Florida State Kicks Off Kansas, 42-0 : College football: 12-play, goal-line stand highlights easy victory for No. 1 Seminoles.

Saturday’s college football kickoff classic wasn’t one. But that didn’t make Florida State’s 42-0 laugher over Kansas, before a well-under-capacity crowd of 51,734 in the Meadowlands, a complete bore.

As a matter of fact, this mismatched start of the 1993 college season might well have been the most entertaining and intriguing 42-0 football game ever played. Among the highlights/lowlights:

--Kansas taking three points off the board early in the game and never scoring again.

--Kansas kicker Dan Eichloff, an all-Big Eight selection the last three years, missing field-goal attempts of 23 and 27 yards and having a punt blocked for a touchdown. A shocking day for a preseason All-American, who had never before in his career missed from inside the 30.

--A halfback pass from Florida State’s Sean Jackson to Kevin Knox just before the half ended, on which Jackson simply threw the ball up for grabs with two Kansas defenders glued to Knox. Knox somehow grabbed it on the two, allowing the Seminoles to leave the field leading at halftime, 21-0.

--An over-publicized freshman kicker named Scott Bentley, fresh from this week’s cover of Sports Illustrated, blooping his opening kickoff so shallow that Kansas’ George White was able to return it to the Seminoles’ 38. That set the Jayhawks up for the three points they scored and gave back.

--Later in the game, Bentley missing an opportunity at attempting his first college field goal because his coach, Bobby Bowden, thought it was third down instead of fourth.

--A new approach to platoon football by Bowden, whereby the second-team offense was frequently sent out to start new series, usually giving starting quarterback Charlie Ward and his first unit something like second-and-three for each of their starts. “It was hot,” Bowden drawled, in postgame explanation, “and I thought I would get about 12 plays like that out of my second team, meaning that Kansas would be 12 plays more tired near the end of the game.”

--A backfired inspirational attempt by Kansas defensive tackle Chris Maumalanga, from Bishop Montgomery High, who followed a penalty that had set Florida State back to first and 20 by breaking through before the snap on the next play and decking Ward. He got a 15-yard personal foul and four plays later, Florida State made the score 28-0.

--And Bowden, ending his news conference, looking much like the cat who swallowed the canary, by saying, “Thank you, Yankees.”

But there was one more thing that topped them all. It was perhaps the greatest goal-line stand in the history of college football. It certainly would have been, had it not happened against Kansas.

Early in the second quarter, after having given away its three points on Eichloff’s 36-yard field goal--Coach Glen Mason took it off the board when the penalty for 12 Seminole defenders on the field gave the Jayhawks a first down--Kansas started to drive. The score was only 14-0.

Soon, the Jayhawks were inside the Seminoles’ 10-yard line. Then the fun began. Twelve times, Kansas ran plays at Florida State. Six of those 12 times, the Jayhawks were either on or inside the one-yard line. Four times, the Seminoles were penalized, three times for being offside and once for pass interference in the end zone.

Finally, on fourth and goal, Kansas sent Charles Henley over the right side and Florida State met him head on with Ken Alexander, Derrick Brooks and Corey Sawyer. Kansas was now a big balloon with a needle stuck in it. You could hear the woosh all the way to the cornfields around Lawrence, especially when Florida State went 99 yards in 2 minutes 34 seconds.

“That was embarrassing,” Mason said. “I’m an old offensive line coach, and I’ll promise you one thing, we’ll take care of that sort of thing immediately. Tonight.”

Alexander, Brooks and Alonzo Horner make up the new key elements of a linebacking corps that lost perhaps the best player in the country last year, Marvin Jones. But Alexander, a senior, said he had played in greater goal-line struggles many times.

“In practice, they give the ball to our offense on the three and give them eight shots at the goal,” Alexander said. “I’m talking Charlie Ward and William Floyd and Sean Jackson and the best. And if we don’t stop them six of the eight times they try, we gotta run gassers (wind sprints) till we want to die.

“This thing today, it was a great one, I guess. But comparatively, it was easy.”

So, too, for Alexander and his well-prepared Seminoles was the oppressive weather. The temperature at game time was 91 degrees (106 according to a thermometer on the field), with 80% humidity.

“We’re from Tallahassee, Florida,” Alexander said, “and we’ve been doing two-a-day workouts in 90 degrees and 85% humidity at 9 in the morning. This was no big deal.”

Florida State’s rout, perhaps befitting a team that is such a clear preseason No. 1 this year, produced the largest margin of victory in the 11-year history of this game and the most yards of offense, 538.

Florida State will play Duke at home next Saturday. No doubt, the Seminoles will enter that game as an even clearer No. 1.

“I can’t imagine anybody who voted them No. 1 last week not voting them No. 1 again,” said a dejected, realistic Mason.