Poet in Motion Gives Trojans a Sonnet Boom

Curtis Conway couldn’t be anything but a USC Trojan football player. Even if he didn’t run the 40 in 4.25 seconds, have the hands of a Paris pickpocket and the moves of Nureyev, you’d know he belonged in a cardinal and gold uniform.

It’s the name. Guys with alliterative names like that are either British poets--or SC flankers or tailbacks.

As chronicled before here, SC usually looks as if it got its varsity from the pages of “Ivanhoe” or “The Knights of the Round Table.” The only other place in the world with names like this backfield is the House of Lords.

This is the school that gave us Addison Hawthorne. And, forget the nickname O.J. Folks, his name was Orenthal Simpson. He had half a Heisman right there.

SC backfields have had Marcuses and a Gaius. How do you like Grenville Lansdell? Aramis Dandoy? Haskell Wotkyns? Morley Drury?

They had a player named Marion Morrison once. He changed that name to John Wayne. My contention is, if it had been John Wayne in the first place, he wouldn’t have gotten a scholarship. SC didn’t deal in Johns. If a guy’s name was Joe, or Pat or Butch, they told him to go to Nebraska. If his name was Decius they said, “Come right in!” And gave him the football.

The only unusual thing is, Curtis Conway isn’t a tailback. USC is Tailback U. First, you get a name right out of Elizabethan England, then you get 2,000 yards, then the Rose Bowl, then the Heisman.

Actually, they didn’t know what to do with Curtis Conway when he first came in. He had been a quarterback in high school. He was a world-class sprinter--10.28 in the 100--so he could be a wide receiver. He hit hard, so he could be tailback. He could backpedal and jump, so he could play cornerback or safety. And he could change direction on a gum-wrapper while running at 20 m.p.h., so he could return kicks.

SC tried him at quarterback but eventually gave up on that. Curtis Conway giving or throwing the ball to someone else was a bad idea. Defense was out, too. They didn’t want Curtis chasing somebody with the ball, they wanted somebody chasing Curtis with the ball.

The first time they saw him run a pass route in practice, they asked the defender if he hadn’t seen Conway going by him.

“Well, I heard him!” the cornerback said, scratching his head.

Lots of people have heard Curtis Conway this season. There isn’t a safety in the league who knows what he looks like from the front. They’re lucky if they get the number. For their information, it’s 3.

To Conway’s credit, he always knew he was destined to be a Trojan. It’s all he dreamed about growing up in Hawthorne. He stayed out of gangs, stayed in a gym. His idol was not some guy in gold chains and a pink Cadillac but the dazzlingly-gifted USC--and Pittsburgh Steeler--receiver, Lynn Swann.

But, he was a Prop. 48 recruit. This is a student who comes in under the line academically and is admitted semi-probationally. USC does not take Prop. 48s. USC is not Yale. But neither is it Miami. Conway had to go elsewhere.

He chose Nebraska. But his heart wasn’t in it. He stayed for six days, then went to the coach and said, in effect, “I don’t belong here. I’m supposed to go to USC.” He knew a Curtis Conway belonged at Troy, not the Platte.

He came home, went to classes at El Camino College where he upped his scholastics to the point he could pass the college boards.

Curtis Conway could become the first non-tailback to win a Heisman at SC. In a mini-confrontation with the leading Heisman candidate, San Diego State’s Marshall Faulk, this year, he caught five passes for 80 yards and a touchdown--another touchdown catch was called back because of a penalty--and he gained 18 yards rushing on his only carry.

He demolished Oklahoma. He caught nine passes for 115 yards and a touchdown. He scored another on a punt return of 66 yards but it was called back. Against Washington, he had 112 yards in receptions, including a 51-yard touchdown play. Against California, he had 121 yards in kickoff returns. Against Oregon, he had 146 yards in punt returns, including one of 96 for a touchdown, the longest in SC history. He scored on an end-around against Washington State.

“He’s our impact player,” says his coach, Larry Smith. Nobody goes out for coffee when Curtis Conway has the ball.

Adds Smith, “I would say Curtis’ best attribute, in addition to his speed, is his honesty. He makes good decisions because he’s super-honest. He’s a force for offense but he’s also a force for defense. Even when the other team scores, they have to think, ‘Uh-oh, now we gotta kick off to Curtis Conway.’ ”

Conway likes his multi-purpose role.

“I like returning punts and kickoffs,” he says. “That’s when you know the ball is coming to you. You can plot out your moves. You can really show your ability. On a pass play, maybe you’re going to get it and maybe not.”

Besides velocity and honesty, Curtis exercises another characteristic--curiosity.

“Speed is God-given,” he says. “The rest is up to you. That’s why I like to study film. It’s like a prizefight out there. You study your man, you get curious about what he does. Just like in a fight, you better know his weaknesses--but you better know his strengths, too.

“Do I come back to the huddle and say to the quarterback, ‘Hey, I can get open on this guy?’ No! I used to be a quarterback myself and I know this can be distracting. You take care of of your business out there and I take care of mine. I might get him to be looking for me on a play and I might slip. I have a wide field of peripheral vision--I hardly ever get blind-sided even over the middle--but he should see more than me.”

Times have changed. Eight-man fronts have made flankers like Conway more important in the Trojan scheme of things than Student Body Right.

But, one thing never changes--Trojan names. They still sound as if they came from an anthology of minor British poets. Or the walls of Westminster Abbey.