St. Louis Post-Dispatch from St. Louis, Missouri • Page 50

OCT 3 0 )983 (ff). Key National, Area College Football Scores Complete list of scores oil Page AD, I'lMdM'liV 1 24 Michigan St. 20 Notre Dama 22 Auburn 16 Georgia 59 D.HJ.I ffAaMUS I Iowa State 12 Ohio St 10 Navy 7 Florida 0 William Mary 24 rillllii -nl Nebraska 26 -JFt Purdue 9 USC 41 Wyoming 48 Alabama 53 W.Illinois 13 Missouri 18 "llr.n.,.n,. I Wisconsin 6 Oregon St. 20 Colorado St.

14 Mississippi St. 34 Illinois St 10 Oklahoma St. 45 Indiana. ...45 IjMKif.VHE I Miami (Fla.) 31 LSU 31 Arizona St 21 SW Missouri 41 Kansas St. 27 Iowa 34 iMalllAtoiL I East Carolina 7 Mississippi 20 Oregon 20 E.

Illinois 21 Oklahoma 63 Michigan. 52 Washington St. 34 West Virginia ..51 Clemson 38 27 Kansas 14 Northwestern 7 UCLA 30 PennSt 30 Wake Forest 21 Lincoln 0 ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH SUNDAY, OCTOBER 30, 1988 SPORTS it My KEVIN HORRIGAN SPORTS A EDITOR Blues Proposal 'Huskers Win 26-1 8 At Kiel Emits (. A By Jim Thomas 01 the Post-Dispatch Staff LINCOLN, Neb.

So this is what a real football game looks like. So this is the way it used to be in the glory days at the University of Missouri. Hard-hitting. Clutch plays. Tough tackling.

Bob Stull, sit tight in El Paso. The Tigers may not need you after all. Woody Widenhofer? Maybe the guy just needed some time. Was that Corey Welch out there at quarterback, or Phil Bradley? Running back Michael Jones punishing would-be tacklers, or James Wilder? Defensive back Otis Smith wreaking havoc on the blitz, or Johnnie Poe? After all, it has been 10 years since Missouri last beat Nebraska. But slowly painstakingly surely Nebraska turned fantasy into harsh reality Saturday afternoon for the Tigers, rallying for a 26-18 victory.

The fifth-ranked Cornhuskers used a familiar Mizzou nemesis the big play to improve to 8-1 overall, 4-0 in the Big Eight. Missouri, losing its fourth game in a row, fell to 2-5-1 overall and 1-3 in league play. What now of Widenhofer's job security? What now of Stull, the Texas-El Paso coach who is the oft-rumored replacement for Widenhofer? We'll know more over the next three weeks'. "We needed to win one like that," Widenhofer said. "Missouri traditionally over the years has played Nebraska tough.

I don't think we were intimidated by them." They weren't. And for Mizzou fans, it looked like one of those glorious days of yore until midway through the fourth quarter. The Tigers were moving the ball. They were harrassing 'Huskers quarterback Steve Taylor. They were See MIZZOU, Page 2 AP Mizzou quarterback Corey Welch is sacked by Nebraska's Chris Caliendo in Saturday's 26-1 8 Cornhuskers victory.

Woody, Staff Engineered Inspired Effort TOM WHEATLEY 5 ft. COMMENTARY rather than carelessness. The looniest burst of fumblemania produced six fumbles in 10 plays, with the ball changing hands four times. Maybe somebody substituted a piglet for the pigskin. And how often does a 35-point underdog, with a coach fighting for his job, having lost by four touchdowns the week before, rise up and smite down the nation's No.

5 team before 76,316 hostile fans? It didn't happen here Saturday. It might have, though, if Charles Mur- See WHEATLEY, Page 2 the score, a 26-18 loss to the Nebraska Cornhuskers. "I really can't fault our football team," Mizzou coach Woody Widen-' hofersaid. And you couldn't fault him and his staff, either. They made sharp, accurate decisions all day and brought the best out of their scrappy team.

When Wldenhofer left the field, Nebraska fans nearby gave him a rousing ovation. The redcoats extend that courtesy to every visiting coach not named Barry Switzer, but there was nothing automatic about this burst of applause. It was enough to make even a frequent Widenhofer critic clap along. This was a big-league effort by Mizzou against a big-league team in the face of big-league odds. When freshman Jeff Jacke blasted a 51-yard field goal to give Mizzou an 18-17 lead, this game was 10 minutes 43 seconds away from being one of the all-time greats.

