COMMENTARY : For Starters, He Doesn’t Get It : Osborne Changes Spots on Phillips

Let this be a lesson to any future Heisman Trophy candidate who considers scaling an apartment complex a la Spider Man to beat up a former girlfriend.

The lesson at Nebraska is to make sure you get your mugging done early in the season so that you can be rehabilitated in time to start in your team’s national championship game.

Lawrence Phillips, you may have heard, has been reinstated as first-string tailback for Tuesday’s Fiesta Bowl showdown against Florida.

Was it any surprise?

The saga of Nebraska Coach Tom Osborne gets curiouser and curiouser. For years, he produced mostly clean-cut, almost-national championship teams. In a sea of football slime, Osborne was perceived as beyond reproach; gracious in victory, indefatigable.

Until he won his first national title a year ago, he was Luckless Tom, loser of seven consecutive bowl games.

But a lifetime of reputation-building has begun to unravel--coincidentally?--at a time when his team is in the midst of one of college football’s greatest runs.

When Phillips was arrested for the Sept. 10 beating of a former girlfriend, Kate McEwen, most expected Osborne to do the right thing.

Initially he did, kicking Phillips off the team. Osborne acted swiftly and forcefully. If it had ended there, Osborne would have saved face and made a lasting statement.

But then came the fudging. Osborne amended his sentence to “indefinite suspension,” which later proved to mean reinstatement after six games.

Phillips, a junior, pleaded no contest in the McEwen matter and was found guilty of misdemeanor assault and trespassing. He was sentenced to a year’s probation and ordered to pay restitution and continue counseling to control his anger.

Only a cynic would suggest it was the same sentence any God-fearing, non-Heisman Trophy candidate in Lincoln, Neb., would have received under similar circumstances.

Osborne only compounded his earlier mistake when he announced that Phillips had won back his starting job.

Osborne explained Wednesday that Phillips had regained the form that made him a leading Heisman contender before the season.

Osborne never mentioned Kate McEwen, but he did speak of Phillips’ loss.

“From a pure football standpoint, it’s a tragic thing,” Osborne said.

Tragic, Osborne said, because “he was a great athlete who had his year destroyed.”

Osborne has had to staunchly defend his program in the face of growing controversy.

“What people don’t understand is that we’ve had six players accused of something or another over a 4 1/2-year period,” he said. “That’s often not mentioned. I would have to be very honest with you and tell you that over 23 years as head coach, probably in most years, most teams would have more than six over 4 1/2 years.”

Actually, a Times 1995 crime survey found seven Nebraska athletes involved in police incidents since July 1993 alone.

Osborne added: “I wouldn’t put a player on the field if I thought he was guilty of some of the things they have been accused of.”

Apparently, misdemeanor assault and trespassing don’t rank high in Judge Osborne’s law book.

So what is the lesson here? Nearly four months after Phillips’ arrest, he gets to strut in the most-anticipated college football game in recent memory.

What is the motive here? Phillips says he will return to Nebraska for his senior season unless he is assured of being a first-round NFL pick next spring.

Osborne speaks of the future financial damage Phillips suffered because of the suspension, yet is now ready to showcase Phillips on national television.

Is Osborne secretly hoping Phillips will have a big game and leave Lincoln for the pros?

Or, is Osborne starting Phillips because he gives his team the best chance of beating Florida?

“I think he’s pretty much back,” Osborne says of Phillips, who has gained 188 yards in three games as a backup since returning from his suspension.

What is the moral here? That three wrongs--Phillips was involved in two legal scrapes before September’s--make a right as long as you say you’re sorry and run a 4.5 in the 40?

No one is denying Phillips had a rough childhood, that he is scarred from abandonment at age 11 by a family that handed him off like a pigskin to foster homes.

No one is suggesting Phillips be banished to hell, or even the Canadian Football League.

But he should not, in kind, be rewarded for his season in this game, in this manner.

So, what if Phillips rushes for 200 yards against Florida and earns an extra million dollars?

Will anyone be able to say with a straight face that crime doesn’t pay?

Or is it already beyond that?