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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Rookie Wr Helps Seattle Reverse Ways

Dave Boling The Spokesman-Revie

There’s an angel made of gold sitting on Joey Galloway’s ball cap.

A guardian angel, he said.

A buddy back in Ohio gave it to him before he came out to Seattle to see if he could make it in the National Football League.

“It was for good luck,” Galloway said of the winged talisman pinned to his hat.

Players around the league might make these angels even more popular than those ubiquitous nose-bandages after seeing how well it’s working for Galloway.

Especially after Sunday when this little, big-play guy, with his Acme-rocket-skate speed and flair for the dramatic dissected Denver in Seattle’s 27-10 upset victory.

And it’s too early to say for sure, but what he may have shown is that the Seattle Seahawks have a gold-plated, good-luck charm themselves in this quiet rookie from Ohio State - this Joey Go-all-the-way.

The margin of Sunday’s victory can be mitigated by the reality that Denver played with a lineup ravaged by injuries.

But it’s doubtful that even the best of the Broncos would have had much luck coursing after the elusive Galloway.

His four catches for 89 yards included a 51-yard completion from quarterback Rick Mirer.

More impressive, though, were his three runs for 54 yards on reverses.

The first went for 20 yards in the first period, the second picked up 17 yards on a third-quarter, third-and-1 situation, and the final reverse was a brilliant 17-yarder on third-and-6 in the fourth period.

“We’ve had the reverse in, it’s just a matter of us disguising it and putting it in different formations so they don’t recognize it,” Hawks coach Dennis Erickson said. “Joey is the key, we have to try to get the ball to him as many ways as we can.”

The first two reverses featured Galloway’s speed; the third his inventiveness, the kind of on-field improv that coaches can’t teach.

At the Denver 26, Galloway went to the line and blanched when he heard some of the Broncos holler “Watch the reverse.”

They did, and as he took the ball to the right side of the field, a wall of Broncos doomed the play to a large loss.

Not quite.

“When I got over there and saw all those Broncos on the right, I guess I figured that if they’re all there, there must not be any of them over on the left,” Galloway said.

Process of elimination.

Cutting back and outracing most of the Denver stragglers, Galloway even picked up a block from Mirer as he made it to the Broncos 9.

“The thing about Joey is that when you call the reverse and it doesn’t work, he can just run the other way,” Erickson said. “That speed just adds so much to this team.”

Yes, it adds excitement.

During what seemed like a coming-of-age drive in the third period, when the Hawks powered 92 yards for the touchdown that effectively put the game out of reach, two of three third-down conversions were made by rookies - Galloway and tight end Christian Fauria.

And the fans in the Kingdome, even with 15,000 empty seats, generated that same long-lost seismic sensation that so disarmed opponents years ago.

Galloway, this year’s first-round draft choice, will be at the epicenter of these waves.

“There’s no secret that we’re going to try to get him the ball in a lot of ways,” Mirer said. “He simply makes things happen.

“He’s such a complete player,” he said. “On that long pass, he wasn’t even open, but I threw it anyway because I can trust him to come up with the big catch. He made it go.”

The Broncos spent a great deal of effort trying to shut down veteran Brian Blades, which often left Galloway in single coverage. But after games like this, Erickson wonders if teams will soon be forced to change their approach about which Seahawk demands the most attention.

“I’ll tell you what, this guy is an exciting player to watch,” Hawks center Jim Sweeney said. “He sure doesn’t look like a rookie and he sure doesn’t play like a rookie.

“It looks to me like this is one guy who’s going to be in this league a long time and make a lot of people take notice. He just seems to do the right thing at the right time.”

As if something is watching over him.

, DataTimes The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Dave Boling The Spokesman-Review