It may qualify anyway. How often do you see teams for 12 fumbles and lose six of them and not call It a sloppy show? You wouldn't Saturday, because most bobbles were caused by crashing hits 17 LINCOLN, Neb. Now we're get-tin' somewhere. And no wisecracks, please, about why it took eight weeks for the Missouri Tigers to get everybody pulling Woody's Wagon in the same direction. Don't spoil the party by dwelling on UCLA Toppled By Washington St, A Certain Smell A guy leaves town six weeks ago, thinking the skids finally are greased for a new downtown arena, Then he comes home and finds that not only are the skids not greased, but they're all covered with horsey-doo.

Oh no. Once again, it appears that this town has taken a perfectly doable idea for a first-class project that is truly needed and turned it into a political football, the only kind of football the town is good at keeping. Instead of doing something, we're arguing about it. The guys with the me-first, can't-do spirit, have struck again. On Thursday, this newspaper revealed that Oppenheimer Properties, the New York management firm that brought in the Canadian investors and Maryland development firm to do the Union Station project here after local investors said it couldn't be done, wants to expand the good ol' Kiel Auditorium.

The $100 million project would include a arena as part of a "National Equestrian Center." Horse shows apparently are big business. Lots of rich people own horses, and the National Equestrian Center the Nagdome, for short would be the Taj Mahal of the curry comb set. Horse shows now scattered across-the country could be centralized at the Nagdome. Two city blocks behind the Nagdome would be decked, with cars on the bottom and stalls for 1,500 horses on top. Hotels would be jammed with big spenders.

Airports would have to expand hangars for private jets. To- matoes' would bloom, what with the sudden availability of large quantities of organic fertilizer. Even better, when the horsey set wasn't using the Nagdome to canter and gallop, the St. Louis Blues would use it to play hockey. Blues chairman Mike Shanahan said he'd met with Steve Miller of Oppenheimer and was examining his options.

This came as a shock to a returning tourist. When these balmy shores were abandoned In early September, Shanahan was closing in on a deal with Anheuser-Busch to build a new arena on a parking lot south of Busch Stadium. The Blues had taken the proposal to the brewery's Civic Center Corp. last spring, and the more the brewery's people looked at It, the more sense it made. The building was to be financed through the advance sale of luxury suites and premium seating.

The Blues would get a share of the suite revenue, the parking and concession and advertising sales revenue. In short, the hockey team would get all the revenue it generates, something that doesn't happen at the rattletrap, 60-year-old blimp hangar on Oakland Avenue; The Blues would nave a chance to prosper, and with prosperity at the bank might come prosperity on the ice, a chance for something really excellent. It was the right building, in the right place at the right time. It was private enterprise, an entrepreneur, identifying a problem, finding a solution and acting on it without going to the public trough. It was too good to be true.

Someone, I said then, would surely mess it up. Now the question is who that someone is. Shanahan wouldn't say. When asked why he's now dickering with the Oppenheimer people, he said only, "They came to us with a very positive proposal that puts on the table everything we've been striving for." And the Civic Center people? Have they put on the table everything you've been striving for? "No comment," Shanahan said. Well, then.

What is it the Blues have been striving for? They want a new building, one that doesn't repel customers, and they want a greater share of the parking, concession and advertising sign rental dollars than they have at the city-owned Arena. They want first choice of the dates they play. They want recognition that the hockey club, with its 40 regular-season home games and whatever home playoff dates it earns, represents a big asset to the arena. This recognition should be reflected in either a minority ownership position, or a sweeter lease deal. The Blues are looking for something like $1.5 million in additional revenue every year from all these sources.

Sources familiar with the negotiations say the last offer from Anheuser-Busch falls nearly $1 million short of that goal. And other sources, familiar with A-B's position, say the Blues' insistence on an ownership interest in the arena is a real sticking point. "They want an equity position See HCgtRIGAN, Page 9 Missouri coach Woody Widenhofer's record in games decided by eight points or less): 1985 Northwestern 27, Missouri 23 Texas 21, Missouri 17 California 39, Missouri 32 Nebraska 28, Missouri 20 Kansas State 20, Missouri 17 Missouri 28, Iowa State 27 Oklahoma State 21 Missouri 19 1986 Texas 27, Missouri 25 Colorado 17, Missouri 12 Oklahoma State 10, Missouri 6 1987 Missouri 23, Baylor 18 Indiana 20, Missouri 17 Oklahoma State 24, Missouri 20 Oklahoma 17, Missouri 13 1988 Missouri 28, Indiana 28 Nebraska 26, Missouri 18 MU Record 2-13-1 On the ensuing kickoff, Washington State kicker Jason Hanson recovered a fumble by Brian Brown at the UCLA 37-yard line. The Cougars then marched to the Bruins' 19 where the drive stalled, and Hanson was wide left on a 36-yard field goal attempt with 3:16 remaining. UCLA then moved to the Washington State 45-yard line, but an Aikman pass was intercepted by Artie Holmes at the Washington State 38 with 1:59 left.

