Chicago Tribune from Chicago, Illinois • Page 153

El INSIDE SECTION 4 Press Box 2 Odds Ins .2 Don Pierson 3 NHL roundup .4 ScoreboardRacing ......7 Briefs 7 Gil Thorp 7 FAVRE NFL'S BEST The Green Bay quarterback wins Most Valuable Player voting in a landslide. See Page 3 TTJESEsy, January 2, 1996 comes FOOTCALi cava oisults Tuesday showdown Rose Bowl Outback Bowl fc Citrus Bowl Gator Bowl Cotton Bowl Orange Bowl The battle for No. 1 featuring two of the nation's top offenses. Bowl Nebraska (11-0) vs. Florida (12-0) at 7 p.m.

on WBBM-Ch. 2 1 Northwestern 32 Oregon 6 1 t. Notre Dame 2S Orange record three touchdown receptions for FSU's Andre Cooper. ClemsonO Chicago native Donovan McNabb throws for 309 yards in the rout. Auburn 14 -4 Penn State's Wally Richardson throws four touchdown passes in swamplike conditions.

Ohio State 14 Heisman Trophy winner Eddie George and the Buckeyes finish with two straight losses. Colorado's defense takes over in shooting down the Ducks. Northwestern can't first-half deficit and 'Keyshawn Johnson. "tot Ev W.r IK kj'ti Give 'edge' to Florida Experience No. 1 factor in Nebraska's favor NOT SO GOLDEN: Fla.

St. 31, Notre Dame 26 Hoiidla St. figraresoit Irish pirfe 4th-quarter lead lost in flurry of records By Andrew Bagnato Tribune College Football Wrtter TEMPE, Ariz. Tommie Fra-zier hasn't watched Florida practice. He hasn't sat with the Gators on their team bus or hung out with them around the hotel pool.

But he said he knows what the second-rated Gators are thinking as they head into their Fiesta Bowl showdown Tuesday night against No. 1 Nebraska. "They're on edge," said Fra-zier, Nebraska's deft option quarterback and leader. "They're trying to pretend that they're not. Our first championship game, we were nervous and didn't know what to expect.

We know what it's going to take, and we're going to do it." was Jan. 1, 1994, when the Cornhuskers met Florida State irithe Orange Bowl for the national title. Nebraska lost that thriller, but returned to Miami last season to capture the No. 1 ranking. In a Fiesta Bowl that presents many contrasts, this might be the most critical come kickoff time in the desert.

The Corn-husker lineup is loaded with players who have been through the peculiar hype and tension of a. bowl game with national title implications. "We feel we've been there and done that," offensive guard Aiiron Taylor said. "Give us a little respect." center Aaron Graham: "Hhink experience is probably going to be the determining factor for the outcome of this game. I 'have said this before, back in Lincoln, until you play in a national championship game you prepare for a national championship game." And the Gators? They've never See Fiesta, Page 6 By Joseph Tybor Tribune Staff Writer MIAMI-It's not that Bobby Bowden thinks Lou Holtz speaks out of both sides of his mouth.

Bowden, like many, just would like to have some inkling of what the man means or what he might do. "Lou's such a psychologist," Bowden believes. "He might be the world's best at saying something that has a meaning you aren't sure of. "Lou's saying he can't run a lick. And I'm wondering if he's saying that because he can run, or because he can't run but he wants me to believe he can run." Bowden is still wondering, shaking his head because of the scare Holtz and Notre Dame threw into him and Florida State despite a 31-26 victory Monday night in the Orange Bowl.

Florida State finished with at least 10 wins for the ninth straight season. The winning score came on Andre Cooper's Orange Bowl-record third touchdown catch with 6 minutes 9 seconds to play. Cooper also caught the two-point conversion. Holtz coached the first half like he had a personality makeover and a brain transplant and returned to a more traditional power game in. the second half in a failed attempt to put a ribbon on the season.

After the Irish (9-3) went ahead 26-14 in the fourth quarter, Florida State's Danny Kanell threw two of his Orange Bowl-record four touchdown passes within a 4-minute span. The Seminoles received a controversial safety call on a Notre Dame grounding penalty for the final margin. Holtz's team bluffed Florida State with the specter of its traditional power running game in the first half. Instead, Holtz introduced his own version of the West Coast offense, which made loosey-goosey backup Thomas Krug sometimes look like a reincarnation of Joe Montana and Rocky when he was knocked groggy early in the second half. In their first three possessions, the Irish rolled up 188 yards and 10 points, but missed touchdowns twice when they were inside the 5.

