COLLEGE FOOTBALL SPOTLIGHT

COOPER A REAL TROUPER (AT LEAST IOWA THINKS SO)

You’re Ohio State Coach John Cooper. Your team has just scored 56 points against Iowa. In the first half. So what do you do in the second half?

a) Try for 100.

b) Try for 200.

c) Try calling vet for Hawkeyes.

d) Check on dinner reservations.

e) Nothing.

If you answered (e), you are correct. Even though the Hawkeyes rolled snake eyes against the Buckeyes, Cooper decided not to rub it in.

Cooper pulled his starters in the second half, including quarterback Bob Hoying, tailback Eddie George and receiver Terry Glenn, and watched Iowa outscore his team, 28-0 in the second half. The only problem for Iowa is that Ohio State won the first half, 56-7.

Now, a 56-35 victory looks pretty nice, but it could have been a whole lot more overwhelming if Cooper had chosen to run up the score to impress those impressionable voters in the polls.

“For all of you people asking me if we would run the score up, you got your answer today,” Cooper said. “I made the decision at halftime--the first time I’ve done it since I’ve been a head coach--that we wouldn’t play the first team on the first series of the second half.”

Cooper said he didn’t pull his starters because of his respect for Iowa Coach Hayden Fry, who is a friend.

“We’ve got five tough games left and I didn’t want to take the chance of getting anybody hurt,” Cooper said.

THINK QUICK

Ohio State’s longest drive of the opening half took 2:05.

Four possessions required less than 45 seconds each.

Touchdowns on three consecutive possessions midway through the half required a combined 48 seconds.

NOTHING RUSTY ABOUT HIM, THE WAY HE WAS THROWING

The air above Durham, N.C., was filled with pigskins, thanks to a record-setting day by one Rusty LaRue.

Uh, Rusty LaRue? Sounds like a villain in a silent movie. You know, the guy who twists on his mustache, then gets busy tying damsels to railroad tracks. But this LaRue is Wake Forest’s quarterback and he completed 55 of 78 passes for 478 yards, including 41 completions in the second half, as he rallied Wake Forest from a 35-0 deficit.

Alas, it wasn’t enough. Duke won, 42-26.

LaRue, a backup guard on the Wake Forest basketball team, broke the major-college records of 48 completions in a game and 32 in a half, both set by Houston’s David Klingler against SMU in 1990. The number of his passing attempts fell one short of the NCAA mark of 79 by TCU’s Matt Vogler against Houston in 1990.

THIS TIM IS MAKING A NAME FOR HIMSELF

Headline writers were on red alert again in Ann Arbor, Mich., where a guy with a real long, complicated name had another big game for Michigan.

Name of the day was Tshimana Biakabutuka (pronounced Ti-MONG-ah Be-OCH-ah-buh-too-kah), a sophomore tailback from Quebec, who is better known to his Wolverine teammates as Tim.

Anyway, Tim had 196 yards in 19 carries, including touchdown runs of 52 and 16 yards in a 52-17 victory over Minnesota. Tim has 997 yards for the season, is only three yards short of 2,000 for his career and has rushed for 100 or more yards five times this season.

BEARS, FROGS SAY GOODBY; NATURALISTS, SWC SORRY

What started in 1899 and ended Saturday? Why, it’s the Baylor-TCU football series. The Bears played the Horned Frogs for the last time as Southwest Conference foes--and maybe ever--and won, 27-24, at Waco.

It was the 103rd and last meeting between the schools in a rivalry that started last century. It ended with Baylor ahead 49-47-7.

TCU, which will move to the Western Athletic Conference next year, said it has no desire to continue the series against the Big 12 Conference-bound Bears.

WIND WARNINGS IN EFFECT

Take a stone crab out for lunch today. Miami’s 36-12 victory over Temple at Miami meant that the Hurricanes (4-3, 3-1 Big East) are in contention for the conference title and a New Year’s Day bowl berth.

Also, a three-game winning streak has given Miami a winning record for the first time this season.

LIKE BROTHER, LIKE BROTHER

Emmitt Smith was in the stands in Atlanta to watch his kid brother, Emory, play for Clemson in the Tigers’ 24-3 victory over Georgia Tech. Emory Smith scored on a three-yard run and finished with 100 yards on 26 carries.

BANG THE DRUM SLOWLY, OR FASTER OR WHATEVER

For its big showdown against Nebraska in Boulder, the Colorado Buffaloes came up with a surprise move before the game even started.

Instead of coming out through the tunnel, the Colorado players walked through the student section of the stands on their way to the field.

They gathered at midfield, raised their gold helmets and pointed toward the north end zone, where a Colorado band member was busy beating a Samoan war drum.

The record crowd of 54,063 at Folsom Field loved it. The Cornhuskers, apparently music critics, remained unfazed.

After forcing Colorado to punt on the first series, the Cornhuskers scored on their first play on their way to a 44-21 blowout.

The moral? Ask not, you Buffaloes, for whom that drum is being banged, it’s being banged for you.

