Sports
Wednesday, September 20,1995 Page 7
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Urn Pearson
Pacific coach
betterprepare
for nightmare
Pacific coach Chuck Shelton
must be having nightmares.
Last season, the Nebraska of
fense was in high gear when
Shelton’s Tigers came to Lincoln.
Comhusker quarterback Tommie
Frazier was in the game for nine
plays before sitting down for the
day.
To make a very long story short,
the final score was 70-21.
Shelton said lastyear’sNebraska
team was the best team he had ever
coached against.
Now it’s the same story all over
again.
Just stay home and watch last
year’s game film.
The Huskers have won their first
three games by a combined score of
191-59, averaging an astounding
63.5 points a game.
Watch out Pacific. With all the
clamor about top teams running up
the score to impress voters, Ne
braska coach Tom Osborne better
have his reserves in early on Satur
day, or it could get really ugly.
And with Frazier at the helm,
Shelton could be crying mercy after
the Huskers’ first drive of the game.
After last year’s drubbing,
Shelton already was looking ahead
to this year and cringing about fac
ing Frazier again.
“Having to face him next year
may be why I retire,” Shelton said
after last year’s game.
But Shelton is still here, and
he’ll be in Lincoln Saturday hoping
to avoid what happened last year.
It will happen again, though.
There really is no way that Pacific
—a team that gave up 56 points to
Fresno State last Saturday — can
stop the Husker offense.
50 now me tocus snitts oack to
Osborne and Nebraska. Will there
be more cries about Nebraska and
other ranked teams, such as Big
Eight foe Colorado, running it up?
“I think there are some cases
where people are trying to pile up
points to impress voters,” Colo
rado coach Rick Neuheisel said.
“But the bottom line is that coaches
have to keep it reasonable.
“We have an obligation to let
players who don’t play have a,
chance. We have to be careful not
to run it up, but when the players get
the chance, they’re going to do ex
actly what they’ve been practic
ing.”
To put it plainly, Pacific is prob
ably no better than the Huskers’
third-team. Against third-and
fourth-team players, Pacific played
the Huskers to a tie in the second
half last year.
When you have a program that is
as good as a Nebraska or a Colo
rado, quality players are collected
in mass quantity. The Huskers and
Buffaloes have quality from top to
bottom.
And that’s enough to give
Shelton nightmares for years to
come.
Pearson Is a senior news-editorial
major and the Daily Nebraskan sports
editor.
Hard hitter
. •. . ..
Jon Waller/DN
Nebraska rover Octavious McFarlin hits Oklahoma State tailback David Thompson in the Huskers’ 64-21 victory over the
Cowboys on Aug. 31 in Stillwater, Okla.
NU defensive back still waiting for his shot
By Mike Kluck
Staff Reporter
Octavious McFarlin hasn’t had
the opportunity to deliver a hard hit
at Nebraska yet, but he is looking
forward to getting his first good
shot.
McFarlin, a Comhusker rover,
said when he played football at
Bastrop High School in Texas he
had the opportunity to give one of
his favorite bonecrushing hits.
An opponent came across the
middie of the field, McFarlin said,
and jumped for the football.
McFarlin saw his opportunity. He
hit the receiver solid, knocking him
out cold.
“If I can get a good shot off and
hit a guy real good,” McFarlin said,
“then he knows that he is playing
against somebody who is going to
come out there at him every play
and every snap.”
McFarlin, a 5-foot-ll, 180
pound sophomore, said he was wait
ing for the chance to hit a Husker
opponent as hard as he could. Even
though he hasn’t, McFarlin is still
pleased with his performance.
In Nebraska’s win over Michi
gan State, McFarlin graded the best
of any defensive back with a score
of 92 out of a possible 100 points.
After every game, he said, Ne
braska defensive coaches grade
their players based on performance
and techniques.
Nebraska’s defensive backs
don’t talk about their scores,
McFarlin said. Instead they let their
actions speak for themselves.
