FOOTBALL'S WEEK
SOUTH
1. TENNESSEE (5-0)
2. LSU (5-0)
3. FLORIDA (5-0)
With only a minute left and the bail's nose resting six inches away from Georgia Tech's goal, Auburn's John Riley ran out to try a field goal. The score was 14-14, and Riley couldn't help thinking about what had happened exactly 364 days earlier, when he had missed a field goal late in the game as Tech beat the Tigers 21-20. "I could still see that ball, sitting four feet off the right hash mark—and going about four yards to the right," he said later. "I mean, I had a funny feeling when I went out there in about the same situation. I wore out the Good Lord's ears praying."
This time Riley kicked the field goal, and Auburn got away with a 17-14 victory—its fourth in five games. The field-goal try was considered something of a gamble, since Tech had blocked all of Riley's three previous attempts, but Auburn Coach Shug Jordan said he never considered trying a run instead. "We would have gone for the field goal if it had been fourth and a quarter of an inch," said Jordan.
Auburn's only conqueror, unbeaten Tennessee, scored three quick touchdowns in the first quarter and went on to stun Alabama 41-14 at Birmingham's Legion Field. Besides being Tennessee's third straight victory over Alabama, it stuck the Tide with back to back losses for the first time since Bear Bryant came to coach in 1958. "I couldn't believe we beat them that bad," said Tennessee's All-America linebacker, Steve Kiner. "They've forgotten what it means to wear that red jersey." Kiner made eight unassisted tackles and intercepted a pass in addition to harassing Alabama's passing game with repeated blitzes against Quarterback Scott Hunter.
After four straight nonconference wins, Louisiana State stepped into the SEC and promptly smashed Kentucky 37-10, despite fumbling the ball away four times in its first six series of downs. "We have to have a great team to make the mistakes we do and still win," said LSU Coach Charlie McClendon, who played all 52 boys who made the trip to Lexington. "Every time I looked up I was looking at a different tailback," said Kentucky Linebacker Wilbur Hackett.
At Gainesville, Florida's sophomore quarterback, John Reaves, passed for four more TDs in the Gators' 52-2 win over North Carolina, the Tar Heels' worst defeat since 1923. Reaves has passed for 15 scores in five games, only one less than Steve Spurrier threw in his 1966 Heisman Trophy season.
Vanderbilt fans had stayed until the final gun in the Commodores' upset of Alabama, but began leaving late in the third quarter as the home team fell farther and farther behind Georgia. The Bulldogs finally won 40-8 behind Mike Cavan's three TD passes, and Vandy Coach Bill Pace groused, "Our offense was the most inept I've ever seen." Memphis State Coach Billy Murphy had been (he object of bumper stickers reading, "Get Rid of Spook Murphy," so his Tigers put "Beat Miami" stickers on their helmets and did just that 26-13.
Ole Miss' biggest offensive display since 1935 ended in a 69-7 victory over Southern Mississippi at Oxford. The Rebels were so much in control that their star quarterback, Archie Manning, sat out the entire second half.
Virginia Tech looked like a winner when Gil Schwabe passed 26 yards to Jimmy Quinn for a 16-14 lead with 1:13 to go, but South Carolina came back to win on Billy DuPre's 47-yard field goal with only nine seconds left. The victory gave Coach Paul Dietzel's Gamecocks a 4-1 record and kept them ahead in the Atlantic Coast Conference. The No. 2 team, Clemson, got two TDs from Ray Yauger and beat Wake Forest 28-14.
In the Southern Conference Davidson defeated William and Mary 17-15 to run its unbeaten streak to five. And little Centre College of Danville, Ky. won the College Athletic Conference championship by beating Sewanee 20-8.
MIDWEST
1. OHIO STATE (4-0)
2. MISSOURI (5-0)
3. OKLAHOMA (3-1)
It was another tie—Notre Dame 14, Southern Cal 14—but the game really was much closer than the score might indicate. With only 2:04 left, Notre Dame sent in a stumpy, freckle-faced kid named Scott Hempel to do something he had never done—kick a 48-yard field goal. The Irish looked like sure winners when Hempel's kick flew over the clawing Southern Cal defense and took off straight for the goal, but then Notre Dame's notoriously good luck took a freaky turn that the Gipper just wouldn't have believed. Hempel's kick descended from the heavens, hit the crossbar dead center and bounced back on the playing field. "It was the best ball I kicked this year," said Hempel sadly.