Derrick Mayes also had a punt return for a touchdown called back because of an illegal block. "For whatever reason, we did the wrong things at the wrong time," said offensive guard Ryan Leahy, who played his last game for the Irish. "What the coaches gave us was working. I think we disgraced our coaches with the mistakes we made." It was Holtz, known as a magician in some of his lighter moments, trying to pull a rabbit out the hat to beat the 11-point-underdog status for his Irish and to continue their comeback season See Orange, Page 6 S' (fey I VV It I 4 4 it -J AP photo Andre Cooper, who set an Orange Bowl record with three TD receptions, celebrates a two-point conversion he caught in the fourth quarter of Florida State's victory over Notre Dame. IIJIIIILIII UiJMfltll fw SOAKED: Penn State 43, Auburn 1 4 Penn State leaves Auburn in its wake Aerial attack belies soggy conditions SQUEEZED: Tennessee 20, Ohio St.

14 New year, same old Ohio State Cooper's decisions help vault Vols fi Big Ten at the Bowls Big Ten at the Bowls 1 By Andrew Gottesman Tribune Staff Writer TAMPAt-As Auburn players ran onto the rain-drenched field before Monday's Outback Bowl, led by a group of cheerleaders, their Tiger mascot accidentally slipped into a feet-first dive and slid several yards on his rump. It was a bad omen, as the other Tigers spent a lot of time on their own rear ends. The game, in fact, turned into a complete wipeout for Auburn. Penn State handled horrendous weather conditions with much more poise, playing almost as if the field was not a muddy quagmire. The Nittany Lions stuck with a diverse game plan and stymied Auburn's vaunted offense, rolling to an overwhelming 43-14 victory.

The rain began Sunday and was coming down in earnest by Monday morning. It turned into a steady downpour by kick-off chopping thousands of fans off the announced attendance of By John Cherwa Tribune Staff Writer ORLANDO Now you can officially add the Florida Citrus Bowl 'to the annual list of games that Ohio State coach John Cooper Just can't seem to win. The sometimes hailed, sometimes hated (usually after the Buckeyes play Michigan) coach, who probably deserves a better fate, has real trouble winning at the end of the season. I Monday, the once-dream season that was shattered by Michigan icrashed to the rain-soaked ground as Tennessee defeated Ohio State 2014. "Seems like I've done this before, too many times," Cooper said after losing this New Year's Day bowl game for the third straight time.

The Buckeyes have played here in three of the last four years, taking time off to win the Holiday Bowl in December 1993. 65,313 at Tampa Stadium and worsened as the game wore oa i Players said the mud and puddles were several inches deep at certain spots, with every tackle resulting in a skid. The footing was terrible, and even the painted corporate logos had trouble maintaining their form. Auburn coach Terry Bowden made a pair of observations afterward: The 16th-ranked Tigers (8-4) never have been so thoroughly routed during his three-year tenure, and they never have played on a field in such bad shape. Clearly, he saw a link.

"The weather really seemed to' affect us more than them," said Bowden, who took the Alabama school to its first bowl game since 1990. "It just looked like Pennsylvania weather, and they looked See Outback, Page 5 Actually, Tennessee (11-1) didn't play too badly, although it did get its fair share of luck and benefited from mistakes by the Buckeyes (11-2). Part of the problem was the monsoonlike conditions that prevailed during most of the game. For some reason, a majority of the sellout crowd of 70,797 stayed in their seats during a daylong storm that dumped a couple of inches of rain on the so-called Sunshine State. But the problems that merited the most discussion were decisions Cooper made.

Ohio State had taken a 7-0 lead late in the first quarter on a 2-yard run by Heisman Trophy winner Eddie George. But with 6 minutes to go before halftime, the SE Citrus, Page 5 AP photo Ohio State QB Bobby Hoying is buried by Steve White (left) and Leonard Little in Tennessee's 20-14 victory Monday inthe Citrus Bowl..