“They just look at me like I got a
92, and I just smile,” McFarlin said.
“And I just look then to see what
everybody else got.”
As a true freshman last season,
McFarlin played in eight games as
a backup to Kareem Moss at rover
after Mike Minter went down with
a knee injury in the Huskers’ sec
ond game of the year.
He was one of only two true
freshmen — Grant Wistrom was
the other—to play last season.
McFarlin said his experience in
high school helped prepare him for
college. At Bastrop, McFarlin
started tor three seasons as safety
and had the chance to learn defen
sive coverage.
Learning to read defenses in high
school, McFarlin said, helped him
last year at Nebraska. He said his
high school team ran some of the
same defenses and coverages as
Nebraska.
Against Arizona State, the
Husker defense gave up 290 pass
ing yards, but McFarlin said he
wasn’t worried. He said most of the
Sun Devils’ passing yards came
from three big plays.
“If you take those three big plays
away, it wouldn’t be that bad,”
McFarlin said. “It’snothingthat we
can’t correct.”
Part of the problem against Ari
zona State, McFarlin said, was the
Huskers’ tendency to relax after
jumping to a big lead. Nebraska led
28-0 before the Sun Devils scored
on a 2-yard pass three plays after a
completion of 66 yards.
But by that time McFarlin had
left the game with a deep right thigh
bruise. He is questionable for
Saturday’s game against Pacific.
Legal process too slow for Osborne
By Trevor Parks
Senior Reporter
Nebraska football coach Tom
Osborne’s duties now include being a
judge.
Over the past nine days, Osborne
has had to make many decisions re
garding Comhusker football players
Osborne
who have been the
subject of legal
charges with their
names slapped
around in the press.
Because of the
slowness of the le
gal process,
Osborne said he
had no choice but
to make decisions
regarding his team before the courts
verdicts.
“You folks don’t take time, and I
can’t take time because we play every
week and I have to make judgments
before it all plays out,” Osborne said.
“Sometimes my judgments have to be
awfully quick because of the fact of
publicity.”
I-backs Lawrence Phillips, Damon
Benning and James Sims have all been
arrested since July. It was announced
Tuesday that charges would not be
filed against Benning.
Osborne said it was tough for him
to find out everything that happened
before makingthose auick judgments.
Time is all that Osborne wants. He
said he would like a period of 24 to 48
hours to gather all of the information
before a media explosion occurred.
“Then at least we could provide a
little balance,” Osborne said. “You
have some guys get burned, and that’s
part of the deal... I try to get the best
information I can and then I go from
there.”
Osborne said he had tried to be
open about all the incidents.
“We ’re not ever trying to have any
body fix anything or hide anything,”
Osborne said. “That’s not what we’re
doing. We’re just trying to make sure
that it’s dealt with, and that
everybody’s dealt with fairly.”
But Osborne said athletes were
more scrutinized than regular students.
“Most of the students on this cam
pus, with a lot of these charges, no
body knows or nobody cares until it’s
all resolved,” Osborne said. “You
could say, 'Well, he was found guilty
or he was found innocent.’ But here
we’ve got a little different case.”
Looking into Huskers’ criminal
records has become somewhat of a
pastime, Osborne said.
“Apparently there have been quite
a few people interested in looking at
records of potentially former play
ers,” Osborne said. “It’s kind of a
sport I guess.”
But with the way Nebraska has
been portrayed and investigated lately,
Osborne said neither he nor the ath
letic department had time to examine
all criminal records.
“If your name is Joe Brown or
James Sims, they may not pick it up
real quick,” Osborne said. “Once you
go 80 yards against Michigan State,
then the odds are better that it will be
picked up.”
NOTES:
• Defensive tackle Larry
Townsend (knee), offensive guard
Steve Ott (ankle), rover Octavious
McFarlin (thigh bruise), and I-backs
Damon Benning (hamstring) and
Clinton Childs (knee strain) missed
practice Tuesday.
