THE HURRICANES ARE BACK IN A FAMILIAR ROLE AS.... SPOILERS

Throw out last Saturday--as they dearly wish they could--and the Miami Hurricanes are a top-15 team, a great reconstruction story, and a program uniquely situated to blow up UCLA’s perfect season in the Orange Bowl’s rowdy confines.

Throw out last Saturday--which they can’t--and the Miami Hurricanes are a classic, super-motivated spoiler.

Miami got a break when this game was postponed from Sept. 26 because of Hurricane Georges, giving the extremely young squad a chance to grow up and get battle-tested for the Bruins.

Before last Saturday’s trip to Syracuse, the Hurricanes had lost only to Florida State and Virginia Tech. No shame there. They have a bull running back in Edgerrin James, a savvy fifth-year senior quarterback in Scott Covington, and a sense that next year, this will be a team in the national-title race.

Then last Saturday in the Carrier Dome, something completely, wholly, horribly unforeseen dropped on the program: Syracuse 66, Miami 13--the second-worst defeat in the history of the program.

Hurricane Georges missed Miami. The Syracuse Orangemen, however, did not, costing Miami the Big East title, any kind of ranking, and a $6-million appearance in the Orange Bowl game.

Despite everything else Miami has accomplished, has 66-13 changed everything?

“Last week, it wasn’t in anyone’s imagination that it would happen that way,” Covington said. “Everything spiraled, everything happened negatively and it just compounded itself.

“No one here believes we’re a 66-13 team. I’ll tell you, it’s nice to be back out on the field on Saturday. We’ve got nothing to lose.”

By now, of course, Miami is used to devastation, and recovery.

The Hurricanes have been caught, penalized and demonized. They have rebuilt themselves after having been on probation, basically from the ground up. They have gathered up all their pride and resources, and begun the clawing climb back.

But even though they are aching to play spoiler to UCLA’s national-title aspirations, the Hurricanes understandably looked very much like a team still catching its breath.

Senior cornerback Nate Brooks tried to jump-start the process minutes after the defeat, declaring point blank amid the groggy atmosphere of the postgame locker room: “We’re going to beat UCLA.”

By Wednesday, Brooks was less direct about the prediction, but equally impassioned about what Saturday’s game at the Orange Bowl means in Miami’s big picture:

Being a Hurricane, even after a 53-point loss, even after three years of probation penalties and high scrutiny, even seven years removed from the program’s last national title, still should mean expecting victory.

Especially with a chance to derail a team one step away from a national-championship game.

Miami used to define itself by fending off the challenges of upstarts. Can the team redefine itself this week to blow apart UCLA’s 20-game winning streak and perfect season?

“I look at it like this: I’m always convinced in myself and my team,” Brooks said. “I’m a Hurricane. I’m from Miami and I was born and raised in Miami, you know? I always feel that we’re going to win, regardless of the adversities. . . .

“So it may sound cocky to some people, that I’m talking trash or whatever. But I’m really not. I’m just trying to keep the guys’ heads focused and let them know what it’s all about.

“We’re the Hurricanes. So if you can’t picture yourself winning . . . I know UCLA doesn’t picture us winning. So if I don’t picture us winning, who will?”

Coach Butch Davis, the blunt architect of the Miami renaissance, said he wasn’t sure he wanted to be motivated strictly by a spoiler role.

Miami does have a history of derailing undefeated runs. The Hurricanes halted Notre Dame’s 23-game winning streak in 1989, Nebraska’s 22-game streak in 1984, and five other streaks of at least 10 games since 1984.

But, at the tail end of his fourth season in this project, Davis (29-15 since arriving) didn’t want to limit his team to that narrow focus so soon after the blowout.

“It’s an opportunity on national television to certainly play much better than we did the last time,” Davis said. “And obviously, the role of the spoiler, that makes up a little bit of the emotional, psychological portion of it.

“But by the same token . . . if we’re relying on that to win the game, we’re in trouble.”

For most of the team, the saving irony of the whole Syracuse scenario is that the young, sophomore- and freshman-dominated Hurricanes are a far more prepared, experienced team than they were on Sept. 26.

Excepting, of course, last Saturday.

This was a team that, bolstered this season by its first full freshman class in four years, looked to be Miami’s most complete since the Dennis Erickson-Gino Torretta era.

After violations involving misuse of Pell grant money, NCAA penalties in 1995 included a reduction of 31 scholarships over three years.