Up until then, Notre Dame had gotten most of the breaks, as it usually does in South Bend. Southern Cal's latest Trojan horse, Clarence Davis, pounded into the end zone in the first half, but the play was rubbed out by a holding penalty. Then, after Jimmy Jones passed Southern Cal into a 14-7 lead to start the fourth quarter, Notre Dame's monstrous Mike McCoy (6'5", 274 pounds) put his head in the path of a Trojan punt, and the Irish turned the ensuing recovery into a TD with 6:41 remaining. Notre Dame Coach Ara Parseghian declined to go for two points and Hempel came in to kick the extra point. "I wasn't tempted to go for the two," said Parseghian. "I noticed Big Ten statistics show 91% success in kicking but just three of 17 successful two-point efforts."
Nobody liked the tie, but Parseghian recovered quicker than Southern Cal's John McKay, whose team had been ranked No. 3 before the game. Asked whether Davis (75 yards in 30 carries) had done as well as he had hoped, McKay said, "We just keep running the same old plays. Sometimes they work; sometimes they don't."
In the Big Eight, Missouri and Oklahoma each look better and better as they get closer to their big game Nov. 8 in Columbia. The Tigers battered Oklahoma State 31-21 as Halfback Joe Moore gained 120 yards the fifth straight game he had gone over 100. "I love to hit people," admitted Moore. At Norman the question was not whether Oklahoma would beat Colorado—the Sooners finally won 42-30—but whether Steve Owens would gain more than 100 yards for the 13th straight game. He did, barely, by carrying six straight times in the last 2:30 for a total of 112. "It's not an obsession with me," said Owens, "but the game was out of reach and all the guys were pulling for me." Owens scored four touchdowns, giving him 12 TDs for the year and 45 in his career.
At Lincoln, Neb. everyone was wondering whatever happened to funny old effervescent Pepper Rodgers. After his Kansas team had lost to Nebraska 21-17 in the final two minutes, Pepper saltily opened his postgame press conference with an obscenity ("Let's see you print that"). Then he wadded up his sack lunch and threw a beef sandwich against the wall. "How about that?" said Pepper. "There's your story, "Rodgers Throws Beef Sandwich Against the Wall with Vengeance.' " The way Kansas has been playing, Pepper was lucky the wall didn't throw it back.
Once Coach Vince Gibson's concept of "Purple Power" was the laugh of the plains, but the time has come when people have to take Kansas State seriously. The once-lowly Wildcats beat Iowa State 34-7—their fourth win in five starts—and stayed in contention for the Big Eight championship. Mack Herron scored three times for the Wildcats, who now face the two conference giants, Oklahoma and Missouri, on successive weekends.
Indiana and—good grief!—Northwestern each won its second straight Big Ten game to move into a tie for the lead in the Rose Bowl derby. The Hoosiers, reacting to Coach John Pont's new get-tough practice policies, beat Illinois 41-20 while the Wildcats dumped Wisconsin 27-7, ending the Badgers' winning streak at one. Northwestern's junior Halfback Mike Adamle set a school record with 316 yards rushing.
Michigan State Coach Duffy Daugherty junked the triple option in favor of his old Power I, and the Spartans upset Michigan 23-12 to even their league record at 1-1. "I've got a good chance to be in Pasadena because I can buy a plane ticket," said Duffy. "I don't know about my football team."
Minnesota gained 14 more yards than No. 1 Ohio State, but the Gophers lost five fumbles and the Buckeyes won 34-7, their 18th in a row. "We were good when it counted," said OSU Coach Woody Hayes. Purdue lost the ball six times and was out-gained by more than 200 yards but still managed to outlast Iowa 35-31 to give Jack Mollenkopf his 80th victory as Boilermaker coach.
Missouri Valley leader Louisville remained unbeaten under new Head Coach Lee Corso by defeating nonconference Mar-hall 34-17, the Herd's 26th straight winless ame. Tony Harris ran 81 yards on Toledo's first play of the second half, and the Rockets won over Western Michigan 38-13 to remain tied with Miami for the MidAmerican lead. The Redskins beat Ohio University 24-21, and the Bobcats lost not only the game but Quarterback Cleve Bryant because of a knee injury.
Hillsdale's Chet Marcol kicked a 62-yard field goal—a national college-division record—to help his team dump Fairmont State 20-13. For all you trivia fans, his kick was a yard farther than the old record, which was set by Bill Shear of Cortland State against Hobart on Oct. 15, 1966.
EAST
1. PENN STATE (5-0)
2. SYRACUSE (3-2)
3. WEST VIRGINIA (4-1)
It was O.K.—quite nice, really—for Boston College to loan Villanova its road jerseys after the visitors had some of theirs stolen, but the charity should have stopped right there. Instead, the Eagles politely forked over the football seven times—four fumbles and three interceptions—and got pinned with a 24-6 loss, their first in three games. "We think we have a pretty good defensive team," said Villanova Coach Jack Gregory. "We have about 914 blitzes."
Boston College's top runner, Fred Willis, was blitzed so hard early that he had to be taken out, and his Villanova counterpart, Mickey Kerins, paid for his 94 yards with a bloody mouth, cut eyebrow and sliced cheek. The man who put Willis out, Villanova Linebacker John Babinecz, wound up with 10 unassisted tackles as the Wildcats won for the fourth time in five games.
