Michigan City, Ind. -- If Notre Dame's 28-20 shocker over Michigan didn't wake up the echoes of how unpredictable early season play can be, there were plenty of other seismic blasts throughout the Midwest.
To wit, after Athletic Director Steve Pederson, the genius who changed Pitt's culture into an ungamely new terminology -- "Pittsburgh," fired native Western Pennsylvanian Frank Solich for committing the mortal sin of having a career won-lost percentage of .763 at Nebraska, nearly the exact figure of a longer-term Hall of Famer named Wayne Woodrow Hayes, Pederson eyeballed West Coast offense wizard Bill Callahan, dreaming of those 400-yard passing days.
And promptly witnessed their Cornhuskers losing their seventh home game since 1988, 21-17 to undermanned Southern Mississippi.
Not Mississippi. Southern Mississippi. Outweighed by 15 pounds a man on both sides of the ball, the Golden Eagles rode the combination of bend-don't-break defense and timely offense to spring the huge upset in front of nearly 80,000 stunned witnesses.
"Our kids from the start believed they'd win," SoMiss coach Jeff Bower told an equally-stunned media afterward.
It was one of several "darkest hours" for the much-too-ballyhooed Big 12. Consider...
* In northern Alabama, cocky Missouri, with its journalism-school know-how in full swing, hyping quarterback Brad Smith for the Heisman Trophy, left the Appalachian foothills with a 24-14 shiner that was more predictable.
The Trojans had upset perennial Mid American Conference power Marshall in Huntington, W.Va., the week before.
* Kansas State coach Bill Snyder, not exactly Mr. Goodquote on his best days, was brutally honest after his team, often criticized for opening its seasons with a trio of podunks, fell 45-21 to Fresno State in Manhattan.
"I've been here for 16 years," he told USA Today's Jack Carey. "You can remember some of the 1-10 and 5-6 (seasons). We never had a football team that just got beat up as bad as we did (Saturday)."
He could be at least partially forgiven, because Fresno has beaten Wisconsin twice in Madison's forbidding Camp Randall Stadium and has snapped off a couple of minor upsets against Pacific 10 teams as well.
So you'd think that would pretty much cover it, right? Well, no. But this game was clearly more predictable. Iowa State fell 17-10 at bitter in-state rival Iowa, at least giving a decent account of itself en route.
In other precincts, there were near-misses -- Minnesota finally wore down I-AA Illinois State in the fourth quarter and won 37-21. Northern Illinois, which nearly defrosted Ralph "Fridge" Friedgen's nationally ranked Maryland Terrapins (No. 21 in The Associated Press, 19 in the coaches' poll), barely hung on to beat another feisty I-AA, Southern Illinois before a packed house of over 28,000 in DeKalb. The Salukis failed on a two-point conversion pass instead of a conventional tying point-after-touchdown, allowing the Huskies to even their record at 1-1.
Meanwhile in surprisingly Happy Valley, Penn State coach Joe Paterno, fresh off a 21-7 disappointment at Boston College, was mostly upbeat as he assessed his team's performance and looked ahead to the Nittany Lions' home date with Central Florida, coached by George O'Leary.
You may remember O'Leary was Notre Dame's John Paul I coaching figure, replacing the fired Bob Davie for five days in 2001 before it was discovered he misrepresented his educational and football playing background on his resume.
"Nobody's perfect," Joe Pa said at his weekly press conference. "George made a mistake (and eventually landed an assistant position on the Minnesota Vikings staff before taking the U.C.F. job), but I would hope we don't excommunicate him."
Standout wide receiver Maurice Humphrey, who got into a legal jam after he allegedly assaulted his ex-girlfriend, appears to be working his way back into the university's good graces as a student at Penn State-Altoona.
"If he satisfies what the university wants done," Paterno told Rudel, "I think we certainly ought to consider having him return."
FREEFALL: Michigan's road defeat by 13 1/2-point underdog Notre Dame cost it big time. The now No. 17 Wolverines dropped nine spots in the A.P. poll and 10 in the coaches'. |
