The Gazette from Cedar Rapids, Iowa • 23

INSIDE College Football, 2-7B College Wrestling. 8B Today in the NFL, SB 1 3B Northwestern whips Penn State to stay perfect Dougall sparkles at state It was a satisfying conclu Dougall also won the 100-yard backstroke and was named the state's top swimmer. Also winning championships Saturday were Heidi Landherr of Linn-Mar and Sanami Fottral of Cedar Rapids Prairie. Landherr won the 100-yard butterfly, Fottral the 100-yard breaststroke. Cedar Rapids Jefferson was the top Metro finisher in the team competition, placing ninth.

Details, Page 12B Wildcats 6-0 with 21-10 defeat of Nittany Lions EVANSTON, 111. (AP) Forget the past once and for alL Northwestern's -Wildcats are no longer just the biggest surprise in college football this season. They're now one of the top teams. "We get to read, 'Who are these guys, these lowly hooligans who are beating all these good teams they aren't supposed said Pat Fitzgerald, who had 20 tackles Saturday as the sixth-ranked Wildcats beat No. 12 Penn State, 21-10.

"We have no control over what North western did in the past" But they have taken control of this season and the near future. The victory Saturday will probably land the Wildcats, the Big Ten leaders, in a New Year's Day bowl game as a reward for their improbable success. First it was Notre Dame the first weekend of September. Then it was Michigan the first weekend of October. And the first Saturday of November, the Wildcats beat yet another team with a pedigree.

They used the running of Darnell Autry, who gained 100-plus yards for a 10th straight game to go with three touchdowns, and a defense that allowed only three second-half points, even though the Nittany Lions were twice inside the 10-yard line. sion Saturday for Sarah Dougall, the Cedar Rapids Washington junior who returned to prep competition this fall after taking the season off a I. year ago to focus on club swimming. Dougall won two championships in the state swimming meet at Fort Dodge, including a record-setting performance in the 200-yard individual medley. She bettered the mark she set as a freshman.

BIG TEN FOOTBALL "This is the best defensive team we have played against this year," said Penn State" Coach Joe Paterno. "They don't have a lot of glamour athletes, except for Autry. They remind me a lot of the teams I used to have. They are my kind of football team. They play football the way I like to see kids do it Nothing fancy.

They don't win big. They just Northwestern (8-1. 6-0 Big Ten) equaled the victory total of its 1948 team that Went on to capture the Rose Bowl in the school's Turn to 3B: Wildcats 'j- UA i f'JSl A zrj t- 'W sJVi i Hawk season rf M' rf. 1j 7 -sr, J. y.

c. -su it--. 1 a is unraveling DOWA CITY Bobby Diaco sat alone on a frigid aluminum bench on the Iowa sideline Saturday afternoon, staring at the ground, clasping and unclasping his hands, rocking back and forth as if he were in physical'pain. The senior linebacker ached, all right. He came all the way from New Jersey to play in a Rose Bowl, to contribute to Big Ten title contenders, to be one of the main men on a winner.

After three years of mediocrity, this looked like his team's breakthrough season. A 5-0 record. A spot in the national rankings. A seemingly sure bowl bid. Dust in the wind.

Though the Hawkeyes wouldn't say it after their 26-7 loss to Illinois at Kin-nick Stadium, their season has become a southbound train perilously close to hopping the tracks. It doesn't matter how good the competition has been, when you're into November and riding a 3-game losing streak, you're facing a confidence crisis. Iowa's defense, which spent the previous Saturday trapped in Ohio State's chamber of horrors, played well enough to beat Illinois. Hold a team to 304 yards and make the stands that Hawk defenders made, you should win. But the Iowa offense was feeble against the Fighting Illini's fighting defense, and that was the ballgame.

This contest's defining moment came late in the third quarter. Iowa had a fourth-and-inches at its Own .29, trailing 16-7. Going for a first down was a pretty good call. The play that tried to get it was not. Instead of quarterback Matt Sherman diving forward for those precious inches, the Hawks ran a delayed handoff to tailback Sedrick Shaw.

As was the case all day, Shaw was never given a chance against the Illini's stellar run defense. He was dropped in the backfield for a 2-yard loss. Illinois got a field goal on the subsequent drive, but the symbolism of Shaw's getting stuffed meant more in the way the rest of the game went. Iowa's offense vanished in the final period. you a Hawk defensive player, you probably would have seethed at Turn to 7B: Hlas Gazette photo by Linda Kahlbaugh Illinois takes the lead for good Saturday on a touchdown reception by Matt Cushing (86) in a Big Ten football game against Iowa at Kinnick Stadium in Iowa City.

Rushing in for the celebration is Conrad Adams (80), while Hawkeye Plez Atkins takes up a spot on the turf Illinois intercepted five Matt Sherman passes and effectively shut down the Hawkeye offense in a 26-7 victory. ''2 Iowa running game shut down, passing game stolen Sherman throws 5 interceptions in a 26-7 defeat time we'd run, we'd get popped. Sedrick didn't have a chance." Illinois ranks 13th in the nation in total defense. That nlimber be going up. The NFL scouts think Illinois has two of the best linebackers in jjhe country in Simeon Rice and -Kevin Hardy.

