The San Bernardino County Sun from San Bernardino, California • Page 31

Local colleges: of routs Pomona-PitzerC2 Golf: Jones leads LPGA tourneyC8 Paul Oberjuergs Sports Editor (909) 386-3865 Fax (909) 384-0327 PORTS The Sun Section Sunday September 19, 1993 COLLEGE FOOTBALL: WEEK 3 Paul SV Oberjuerge Ifo IN THIS CORNER Seminoles Ward off Tar Heels "It was a tough test and we passed Ward said. it, HOW THE TOP 25 FARED 1. Florida State d. North Carolina 33-7, 2. Alabama d.

Arkansas 43-3. Next La. Tech 3. Miami d. Virginia Tech 21-2.

Next Colorado 4. Notre Dame d. Mich. St 36-14. Next Purdue 5.

Tennessee lost to Florida 41-34. Next LSU 6. Syracuse tied Texas 21-21. Next: Cincinnati 7. Colorado lost to Stanford 41-37.

Next Miami 8. Nebraska d. UCLA 14-13. Next Colorado St. 9.

Florida d. Tennessee 41-34. 10. Michigan did not play. Next Houston 11.

Ohio Stated. Pittsburgh 63-28. 12. Oklahoma did not play. Next: Tulsa 13.

North Carolina lost to FSU 33-7. Next NC State 14. Penn State d. Iowa 31-0. Next Rutgers 15.

Arizona d. Illinois 16-14. Next Oregon State 16. Texas Missouri 73-0. 17.

NC State did not play. Next: North Carolina 18. Washington did not play. Next: East Carolina 19. BYU d.

Colorado State 27-22. Next: Air Force 20. Stanford d. Colorado 41-37. Next: UCLA 21.

Cal d. Temple 52-0. Next: San Jose State 22. Boston lost to N'western 22-21. Next Temple 23.

ASU lost to Louisville 35-17. Next: Oklahoma St. 24. Wisconsin d. Iowa State 28-7.

Next: Indiana 25. Virginia d. Georgia Tech 35-14. Next Duke Game coverageC4-5 i fun, however. Eleven minutes into the third period, it was 27-7 Florida State.

The Tar Heels' first three plays of the second half all lost yardage. Their first five possessions of the second half netted 16 total yards. Yep, same old Florida State. When it was over, the Seminoles had little to regret, save maybe committing four turnovers, and Scott Bentley's sixth missed PAT kick of the year. But Florida State's third-period explosion was decisive and deadly.

First, it was Ward passing 33 yards to Kevin Knox for the touchdown and 17-7 lead. Then, it was Bentley's 21-yard field goal making it 20-7. Finally, it was Brooks stepping in front of a hurried Mike Thomas pass and taking it back 49 yards for the touchdown and a 27-7 gap. "We can fatigue people (opponents) and we did," Seminoles coach Bobby Bowden said. Heisman candidate passes for 303 yards, two TDs as top-ranked Florida State explodes after close first half to beat No.13 North Carolina 33-7.

By Mike Lopresti Gannett News Service CHAPEL HILL, N.C. The first half Saturday night kept the ESPN audience interested. The second half was business as usual for Florida State. Tested for the first time this season for 30 minutes, anyway the top-ranked Seminoles strangled North Carolina with defense in the second half to whip the No.13 Tar Heels 33-7 and roll on down the road toward Miami. Charlie Ward's passing (27-for-41, 303 yards, two touchdowns) and linebacker Derrick Brooks' third return for a touchdown this season led the charge as the Seminoles marched to 4-0, by a combined score of 177-14.

Next comes an open week, then Georgia Tech, and then Miami in Tallahassee on Oct. 9, when things get truly serious. "I thought going into the game that Florida State had one of the best football teams I've ever seen. Nothing in this game made me change my opinion," said North Carolina coach Mack Brown. "Charlie Ward is absolutely unbelievable.

He's got to be the leader for the Heisman. I never saw anybody like him. He's as good as anybody I've ever coached against." Saturday was supposed to be the first stiff challenge for Florida State. It was for a while. Trailing 7-0 in the first period, clinging to a 10-7 lead at half-time, the Seminoles had been introduced to the brave, new world of a close game.