A 31-yard punt return by Darryl the threat and, in all likelihood, UCLA's hopes for a national championship. Washington State has a 2-3 Pacific-10 Conference record and a 5-3 overall mark. UCLA (7-1) fell to 4-1 In the Pac-10. After Alfredo Velasco's 30-yard field goal with 11:39 to play put the Bruins ahead 30-27, Washington State drove 80 yards in 13 plays all on the ground to score the winning touchdown. The march was aided by two personal foul penalties against UCLA.

Henley and a 33-yard pass from Aikman to Charles Arbuckle put the Bruins In position to win the game, but the Washington State defense did what it needed to do. Aikman completed 27 of 44 passes for 325 yards and one touchdown with one interception. Washington State's Timm Rosenbach hit on 16 of 25 throws for 272 yards and two touchdowns, both to Tim Stallworth. Starting with its second possession, UCLA scored on five successive drives to take a 21 -point lead early in the third quarter. PASADENA, Calif.

(AP) Rich Swinton's 1-yard touchdown run with 6 minutes 21 seconds remaining capped a remarkable Washington State comeback Saturday as the Cougars shocked top-ranked UCLA 34-30. Washington State, a 19-point underdog, outscored the Bruins 28-3 after Eric Ball's 8-yard touchdown run with 12:35 left in the third quarter had given UCLA a 27-6 lead. The Bruins got to Washington State's 6-yard line with 35 seconds remaining, but Troy Aikman threw four successive incompletions to end mi 1 '4 1 Slumping Cowboys Face Cards Pro Basketball Franchises, Like Jordan, Become Bullish By Jeff Gordon 01 the Post-Dispatch Staff 1 i hicago Bulls star Michael Jordan provides a good metaphor for the National 1 1 f. it 4 2- IRVING, Texas (AP) It's one game Tom Landry needs worse than a former assistant. For his morale and the 47 players on the Dallas Cowboys team, Landry hopes something positive happens Sunday when the Gene Stallings-led Phoenix Cardinals come calling at noon In Texas Stadium.

The Cowboys have lost four games in a row and have tumbled to a 2-6 record, worst in 26 years. Stallings spent 14 seasons on Landry's coaching staff but he Isn't going to roll over. "We need a victory worse than Tom does," Stallings said. "He's been to five Super Bowls. We'd Just like our fifth victory." The Cardinals are 4-4, losing their last two games after taking an early lead In the NFC Eastern division.

Stallings has lost four of his five meetings against Landry, including a 17-14 decision in the second game of this season. "Tom has been pretty tough on me," Stallings said. "He's still a great coach. He's catching a lot of criticism but it's not deserved." Stallings called Landry this week to check his morale. "He's still a good friend of mine," Stallings said.

"I don't care if we are playing." Landry helped Stallings get his job with the Cardinals, giving a glowing recommendation when queried by See BIG RED, Page 10 ing. "Michael is awesome. I feel I'm the luckiest guy who ever held a marketing job in sports, getting to sell the greatest basketball player who ever lived." The Bulls' success is a good Illustration of how the NBA has progressed. In 1983-84, their final pre-Jordan season, the Bulls drew an average of 6,365 fans to their games at Chicago Stadium. In four seasons with Jordan, the Bulls have averaged 11,887, 11,445, 15,871 and 18,060 fans.

And Jordan's road show has been lucrative to the NBA he drew an average of 16,174 and 16,461 to other arenas the past two seasons. In their final pre-Jordan season, the Bulls drew an average of 9,441 on the road. "My job is to maximize the selling potential," Schanwald said. "Michael is the main reason behind our success, but there are other reasons as well. The Philadelphia 76ers were a team that had the first Michael Jordan, Julius Erving.

They won six divisional titles and one world championship and they only averaged 1 3,000 a game." In sports, you need something exciting to sell and a flair for sell-See NBA, Page 8 '4 4 Basketball Association's recent surge. Pro basketball has become sudden, aggressive and acrobatic, like one of Jordan's dunks. Like Jordan, the NBA and its teams have turned into marvelous marketing machines parlaying newfound excitement into previously unimaginable revenue. Jordan, whose Bulls play the Phoenix Suns at 7 p.m. Sunday at The Arena, is one big reason why the NBA is the hottest professional league.

Since 1983, the value of marginal franchises has grown from $10.5, what the Kansas City Kings cost, to $55 million, which the San Antonio Spurs recently fetched. The league's soaring popularity is one big reason why Jordan Is arguably the wealthiest and most charismatic pro athlete today. The NBA, and Jordan, have become sports phenomenons. "Michael has done for the NBA in the 1980s what Babe Ruth did for baseball in the 1920s," said Steve Schanwald, the Bulls' vice presi-dent for marketing and broadcast 4 i WTBSNBA Dhoto Michael Jordan has become the NBA's hottest attraction..