Only a year ago, Davis, a former assistant under Jimmy Johnson at Miami and a defensive assistant under Johnson with the Dallas Cowboys, hit a hard spot, watching the Hurricanes go a disappointing 5-6.

But this year, James, a 220-pound junior, has developed into a crunching running back, becoming the first runner in Hurricane history to record consecutive 1,000-yard seasons.

Covington, after years of battling--fruitlessly--for snaps, finally took over at quarterback after the departure of Ryan Clement, and has looked poised and savvy. The defense sometimes overwhelmed teams.

Miami won at West Virginia, blasted Rutgers and Temple.

This was a rising team.

Except, of course, last Saturday.

“We’re a much better team,” said Covington, who came to Miami from Dana Hills expecting to be an instant starter, but for most of three years stood on the sideline watching Clement.

“You may wonder that after last weekend. But we are. We’ve got guys who have played the entire season now, been in some hostile environments, played well, know how to prepare themselves for big ballgames.”

At 7-3, Miami recently accepted a $750,000 bid to play in the Micron.com Bowl in Miami’s Pro Player Stadium, a major financial if not geographic leap from the Orange Bowl.

“Regardless of what happened, it’s kind of like, ‘Whew, we’re going to a bowl game, we know our future,’ ” Covington said. “Now it’s just go on out and play.

“Obviously, there’s a lot of people around the country who are rooting for us and hoping we do them a big favor. But we’re not playing this game to make someone else’s day. We’re doing this to complete our season and finish off a very good positive season in a very good way.”

Covington, especially, has perspective on the entire process, having been through as many individual see-saw moments as the program itself.

After being recruited by Erickson--he left for the NFL after the 1994 season--then battling for and losing the starting job to then-sophomore Clement in Covington’s freshman season, Covington asked to be released from his scholarship, so he could transfer back West, probably to California. But Davis and Miami refused to release him, forcing Covington to stick it out with the Hurricanes.

Covington also points out that the Hurricanes had to live through the campus murders of linebacker Marlin Barnes and Barnes’ girlfriend, Timwanika Lumpkins on April 13, 1996. Labrant Dennis was convicted of the murders in October, and on Wednesday a Miami-Dade jury recommended he receive a death sentence.

“Myself and the other group of seniors, we’ve been through a lot--lost some guys who were our teammates,” Covington said. “We’ve gone through some things that people shouldn’t really have to go through.

“We’ve been on both ends--freshman year [1995, which Covington redshirted], we’re playing in the Orange Bowl against Nebraska. . . . You go on probation and the dismal year we had last year. And this year we had a goal of reaching a bowl game--bottom line . . . and we’ve reached that.

“We won in Morgantown [W.Va.], which is tough. There’s a lot for this team to be proud of. Going up to down to back up is a nice feeling, to be part of that.”

And next year, even without Covington, Miami will be shooting for nothing less than what UCLA has now--a chance at playing into January, undefeated.

Only three seniors start on this season’s team, and redshirt freshman Kenny Kelly is apparently ready to go at quarterback.

“If I had to put some money on it,” said Brooks, projecting into the future again, this time about Miami being a national contender next season, “I’d put some money on them.”

And next year, you can sense, might begin Saturday for most of these Hurricanes.

“Without a doubt,” James said. “We have . . . whew, an unlimited amount of starters coming back. That’s what it takes to have a team win a national championship. We’re in that position. Now what we do with that, that’s up to us.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

No. 3 UCLA at Miami

When: Saturday

Where: Orange Bowl

Time: 11 a.m.

TV: ESPN

Radio: KXTA (1150)

Records: UCLA: 10-0, Miami: 7-3

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Miami Hurricanes: Streak Stoppers

Win streaks of 10 or more stopped by Miami (and rank of team when happened). The Hurricanes are 7-7 against Pacific 10 opponents, including 0-2 against UCLA: *--*

STREAK OPPONENT DATE RESULT 23 No. 1 Notre Dame Nov. 11, 1989 27-10 22 No. 1 Nebraska Jan. 2, 1984 31-30 20 No. 1 Oklahoma Jan. 1, 1988 20-14 16 at No. 1 Florida State Nov. 16, 1991 17-16 14 No. 2 Florida State Oct. 6, 1990 31-22 10 No. 1 Oklahoma Sept. 27, 1986 28-16 10 No. 1 Auburn Aug. 27, 1984 *20-18

*--*

* at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J.

Inside

Taking Flight

The Bruins leave today for Miami with little time to adjust to conditions for Saturday’s make-or-break game. Page 8