At the rate Army and Navy are prodding along, both may be too embarrassed to show up for this year's traditional game in Philadelphia. With their two top quarterbacks out with injuries, the Cadets had to start Roger LeDoux—who had not played a minute this season—and Utah State took advantage of the resulting confusion for a 23-7 win. It was Army's third straight loss, but the situation is even more desperate at Navy, which is 0-5 after losing to Rutgers for the first time 20-6. The Knights got all their touchdowns from Larry Robertson, who started his first game at tailback.
In the Ivy League, Dartmouth's John Short returned the opening kickoff 90 yards for a touchdown, and the Indians went on to beat Brown 38-13 for their fourth straight. "We didn't try anything new or different," said Indian Coach Bob Blackmail, "because we have an important game with Harvard next week and we knew their scouts would be watching." Blackman's own scouts saw Cornell upset Harvard 41-24 for its first win of the season as sophomore Ed Marinaro dazzled everyone with five touchdowns and 281 yards rushing on 40 carries. Yale routed Columbia 41-6 to remain unbeaten against Ivy opponents since 1966.
Fifteen minutes before game time, Temple Coach George Makris decided to start sophomore Frank DiMaggio at quarterback against Hofstra. DiMaggio's statistics were hardly impressive—a career record of one completion in nine attempts, with three interceptions—but he came through like Joltin' Joe's cousin should, throwing one TD pass and running for two more as the Owls won 34-7. The Temple students got an even bigger kick out of the halftime ceremonies, when the homecoming queen showed up with a beard, sideburns down to the chin and wearing an eight-button, double-breasted Edwardian suit. He had entered the queen contest as a joke, explained Marc Frantz, and then of course he was elected. Temple's chancellor, Millard M. Gladfelter, went along with the gag, even to the point of kissing Frantz on one of his hairy cheeks. Ugh.
Pittsburgh started fast, opening up a 20-0 lead in the second quarter on two TD passes from Quarterback Jim Friedl to End George Medich, but success—or something—finally spoiled the Panthers. Pitt's amazing two-game winning streak halted when End Maxie LeBlanc scored on a 32-yard pass with 43 seconds left to give downtrodden Tulane a 26-22 win—its first of the year.
In Philadelphia the casualty rate among Penn quarterbacks continued to escalate at an alarming rate. The latest victim, Phil Procacci, had been switched from defense only after Penn's first two quarterbacks each suffered a shoulder injury, so last week Procacci broke his jaw against Lehigh and will be out for the season. The Quakers managed to stall off Lehigh long enough for a 13-7 win, and everyone was wondering how long the newest quarterback, Terry Groome, would last. After all, he missed his entire freshman season because of a broken foot.
End of the Road Dept.: Wilkes College lost to Ithaca 13-7, ending the nation's longest winning streak at 32 games. Are you paying attention, Woody Hayes?
WEST
1. USC (3-0-1)
2. UCLA (6-0)
3. WYOMING (5-0)
Wyoming's bid for an unbeaten season and fourth straight Western Athletic Conference championship was put in doubt when Coach Lloyd Eaton suspended 14 black players—six of them starters—before the Cowboys' 40-7 victory over Brigham Young. The blacks had defied Eaton's direct orders and worn black armbands to protest what they regarded as the racist principles of the Mormon Church. "It was simply a matter of enforcing discipline," Eaton said. "The black athletes knew exactly where they stood as far as I was concerned."
Wyoming President Dr. William D. Carlson and the board of trustees backed Eaton's decision, and on Saturday afternoon Wyoming's white students turned out in large numbers to chant, "We Love Eaton, We Love Eaton," and then gave the coach a standing ovation when he crossed the field to shake hands with BYU Coach Tommy Hudspeth. The Cowboy team didn't seem to miss the blacks while winning their fifth game in a row. The nation's top rushing defense allowed Brigham Young only 16 yards in total offense and shook the visitors into five fumbles and three interceptions. Offensively, Bob Jacobs kicked two field goals and four extra points to move nearer the school and conference single-season field-goal records. Still, without the blacks Wyoming could be in big trouble in their games against Arizona State and Utah.
The top contender, Utah, won its third league game by blanking New Mexico 24-0. The loss was New Mexico's 23rd in WAC play but also its first shutout in 27 straight games and 51 in a row at home, the latter streak dating back to 1960. Behind 7-0 going into the second half, New Mexico elected to receive instead of taking the 40 mph wind at its back, and this was the Lobos' undoing. Kicking into the wind, New Mexico got off a couple of 13-yard punts and Utah turned them into 10 points, including a 37-yard scoring run by Halfback Fred Graves.
