a freshman linebacker-fullback from Fairfax High, are members of the practice team but are not expected to play in Friday’s game.

Each team is allowed to bring 95 players, but Michigan brought 94 so it could give the last spot to Coleman Wallace, a fifth-year senior cornerback whose career ended when he was injured.

Tailback Tyrone Wheatley, who scored on a 53-yard run in last season’s Rose Bowl game, was Michigan state high school track and field champion in the long jump, 100 meters, and high hurdles in 1991.

Wheatley ran 10.67 seconds in the 100 but says, “Napoleon Kaufman (Washington’s tailback) is quicker than I am.”