The Palm Beach Post from West Palm Beach, Florida • Page 472

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 17, 1989 The Palm Beach Post SECTION PORT Seminoles overtake Tigers 31-21 Tough crowd: UM fans sure can be taunt-lipped bunch MIAMI Another venue was selected for determining the No. 1 team in the land. Here, the salient issues dealt more with definitions than national ranking. For example, when does an innocent celebration degenerate into a tasteless exercise in taunting? QB Willis raUies FSU from 21-17 deficit in 4th 6 lead. The senior from Morris, completed 15-of-21 passes for 157 yards in the half.

David Browndyke, who made 19-of-23 field-goal attempts last season in earning AU-SEC honors, kicked a 32-yard field goal on LSU's first possession. After Browndyke kicked his second field goal of the game, a 40-yarder to give the Tigers a 6-0 lead with 14:07 remaining in the first half, Willis and fullback Paul Moore accounted for all of 80 yards in FSU's first scoring drive. Willis hit 5-of-7 passes for 53 Please see SEMIN0LES9C run on a bootleg to the left with 10:55 remaining. After the Seminoles stopped LSU on three plays and freshman Terrell Buckley returned a punt 28 yards, they drove 46 yards to clinch the win. Fullback Edgar Bennett scored the clinching touchdown on a 7-yard run over left guard.

The drive was kept alive when Willis, scrambling from pressure, threw to Dexter Carter, who made a leaping catch for a 21-yard reception on third-and-11 at the LSU 47. Willis had an excellent first half directing the Seminoles, who totaled 233 first-half yards, on 80-and 63-yard scoring drives for a 10- Summary 9C Seminoles' confirmation 9C Willis completed 25-of-35 passes, including a 32-yard touchdown pass to Terry Anthony and ran 7 yards for another as Florida State won its first game of the season. LSU, which opened with a 28-16 loss at Texas dropped to 0-2 for the first time since 1981. Willis rallied the Seminoles from a 21-17 deficit with 13:35 remaining, following a 4-yard touchdown run by LSU fullback Eddie Fuller that gave the Tigers their first lead. Willis capped a 73-yard drive with a 7-yard scoring By JEFF SNOOK Palm Beach Post Staff Writer BATON ROUGE, La.

Florida State quarterback Peter Tom Willis passed for 301 yards as the Seminoles, unranked for the first time in more than three years, came from behind to beat No. 21-ranked LSU 31-21 Saturday night in front of 75,524 fans at Tiger THE ASSOCIATED PRESS FSU QB Peter Tom Willis completed 25-" of-35 passes. Randal Hill, a wide receiver for the University of Miami, makes a reception and immediately after the whistle throws his hands to the heavens and pirouettes for equal display to all sides of the stadium. Is it taunting or celebration? Actually, it is neither. Randal Hill weighs a mere 170 pounds too Dan Moffett SPORTS EDITOR o.

1 Irish run past 9jx lb AT ichigan St -r A 7 'YjV- 1 (4 Ismail returns two kickoffs; for TDs in 24-19 victory Palm Beach Post Wire Services ANN ARBOR, Mich. Notre Dame launched a rocket that destroyed Michigan on Saturday. Raghib Ismail, nicknamed "Rocket" because of his speed, returned two kickoffs for touchdowns in the second half as the top-ranked Fighting Irish beat No. 2 Michigan 24-19 and took a major step toward defending their national championship. Summary 6C Colorado beats Illinois 38-7 3C Auburn tops So.

Mississippi 24-3 3C Ismail, the nation's leading kick returner last season, ran back the opening kickoff of the second half 88 yards and added a 92-yard return with 12:46 left to give Notre Dame its third straight win over the Wolverines the first time any school has done that in Bo Schembechler's 21 seasons as Michigan coach. "He's faster than the speed of sound," Schem-bechler said. "He may be the best I've ever seen. We couldn't tackle him." The two runs were shocking considering that no one had returned a kickoff for a touchdown against Michigan in 32 years. The last to do it was Ron Engel of Minnesota, who had a 95-yarder on Oct.