WHISTLE STOP IN MADISON

Maybe they just don’t like striped shirts. Or they are allergic to whistles. Or they’re just plain sloppy. Whatever it is, Michigan State lost to Wisconsin, 45-14, at Madison, Wis., and continued to attract penalty flags like lint.

The Badgers saw a blizzard of 10 penalty flags fly at the feet of Michigan State players as the Spartans remained the Big Ten’s most penalized team.

At last count, Michigan State has been penalized 71 times for 601 yards.

ATTENTION, JUGHEADS, GET YOUR FILL HERE

You might care to know that the Little Brown Jug is not changing its Ann Arbor, Mich., address.

Michigan defeated Minnesota, 52-17, which meant the Wolverines have retained the Little Brown Jug for the ninth consecutive year and the 55th time since the two schools started playing for it in 1909.

So what exactly is the Little Brown jug? Well, to begin with, it’s not little and it’s not brown. You can call it a jug, though. The story goes that in 1903, when Fielding Yost’s Michigan had won 28 consecutive games, Minnesota tied the Wolverines, 6-6, with a late touchdown in Minneapolis and celebrated so much that the game was called with two minutes to go.

Anyway, the day afterward, Minnesota custodian Oscar Munson carried an earthenware, five-gallon water jug into the athletic department office and said, “Yost left his jug.”

The teams didn’t play again until 1909. By then, the jug was on its way to becoming the symbol of the football series, awarded annually to the winner.

Now you know.

COACHING MOVE OF THE DAY

Oklahoma State’s Bob Simmons chose to take the ball instead of the strong wind at the start of the second half when the Cowboys trailed, 10-7.

With the wind at its back, Iowa State scored two touchdowns and moved into position to get another on the first play of the fourth quarter en route to a 38-14 victory over the Cowboys at Ames, Iowa.

It was Iowa State’s first Big Eight victory in almost two years.

CAN’T KICK . . . OR WON’T

What was so unusual about Bart Edmiston’s 47-yard field goal for Florida in the Gators’ 52-17 victory over Georgia?

It was only the second field goal of the season for Florida.

NOTEWORTHY

Darnell Autry had his ninth consecutive 100-yard game, carrying the ball 41 times for 151 yards in leading Northwestern to a 17-14 victory over Illinois. . . . Darrell Bevell threw for 265 yards and three touchdowns as Wisconsin topped Michigan State, 45-14. . . . Peyton Manning threw four touchdowns to lead Tennessee to a 56-21 victory over South Carolina. . . . Troy Davis, the nation’s leading rusher, carried 37 times for 202 yards and became Iowa State’s single-season rushing leader in the Cyclones’ 38-14 victory over Oklahoma State. . . . Tommie Frazier threw for a career-high 241 yards and two touchdowns and ran for a score as Nebraska defeated Colorado, 44-21. . . . Terry Peebles threw seven touchdown passes and completed his first 18 passes to lead Hanover to a 73-23 rout of Rose-Hulman in a Division III game. . . . Brian Shallcross kicked two field goals in the game’s final two minutes--the last a 47-yarder with no time remaining--as William & Mary beat Villanova, 18-15. . . . Danny Wuerffel passed for 242 yards and five touchdowns, three to Chris Doering, in less than three quarters as Florida ripped Georgia, 52-17.

QUOTEBOOK

Oregon State running back Mark Olford after the Beavers lost to Stanford, 24-3: “Nothing’s going right. They fumble and we don’t get it. We fumble and they get it. There’s no way to explain. Maybe there is a curse over Oregon State” Iowa Coach Hayden Fry after Ohio State counterpart John Cooper pulled his starters following a 56-point first half: “Coach Cooper was kind.” --Compiled by Thomas Bonk, Bob Cuomo and Emilio Garcia-Ruiz.

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TOP PERFORMERS PASSING

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Player Comp. Att. Yds. TD MAXWELL, Nevada 41 52 552 7 LaRUE, Wake Forest 55 78 478 4 BARNES, California 24 43 343 1 GRAZIANI, Oregon 27 55 340 1 SHERMAN, Iowa 18 37 334 2 WALLWORK, Wyoming 21 40 301 3 GRIESE, Michigan 14 19 271 4 BEVELL, Wisconsin 17 21 265 3 WUERFFEL, Florida 14 17 242 5

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RUSHING

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Player Carries Yards TD WILLIAMS, Kentucky 35 238 2 ABDUL-JABBAR, UCLA 33 217 1 ABDULLAH, Pacific 39 205 2 DAVIS, Iowa St. 37 202 1 BIAKABUTUKA, Michigan 19 196 2 McCULLOUGH, Miami, Ohio 42 195 1 HILL, Arkansas 45 186 1 JONES, San Diego St. 21 173 2 MORGAN, Air Force 23 166 3

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RECEIVING

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Player No. Yards TD VAN DYKE, Nevada 18 230 3 GOSHA, Auburn 17 222 0 ESTES, Wake Forest 13 133 2 McHENRY, Nevada 9 181 2 JELLS, Pittsburgh 9 152 1 GUNN, Tulsa 9 135 0 McLEMORE, Oregon 9 108 1 GALLOWAY, East Carolina 9 106 1 PEGROSS, Baylor 8 123 1

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