Rout Makes Colorado’s Going Away Party Complete : Fiesta Bowl: With McCartney retiring and Salaam leaving, Buffaloes run over Irish, 41-24.

Colorado’s football team threw the ultimate party for retiring Coach Bill McCartney here Monday. With New Year’s Eve still fresh in the minds of all, the Buffaloes brought out the hats and horns one more time and gave McCartney an auld lang syne he’ll forever bring to mind, a 41-24 victory over Notre Dame in the Fiesta Bowl.

It was a victory, before a sellout crowd of 73,968 in Sun Devil Stadium, that was not nearly as close as the final score might indicate. It was a victory that represented clear domination by the 11-1 Buffaloes, who entered the game ranked No. 4 nationally by the Associated Press and likely will move up a notch in the final list with Miami’s Orange Bowl loss.

And it was a victory that left McCartney choked with emotion, even an hour after the game.

“For our players to play so well and beat a great team like Notre Dame and send us off like this,” McCartney said, “is just something I’ll savor for the rest of my life.”

So McCartney steps down after 13 years at Colorado, and after compiling a 93-55-5 record that not only made him the winningest coach in the school’s history but also established Colorado as a Division I power.

The immediate recipient of McCartney’s 13 years of spadework is Rick Neuheisel, the 33-year-old boy wonder of college football, who learned his trade as a player and assistant coach under Terry Donahue at UCLA, himself once a coaching boy wonder.

Neuheisel, given much credit for a Colorado offense that became only the second in NCAA history to have one player rush for 2,000 yards and another pass for 2,000 yards in a season, was promoted from Buffalo quarterback and receiver coach Nov. 28, only nine days after McCartney resigned to “give my family back the time they deserve.”

When the game ended Monday, and McCartney was carried by his players to a platform in the middle of the field for trophy presentations, Neuheisel stayed an appropriate distance away, answering media questions near the end zone while remaining respectful to the end of McCartney and his moment.

“This is just a wonderful way for 1995 to start,” Neuheisel said. “This was just a great day.”

The only negative for the Buffaloes was the postgame announcement by Rashaan Salaam, Colorado’s Heisman Trophy winner, that he will turn pro rather than return for his senior season. Despite Salaam’s statements of delight over the hiring of Neuheisel--”If they hire him, it’ll make it 90-10 that I’ll stay,” he had said--the announcement was hardly surprising.

Salaam scored three touchdowns, but was held to only 83 yards rushing, as Notre Dame keyed on him.

On this day, the loss to graduation of quarterback Kordell Stewart might look even bigger to Neuheisel. Stewart rushed for one touchdown, passed for another and established both Colorado and Fiesta Bowl records with 348 yards of total offense. Stewart rushed for 143, passed for another 205 and seemed to turn the corner and scamper for a long-gainer or connect on a key reception when Notre Dame had Colorado in a third-and-long position.

“The option and the third-down pass is what killed us,” said Lou Holtz, Notre Dame’s coach.

The unranked Fighting Irish, much criticized for taking the bid to this game with a 6-4-1 record, came dressed to kill. And didn’t.

Holtz sent his team out in Kelly green jerseys, an occasional Notre Dame gimmick over the years that, as a departure from the normal blue and gold colors, has been an inspirational ploy in the past. It has also backfired occasionally, and Monday’s wearin’ of the green turned out to be beneficial only in ease of laundering, since the Irish excelled mostly at collecting grass stains.

Foremost in that category was quarterback Ron Powlus, who was sacked seven times, a Fiesta Bowl record, for 27 yards in losses. Powlus, who seemed to spend the entire afternoon--at least that portion of it when he remained on his feet--backpedaling and throwing long floaters into the first five rows of the stands. He managed to complete 18 passes, three of them for touchdowns, but Colorado was in such firm control that much of what Powlus was doing resembled the fourth quarter of an NBA route. Garbage time in the Fiesta Bowl.

Powlus did get the Irish back to 31-17 in the third period with a 39-yard fling into the end zone that defensive back Dalton Simmons misplayed into a touchdown catch for a surprised Derrick Mayes. But then, at 34-17 early in the final period and Notre Dame still with a breath of a chance left and driving at the Colorado 30, Powlus tried to force a pass through the middle and had it intercepted by Ted Johnson.

“I was trying to squeeze passes under linebackers arms,” Powlus said. “That ended up being a good turning point for them.”

An even better turning point for Colorado occurred about a month ago, shortly after the bowl bids were set. McCartney, respecting Holtz’s ability to prepare a team well with a month to do so, threw his friend and opponent a curve. He shifted away from Colorado’s double tight-end offensive formation to a triple wide-receiver setup and he went to a 4-3 defensive alignment, dumping his season-long five-man front.

“They ran three wideouts that they’d never done,” Holtz said, “and they played 11 games in the fifty defense, all 11 games, and then today, they hit us with this 4-3.”

Interestingly, both the triple wide-out offense and the 4-3 defense are favorites of Neuheisel.

Perhaps a little party favor from McCartney to the new guy?