The Hawkeyes won't afie. "We tried to go away from themrfeut they seemed to be all oyer thefield today," Purdy said. swers after a promising start. Illinois bewildered Mati Sherman and intercepted five of his passes. It stuffed the line of scrimmage and held Sedrick Shaw to 38 yards, his lowest total since 1993.

The Hawkeyes Finished with 20 yards on the ground. They collected 65 yards in the second half. They went kaput. Now, the Hawkeyes heed two victories in their last three games to qualify for a bowl game. The "Think Big" campaign by the school's public relations department has come back to haunt them.

"If we don't win them now, we're sitting home for Christmas," said dejected of I lineman Matt Scouts from the Alamo, Sun and Independence Bowls watched this game from the press box, trying to find a Big Ten team with six I-A victories. They're still looking. Illinois has battered the Hawkeyes IOWA FOOTBALL 122-17 the last three years. It was 49-3 in 1993, 47-7 last year and now this. "I know everyone starts to crack a smile when I say this, but Hayden Fry causes me more turmoil during the week than anyone else," Illinois Coach Lou Tepper claimed.

"He's probably taken three years off my life the last few years." Turmoil or not, Illinois had the answers with a blitz package that fooled Sherman. "For themost they just confused us," Sherman said. "They stunted when we didn't think they'd stunt," Illinois bobbed when they were supposed to weave. "With all the stunting and blitzing up front, it was uselessto try to run the ball very much," Fry explained. "The linemen kept wanting to.

Every Jim Ecker Gazette sportswnter. BOWA CITY Think big? Think not. The Iowa Hawkeyes are in trouble. Deep, serious trouble. The losing streak has reached three.

Now come road trips to Northwestern and Wisconsin. Five straight losses loom on the horizon, just like in 1993 and '94. Illinois put the Hawkeyes in this predicament Saturday before 70,397 fans at Kinnick Stadium on a clear, crisp afternoon. The Illini smothered Iowa in the second half and posted a 26-7 victory, leaving the Hawks clutching for an The Hawkeyes had their chances, even after Illinois grabbed a in the third quarter, but couldn'CBSike a few inches when they had Iowa faced 4th-and-inches frdiSuits own 29-yard line late in thettjird quarter with a chance to rallyrFry went for the first down, but instead of a quarterback sneak the Hawkeyes tried a normal running with Turn to 7B: Hawkeyes Cornhuskers clobber Cyclones TOW A STATE FOOTRAT.T. "I don't think it was maybe an inspired football game, but I think it was a solid football game." McCarney said it was case of Iowa State (3-6, 1-4) being totally overmatched.

"Obviously, the. score got away from us and I King runs Cornell past Coe South Division title to Rams, 40-28; Ripon next By Bob Hilton Gazette sportswnter MOUNT VERNON After taking "a hard hit" as a Marion High School senior two years ago, Ben King recalled, "I was going to give up football." As a Cornell freshman, the 5-foot-9, 190-pound fullback carried 37 times for 292 yards and two touchdowns Saturday in the Rams' 40-28 domination of Coe for the Midwest Conference South Division championship. Cornell (5-0, 8-1) will host Rip-on (4-1, 8-1) in the conference championship game next Satur- Turn to 4B: Midwest It's absolutely no contest in the Big Eight, 73-14 By' Mike Koolbeck Gazette sportswnter LINCOLN, Neb. The nod in the Heisman Trophy derby goes to Nebraska senior quarterback Tommie Frazier. And the nod for the No.

1 college football team stays with the Cornhuskers. Frazier passed for 118 yards and two touchdowns, and ran for 62 yards and two more touchdowns, as Nebraska annihilated Iowa State, 73-14, Saturday before a sell-out crowd of 75,500 at Memorial Stadium. "He's just truly an outstanding football player, he's so complete," Iowa State Coach Dan McCar-ney said of Frazier, who ran his record as a starter in regular-season games to 29-1. And Nebraska is a complete football team. The Cornhuskers (9-0 overall, 5-0 Big Eight) scored 11 of 13 times they had the ball and their first 10 possessions en route to 776 yards of total offense.

"I thought we played very well today," Nebras- ka Coach Tom Osborne said. "I was a little bit apprehensive. When you play K-State and Colorado back-to-back, sometimes there's a little tendency to have an emotional letdown and I didn't think we did that. didn't think it woulc be quite as bad as it was today," he said. "But it "was the men and the McCarney said Osborne apologized to him wheri the coaches met at midfield after the game.

"He said, 'I'm sorry the score got and I said, 'That's not your fault, coach. That's our McCarney said. "I just wished him the best of luck in winning the national championship. They deserve it." i -f Tommie Frazier Nebraska quarterback Gazette photo by Marie-Susanne Langille Fifteen Nebraska runners had a hand in piling 624 yards the most ever allowed by an Iowa State defense, breaking the old mark of 604 set by the Huskers 1 Turn to 2B: Cyclones Cornell fullback Ben King races past Coe defender Darin Astor during a 40-28 Cornell victory Saturday in Mount Vernon. King, a former Marion prep, rushed for 292 yards and two touchdowns in the Midwest Conference showdown..