Utah State’s Sauk Is Standing Tall

When Utah State quarterback Matt Sauk played his final high school football game for Woodbridge, there were no major college scholarship offers awaiting him.

“I wasn’t that big, and my statistics in high school weren’t all that great,” Sauk said. “I wasn’t 6 foot 4 like the scouts are always looking for, and my high school team didn’t pass a lot.”

But Sauk wanted to play somewhere, and decided on Orange Coast College. It worked out well for him. Sauk had two good seasons.

But again the major colleges barely took notice. Texas Christian was one school that did, and Sauk was planning to sign there, but then learned he didn’t meet the university’s entrance requirements. “It was just one grade that wasn’t good enough,” he said.

It was a big disappointment at the time, but Sauk looks back on it now as probably the best thing that could have happened.

Sauk re-enrolled at Orange Coast, and was two weeks into classes when he received an unexpected call from Utah State, offering him a chance to play there.

“I hadn’t even heard of them at the time, but I said yes as soon as they called,” Sauk said. “I just wanted to keep playing football.”

This fall, Sauk led the Aggies to a share of the Big West Conference championship and a berth in the Humanitarian Bowl.

Utah State (6-5) will play Cincinnati (7-4) in the Dec. 29 bowl game in Boise, Idaho. It will be televised on ESPN2.

“The chance to play in a bowl game is like a dream come true for me,” Sauk said. “Getting to a bowl game was one of my goals. The only goal I didn’t reach was getting 3,000 yards in a season.”

And that could still happen, depending on his performance against Cincinnati.

Sauk passed for 2,896 yards during the regular season, the third-best effort at Utah State. His 2,898 yards in total offense ranked 18th in the nation.

Sauk has 16 touchdown passes and also ran for six touchdowns.

It was his second consecutive outstanding season. As a junior, he passed for 2,489 yards. The two-year total of 5,385 makes him only the fifth Aggie quarterback to surpass 5,000 in career yardage.

Not bad for “an unknown,” as Sauk likes to refer to himself when he joined Utah State two years ago.

Sauk, 6 feet 1 and 223 pounds, didn’t become a starter until the fourth game of the 1996 season, but quickly made the most of the opportunity, completing 22 of 34 passes for 390 yards against Oklahoma State. He went on to rank 14th nationally in total offense.

“I had more yards in total offense this year than I did last year, but I didn’t rank as high. I was a little disappointed by that, but my big goal was to win the conference championship, and we did that.”

The Aggies shared the Big West title with Nevada, each with 4-1 conference records. Utah State won the game between the teams in Reno, 38-19, but the Aggies were upset the next weekend by North Texas, 51-48.

“It was a matter of a lot of people’s minds not being on that game that day,” Sauk said. “It was definitely a letdown after beating Nevada.”

Despite the loss, Sauk passed for more than 300 yards for the third time in the season. He threw for a season-high 396 at Idaho.

“The big difference between this season and last season was that I was a smarter quarterback with the ball,” Sauk said. “I had 14 interceptions last year and only eight touchdowns, and I wanted to improve on that this season.”

Sauk cut his interceptions to 10 and doubled his touchdown passes.

“Sauk has had two great seasons for us,” said Coach John L. Smith, who has been hired as the new head coach at Louisville but will coach the Aggies in the bowl game.

“He’s definitely improved this season by doing a better job of taking care of the football. Before that, he had the problem a lot of guys with big arms have: They think they can make it happen regardless. This year he threw very few bad balls.”

Smith says Sauk also improved his command of the offense.

“He does a good job of reading defenses, and we ask our quarterbacks to make a lot of decisions over the ball. He’s good at that.”

Smith hopes Sauk will have a chance to prove himself on the professional level.

“I don’t know if he’ll be drafted or not, but I think someone will take a chance on him in camp regardless,” Smith said.

“As I look back on it now, it would have been nice if we had been able to redshirt him his first year, because it probably would have helped him from a maturity standpoint, and helped in the future. But he’s got a big arm, and that’s a good place to start. His arm is as good as some guys who are playing in the NFL now.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Humanitarian Bowl

* Teams: Utah State vs. Cincinnati

* When: 12:30 p.m., Dec. 29

* Where: Boise, Idaho

* Records: Utah State 6-5; Cincinnati 7-4.

* TV: ESPN2

* Orange County connections: Utah State--Matt Sauk (Woodbridge/Orange Coast), Sr.; Brad Bohn (Laguna Beach), Fr., K; Jerry Arguella (Orange/Santa Ana College), Jr., P/K; Tony D’Amato (Villa Park/Santa Ana), Jr., LB; Mark Rommel (Villa Park/Santa Ana), Sr., OT. Cincinnati--none.