The composite halftime score of their first three joyrides had been 73-0. One half was apparently enough sBDroaDDTi i i I 1 v- i -y rv The UCLA defense did give up 353 yards but restricted the high-scoring Cornhuskers who came in averaging 63 points a game to just two scoring drives in 11 possessions. But it wasn't enough, with Nebraska freshman Lawrence Phillips coming off the bench for rush for 139 yards and a score, and Tommie Frazier passing for 145 yards and a touchdown. The 11-yard toss to tight end Gerald Armstrong in the third quarter provided the deciding points. "I feel fortunate to get out of here with a win," Nebraska coach Tom Osborne said.

"UCLA's running game kept us on the ropes the entire game. And with four turnovers I'm not sure we are the same team that started the season." The Bruins exhibited some of the same problems that ultimately cost them in their opening 27-25 loss to California two weeks ago. Wayne Cook passed for 134 yards, but was sacked eight times twice on third down to take the Bruins out of field-goal range. "That's my fault," Cook said. "I've got to make quicker reads and learn to throw the ball away." The Bruins made several forays inside the Nebraska 35, but could not come up with the finishing play for points.

"A real concern," Donahue said. And UCLA didn't help itself with inopportune penalties, including a holding call that cost Hicks a 53-yard touchdown. Hicks Impressive. StoryC5 UCLA outplays No.8 Nebraska but wastes chances in 14-13 defeat. By Mike Terry Sun Sports Writer PASADENA Oh, the agony of it all.

Never mind that the Nebraska Cornhuskers took their usual pound of flesh from UCLA. Not only did the Bruins play the nation's eighth-ranked team evenly for much of Saturday, they should have won the game. Instead the Bruins can merely point toward increased frustra- tion after falling a point short of the Big Eight beast, dropping a 14-13 decision before 50,299 at the Rose Bowl, The loss slipped UCLA to 0-2, marking the first time since 1971 that the Bruins have lost their first two games to open a season. "We let the damn thing get away," UCLA coach Terry Donahue muttered afterward. "No one believes in moral victories.

When you make the other team turn the ball over four times and you can control the ball on the ground like we did, you should win the game. We had our chances. But we let it get away." UCLA rushed for 192 yards, paced by true freshman Skip Hicks, who had 148 yards and a touchdown before a sprained left ankle ended his day. The Bruins played errorless ball while forcing three fumbles and one interception, and possessed the ball four minutes longer than the 3-0 Cornhuskers did. Bruins prove size isn't everything PASADENA Stop Nebraska? Sure.

And hold back a glacier, while you're at it. Lift a piano 60 or 70 times, too. And catch a falling safe. Turn back stampeding elephants. Make the Leaning Tower of Pisa stand straight.

Stem an avalanche with your bare arms. Stop Nebraska? Yeah, right. This is a force of nature, not a football team. Yet UCLA almost did it. The Bruins almost succeeded at shoveling sand against the tide.

Final score at the Rose Bowl on Saturday: Nebraska 14, UCLA 13. This was a Nebraska team, remember, that was averaging 63 points and 555 yards a game after two weeks. A team that regularly scores 14 points before the first TV commercial break. That had 40 or more points six times last season andthatwasabadyear. Nebraska has a pretty thick playbook, but mostly it just beats you up in the lines until defensi ve players give up touchdowns just to get off the field and out of the way of those Big Red steamrollers.

From tackle to tackle, the corn-fed Cornhuskers have four 300-pounders. And one runt at center, a tyke at 275 pounds. What they do at Nebraska is take already big guys and stick them in the weight room for a couple sessions of Congress. When they come out, they look like grain silos with legs. Arrayed against these me-somorphs were the 1993 edition of the Gutty Little Bruins.

Biggest guy up front? Tackle Matt Werner at 265 pounds. Factor in the assorted 220-and 230-pound linebackers, and the Bruins were giving up more weight than Julio Cesar Chavez taking on Mike Tyson. "Those guys were huge, man," conceded UCLA linebacker Ja-mir Miller. "Playing against them is like rolling a 100-pound ball up a steep hill for four hours." Exhausting work, Jamir? "I weighed 245 when the game started." And now? "Maybe 220." Facing Nebraska is a defender's nightmare. "It's bad enough they pound you and pound you," said Werner.

