The Whole Thing Seemed Offensive

Let’s face it. It was the So-What Bowl. No Heisman controversy was at stake, no national championship.

Fittingly, it was a sandlot game. It was like a fight in a bar at 2 a.m. All offense.

If you’re into trivia, the score was 38-31, Michigan. But it will never make anyone’s highlight film.

You ever see a major college football game where neither team can break serve? That’s what happened here. Whoever got the ball won at love. The last time you saw tackling this sloppy, one of the parties was greased. And the other was drunk.

I knew we were in trouble when I sat in the regular seats in the first quarter and someone said, “Which one is Washington?� This was solidified when another asked, “What’s a Wolverine?� The answer came back, “It’s a female wolf.�

About 9,000 people managed to miss this Rose Bowl game. I think the last time this many eschewed this Tournament of Roses party, it was still a chariot race.

Nobody ran the wrong way, no substitute quarterback named Doyle Nave came off the bench to pull out a game against an unscored-upon opponent in the gloaming.

Still, it was exciting. Correction: It would have been exciting--except that “exciting� requires that you care who wins, that something be at stake. Nobody south of Puget Sound or west of Ann Arbor saw this as having any more significance than, say, Yale-Harvard.

Any time you have two presumably quality teams in a postseason game and the total scoring tops out over 68, there is a hole in one or both teams. The defense looked most of the day like Oliver Hardy chasing a chicken. While trying to look dignified.

It may have been Washington Coach Don James who could say, “Nice mess you got us in here, Stanley!� We may have seen the last of the storied James Gangs. Those Washington gangs of James wouldn’t give up 38 points a season, never mind in one Rose Bowl game. And if you can believe the reports, it turns out Don has been getting his gangs the same way Jesse did. From wanted posters in post offices.

The reality of the Big Ten-Pac-10 pact is, it works best when a California school is lined up. Cal and Stanford are allowed in--on a restrictive basis. Kind of like the guy who can play nine holes at the exclusive club. An occasional trek south by a Pacific Northwest school is tolerated.

But not when they overdo it. Don James didn’t seem to get the point. He kept sending down these superbly conditioned, smart teams to elbow aside the California teams and cause the ticket-brokers to gnash their teeth. This was the third time in a row Washington came to Pasadena.

It looks as if Don won’t be able to continue throwing overalls into the Rose Bowl’s chowder. Don’t look now, but Don’s team seems finally to have been demoralized by the scandals. When a Don James team gives up 38 points, it needs a shrink. It has something else on its mind.

James’ teams have given up 80 points in their last two games, both losses. That is major league leading with your chin. A Don James team is not normally that susceptible to roundhouse rights. But on Friday, they got floored more than Ernie (The Rock) Durando.

If the game is at all historic, it will be for the 88-yard run from scrimmage peeled off by Michigan tailback Tyrone Wheatley. It was, as it happens, the longest run from scrimmage in Rose Bowl history. It put Michigan ahead, 24-21, a lead the Wolverines lost but regained. It came on the first play of the second half and seemed to put Washington into the posture of a guy trying to look over both shoulders at once the rest of the game. The Huskies were to score again but never regained their poise.

It is customary for a losing coach to rely in the postgame interview on the hoary, well-worn explanation, “We didn’t execute.� Coach James offered instead, “We didn’t wrap up.� English translation: His tacklers let their quarry slip through their grasp. Wheatley was one who escaped the packaging. He ran for 235 yards, an average of 15.7, and two other touchdowns.

What Don didn’t wrap up were his overzealous boosters. They did more to break up his team’s concentration than Tyrone Wheatley. Wheatley ruined a game. Those other guys ruined a career.