26, 1957. "If I make one person miss, we usually do pretty good," said Ismail, a 175-pound sophomore flanker. It was the 25th meeting between the No. 1 and No. 2 teams since The Associated Press started its poll in 1936.

The top-ranked team now has won 16 times and tied twice. Notre Dame's victory on a gloomy, rainy day extended its winning streak to 14, the nation's longest, and snapped Michigan's 10-game unbeaten string. It was Michigan's season opener and the second game for Notre Dame, which beat Virginia 36-13 in the Kickoff Classic on Aug. 31. "Notre Dame is a better football team than Michigan right now," Schembechler said.

"That may or may not be true at the end of the year." As they did in last year's 19-17 victory, the Fighting Irish shut down Michigan's vaunted running attack, A JEFF GREENEStaff Photographer UM's Jesse Armstead (1) forces a fumble as he tackles Cal's Darrin Greer on a second-quarter kick-off return. The Hurricanes recovered and scored to take a 17-3 lead. Anthony Hamlet (97) watches. Sloppy UM beats Cal 31-3 small to taunt in this peer group. Neither is it celebration.

Raising the hands that high could cause a career-ending shoulder injury and spinning around at the same time is a risk to the knees and ankles. No celebration is worth permanent damage. What in these Hurricanes has mistakenly been labeled taunting or celebration is in reality self-expression an uncontrollable force that rises from within. Poor Randal Hill has no recourse but to flaunt himself for public examination. It is his very nature, much as a tree lizard must puff his throat, a longshoreman must spit on the docks or a Miss America candidate must smile through Vaseline while talking of the horrors of world hunger.

They are compelled to do, so. To blame them is to question the validity of nature itself. Now let's go forth and multiply Self-expression need not be confined to solitary exhibitions. If 50,000 people are overcome with the same animal urge to vent their emotions simultaneously in the same way, that can be considered a display of collective self-expression often seen but still not fully understood by sociologists. A good example came late Saturday afternoon when the Miami Hurricanes dominated California 31-3 yet had their quarterback and his offense booed and jeered at several largely irrelevant intersections.

This taunting en masse by alleged partisans defies logical explanation. Consider that in UM's last two games, Erickson has passed for seven touchdowns, and Miami has putscored its opponents 82-6. Consider that Erickson has been thrust into the lineup with a new coaching staff and a new offensive scheme with a corps of new receivers. In terms of pure offensive production, his debut has exceeded that of his predecessors Jim Kelly, Bernie Kosar, Vinny Testaverde and Steve Walsh. Hey, consider that Craig Erickson has won every game he's started here.

Both. So how to explain this collective self-expression of discontent with him? Easy. It is taunting. Erickson threw four interceptions and he was sacked four times. The California Golden Bears were brought in to play Saturday, but the collective mind-set was fixed on Notre Dame here.

The Irish come to Miami on Nov. 25, maybe to resolve a national title. Won't play in Peoria Erickson cannot be permitted to throw four interceptions against the Irish or to be sacked four times. That would be devastating. Taunt the offense against the Californias of the world and hope that it improves.

1 This is a tough crowd here that believes in tough love. "After you score 31 points, you have to feel somewhat happy," said Erickson. "But there are four passes I'd like to have back. You can't win big games with the mistakes that we made." Somebody asked coach Dennis Erickson what these cagey Golden Bears had done to confuse Erickson, the quarterback? "Nothing," he said. OK, then what did the Hurricanes do to confuse Erickson? Confusion was defined here, too.

It is the flight of a forward pass into an area where there are no receivers, only defenders. Erickson was intercepted on a confusion route in the fourth quarter. Then, the first play of his next possession, he passed to Hill for a 33-yard touchdown. There were more mood swings in the Hurricanes' peformance than at a Woody Allen film festival. "It's a game of ups and downs and the ball is oblong and it takes funny bounces," said the quarterback.