While Southern Cal was having its troubles against Notre Dame and UCLA was coasting past Cal (page 36), Stanford unloaded its frustrations on poor Washington State 49-0. Having lost to both Purdue and Southern Cal in the final seconds on successive Saturdays, the Indians jumped on State early and then poured it on. "This is the most explosive team in the West," said losing Coach Jim Sweeney, who then offered this observation on Stanford's big Pacific Eight game this week against UCLA: "UCLA has the speed, but Stanford is much more versatile." Stanford's quarterback, Jim Plunkett, threw two touchdown passes before reserve Don Bunce came in to direct the last two scoring drives, including a 43-yard keeper play of his own.
A senior end caught the first touchdown pass of his career with no time showing on the clock, and Oregon State beat Washington 10-6. The end, Jim Scheele, simultaneously caught the ball and stepped into the end zone as the final gun went off. The pass from Quarterback Steve Endicott covered 49 yards, and an Oregon State lineman admitted, "I feel like I've been cheating at cards."
The Huskies, now 0-5, had gone into a prevent defense when Oregon State began the final drive on its own 15 with one minute and no time-outs left. "I'd have bet a million dollars we wouldn't win," said Oregon State Halfback Billy Main, who had been the primary receiver on the winning play—the only one called from the bench all night by Coach Dec Andros. Oddly enough, Oregon State's other three points—a field goal by Mike Nehl—had come at the final gun of the first half.
A vintage Los Angeles fog hung over the Air Force's Falcon Stadium, but the low ceiling couldn't keep the home team from bombing Oregon 60-13 in their biggest offensive splurge of the year. The Ducks fumbled eight times and Air Force cashed them in for five touchdowns and two field goals. A blocked punt cost Oregon still another touchdown. The Falcons led 40-7 at half-time while winning for the third time in five starts.
Pacific shrugged off the nation's leading passer, Idaho's Steve Olson, in a 28-0 victory in Stockton, Calif. After a scoreless first half, the winners got 23 points in the third period. Quarterback John Read first sneaked over from the one, then passed 45 yards to Bill Cornman for another TD.
SOUTHWEST
1. TEXAS (4-0)
2. ARKANSAS (4-0)
3. HOUSTON (2-2)
While Texas and Arkansas were taking the week off, Texas Christian finally won its first game, thanks to a little psychology on the part of Coach Fred Taylor. Noticing his players' faces growing longer and longer as TCU's record dropped to 0-4, Taylor told his boys to forget their troubles and just have fun against Texas A&M. "We've been pressing too much," Taylor said, "so I just want everyone to relax and go out there and have a good time." After the Horned Frogs' 16-6 victory, Defensive Tackle Bob Creech told the coach, "If we'd known it was this good to win, we might have started a long time ago."
Nobody deserved the victory more than TCU's Steve Judy, who already has established himself as the greatest thrower to hit TCU since the days of Sammy Baugh and Davey O'Brien. Against the Aggies Judy hit his first six passes and finished with 13 of 20 for 183 yards and a touchdown. Even more heartening to Taylor, the Frogs' senior running back, Marty Whelan, gained 134 yards and finally gave TCU the running game to support Judy's arm. The Aggies' biggest gainer was Coach Gene Stallings, who prowled up and down the sidelines all afternoon.
SMU President Willis Tate wore a blue sock on one foot and a red one on the other—hopefully for good luck—while he watched Chuck Hixson pass the Mustangs over Rice 34-14, their second straight win. Hixson completed 22 of 32 for 255 yards, but the people's choice was SMU's tiny Daryl Doggett (5'6", 172 pounds). He looks about two hands shorter than SMU's pony mascot Peruna, but Doggett scored three TDs against Rice and left Mustang fans wondering why he had played defense last season.
At Lubbock, a home-town boy—well, he's really from Lorenzo, which is only 15 miles down the road—came back to lead Mississippi State over Texas Tech 30-26. The boy, Joe Reed, had begun his career at Baylor but transferred to Mississippi State and got into the lineup just in time to throw for two touchdowns against the Red Raiders. Six times Reed came up with a first down on third-and-long situations.
On a muddy field at Fort Collins, Colo., Colorado State slipped and slid past West Texas State 27-7. Lawrence McCutcheon gained 182 yards for the winners, including TD runs of one and 55 yards.
PLAYERS OF THE WEEK
THE BACK: Sophomore Ed Marinaro, acting like an Ivy League O.J., tied a conference record by scoring five TDs as Cornell upset Harvard 41-24. His 281 yards rushing was more impressive, beating the Ivy record by 43 yards.
THE LINEMAN: Tennessee Linebacker Steve Kiner made eight unassisted tackles and intercepted a pass as the Vols stunned Alabama 41-14. "Kiner did a superjob with big play after big play," said his coach, Doug Dickey.