"Then they run that option and you stop that and then they pass on you." Said linebacker Nkosi Littleton: "You take on all those big guys, then they make you run to cover the option. Yeah, you get For all its physical prowess, Nebraska's points came tough. The Bruins came up with four turnovers and forced three punts. Some Nebraska fans don't even know they have a punter. How did UCLA's defense do it? With quickness.

Anticipation. Heart. Guts. "Physically, everybody is exhausted," said Miller. "What kept everybody going is the guy next to you.

You can't let him down because you're tired. "Everybody just sucked it up." The Bruins yielded perhaps the inevitable a pair of 80-yard scoring drives. One in the second quarter and one in the third. But that was all. The rest of the time they hung on by their fingernails.

Grabbing grass, coaches call it. UCLA's defense gave the offense repeated chances to go win the game. There were a couple of missed field goals. Some dropped passes. Bad management of the clock.

When it was over, the guys in the defensive huddle felt bad about losing but they didn't feel guilty. Not when they know the last time Nebraska won a game with as few as 14 points was more than three years ago. The Bruins practically needed to pitch a shutout to win this one. And that's too much to ask against college football's Big Red Machine. Oberjuerge Is sports editor of The Sun.

His column appears four times weekly. Readers may write him at 399 North San Bernardino, 92401 or fax to (909) 384-0327. Trrrr rrnrtm't '-itfl nMiart.H.aai APWIREPHOTO Nebraska's Lawrence Phillips shakes off a tackle attempt by UCLA's George Kase en route to a first down in the second half of the Cornhuskers' 14-13 victory over the Bruins on Saturday at the Rose Bowl. Rams' tackle growing up fast (77? hurry, to go from first NFL steps to dominating player. "He's just going to get better and better," said Rams coach Chuck Knox, who also drafted Kennedy at Seattle.

"He's developing and coming along because he has a great attitude about it. He comes to practice and works as hard as anybody on our football team. And he plays that way on Sunday." Knox knew about Gilbert long before most of the football world. Knox is a Pennsylvania native who coached at Ellword City High School in the '50s, a rival of Gilbert's Aliquippa Indians. When he went back to Western Pennsylvania to visit, he heard about this high school phenom named Sean Gilbert.

He remembered him, too. At Pittsburgh, Gilbert sat out his first season under the Prop 48 rule. In his second season he played in only six games because of a sprained ankle. After his junior year his only full season of college football his talents were clear and he entered the By Steve Dilbeck Sun Sports Writer ANAHEIM The peculiar thing about Sean Gilbert is, by football standards, he is still a baby a 6-foot-4 'a 3 15-pound baby, perhaps, but still a football neophyte nonetheless. Only this baby is growing fast, if not in physical size, in stature.

Around the NFL, people are learning exactly why the Rams used their first-round pick and the third overall in 1992 to draft a defensive tackle who had played only two years of football at the University of Pittsburgh. Four-sack games, like last Sunday's against the Steelers, will do that. So will being rewarded as the NFC Defensive Player of the Week. Gilbert started all 16 games for the Rams last year. He was solid and showed flashes of potential stardom, yet seemed a ways from being compared equally to Seattle superstar Cortez Kennedy.

Yet in his second season, Gilbert seems ready to grow in a NFL draft. Knox, newly re-appointed as the Rams coach, remembered this high school star well and made him the centerpiece of his rebuilding program. And now it appears Gilbert is ready to make that promise pay off. "He's an awesome player," said New York Giants coach Dan Reeves, who has to figure out how to handle Gilbert today. "He's one of those guys who can change the ball game.

He reminds me a lot of Cortez Kennedy. He's a big guy with quickness. "If you leave him isolated one-on-one a majority of the game, then he's going to make an awful lot of plays. You have to have him accounted for and only attack him a certain kind of way or he can destroy you." Which is sort of what happened against the Steelers. Gilbert had only five sacks last season, but nearly equaled that on one Sunday afternoon.

This is serious progress, i' Gilbert may be i comparatively raw, but he recognizes what is making the ij 1 See GILBERTC3 MARK ZALESKIThe Sun Second-year man Sean Gilbert is on the verge of stardom..