"Good things happen and bad things happen. You're never going to have the perfect game." For the record, none of the interceptions took a funny bounce. But the point is well-taken that finding a perfect yuppie marriage is far more likely than finding a perfect football game. So perhaps the booing of Erickson or the Ericksons was justified. Taunt them today.

Maybe love them in November. What is evident in the collective self-expression is that the Miami consensus believes a higher standard is needed to dethrone Notre Dame. And without a victory over the Irish, true celebration will never be defined here. like we did. We turn it over like that and we're going to lose some The third-ranked Hurricanes (who at 2-0 will move to No.

2 following top-ranked Notre Dame's victory over second-ranked Michigan) committed five turnovers in Please see UM12C By TOM D'ANGELO Palm Beach Post Staff Writer MIAMI Dennis Erickson expected days like this, but that doesn't mean he'll accept them, even if means a sloppy 31-3 victory. "We did not have an outstanding day offensively," Erickson said after his Miami Hurricanes routed Side Lines, summary 12C Defense up to challenge 1 2C Hill thrills UM fans 12C the California Golden Bears Saturday for their 27th consecutive victory in the Orange Bowl. "We're just too inconsistent at this point in the season. We can't turn it over Please see IRISH6C Morris (3 TDs) leads UF past La. Tech 347 Montreal spoils Mete' chance to gain ground The Associated Press MONTREAL The New York Mets blew their first chance in more than a week to gain ground on National League East-leading Chicago, losing to the Montreal Expos 10-1 Saturday night as Spike Owen equaled his career high with four RBI and Pascual Perez scattered four hits over eight innings.

The Mets remained 5Vi games behind the Cubs, who lost to Pittsburgh 8-6. j7 By PATRICK McMANAMON Palm Beach Post Staff Writer GAINESVILLE Kyle Morris took a giant step toward burying his past and taking charge of his future Saturday at Florida Field. 8C 8C 8C Side Lines, statistics Allegations worry fans Passing game goes long way Iff 15C 14C 15C Box score Blue Jays win again Pennant Races at a glance Morris, the target of loud boos from many Gators fans during the season-opening loss to Ole Miss a week ago, turned Whitey Jordan's offense into his personal version of Air Jordan. Morris threw three long touchdown passes, two in the third period, as Florida scored three times in 3:33 to turn a tight 10-7 game into a 31-7 rjinaway. By game's end, Florida (1-1) was on the good side of a 34-7 win over the Bulldogs (1-2) in front of a rain-dampened crowd of 65,109.

The Expos, who snapped a five-game losing streak and trail the Cubs by seven games, reached Sid Fernandez (11-5) for seven runs in 2 innings, starting with four in the first. With one out, Fernandez walked rookie Marquis Grissom and Andres Galarraga hit his 22nd home run, giving him 11 RBI in his last nine games. Hubie Brooks iimrr iii THE ASSOCIATED PRESS UF wide receiver Tony Lomack, who caught an 84-yard touchdown pass, is tackled in first half. Please see EXPOS 14C Please see FLORIDA8C SCOREBOARD SCORELINE: (407) 837-4567 (Code 4000) SEEKING RYDER REDEMPTION U.S. golfers will try to regain the Ryder Cup and respect when they challenge Tony Jacklin and Team Europe Friday at The Belfry in England.

STORY, 19C NO REST FOR WEARY "Dan Marino isn't the only Dolphins player have trouble in New England, where plays today the Dolphins have "lost 1 1 of their last 13 games in Foxboro. STORY, 11C NATIONAL LEAGUE Pittsburgh 8 Chicago 6 Montreal 10 New York 1 Houston 3 Cincinnati 1 St. Louis at Philadelphia late Atlanta at Los Angeles late San Diego at San Francisco' ppd. Roundups, standings 14C Box scores 15C AMERICAN LEAGUE Toronto 3 Cleveland 2 Boston 5 Oakland 2 Chicago 2 California 1 Minnesota 8 Detroit 7 Seattle at New York late Kansas City at Baltimore late Texas at Milwaukee late Major League Statistics 16C Marino Jacklin.