Cougs Lose Game, Find A Future
Ryan Leaf’s coming-out party touched every emotion imaginable Saturday afternoon.
There was apprehension, excitement, elation, sorrow and, ultimately, deep disappointment as Stanford spoiled the final Martin Stadium appearance of 15 Washington State seniors by stealing out of town with a 36-24 Pacific-10 Conference victory.
But in the end, it seemed like it was fun to be a Cougar football player again.
Forget the gray, the cold, the wind and the wet. Forget that only 13,259 showed up on a miserable day to witness the Cougars’ home finale. Forget that a four-game losing streak stretched to five.
And forget Chad Davis.
Leaf, the strapping 6-foot-5, 228-pound redshirt freshman quarterback, who has been touted as the future of WSU football since first setting foot on campus in the fall of 1994, became the present of WSU football against the Cardinal.
He used his strong right arm to stretch the field against a solid Stanford defense. He completed 26 of 44 passes for 273 yards and three touchdowns. He helped generate 24 points and 416 yards of total offense.
And he helped quiet much of the controversy that was fueled earlier this week by the demotion of Davis, a two-year starter. What he didn’t do was win.
But that part will come, according to senior offensive tackle John Scukanec.
“I thought he did a really good job,” Scukanec said. “It was a tough situation to get thrown into the fire like that, especially with everything that went on this week. He handled himself well. He didn’t play like a freshman.
“I’m proud of him, and I think he’ll have a lot of wins here before he’s done.”
Leaf didn’t start, but he played every down after little-used fifthyear senior Shawn Deeds separated a shoulder on WSU’s first possession.
He led the Cougars on three firsthalf scoring drives that produced a 17-3 halftime lead, he threw scoring passes of 21, 22 and 17 yards yards to Bryant Thomas and he lit up the scoreboard for more points than the Cougars (3-7, 2-5 Pac-10) have scored in six of their 10 games.
But it the end, penalties, missed opportunities and Stanford’s bigplay offense kept WSU in the middle of another late-season spin.
“We are tough, we are competitive, we gave effort,” Cougars coach Mike Price said after the game. “What we did not do is make the plays when we had the opportunities to make plays - and they did.
“We’ve got to put people away when we have the opportunity. I really felt like at halftime we had a chance to put them away. I felt like things were going our way, but we squandered a few opportunities early and we can’t take them back.”
Stanford (6-3-1, 4-3), after falling behind early, scored on its final possession of the first half and its first two possessions of the second to take the lead for good at 24-17 with 10:01 still left in the third quarter.
The Cardinal added two more touchdowns in the final quarter - one on an 11-yard run by Damon Dunn off a flanker reverse and the other on a well-defended 54-yard pass from Mark Butterfield to Mark Harris - and made itself bowl eligible for the first time in three seasons.
“The second half was real gutcheck for our football team,” said first-year coach Tyrone Willingham. “We were very sloppy in the first half. We did not play very poised, let the game get out of control and were not very physical.”
Said Cardinal tailback Anthony Bookman, who burned WSU’s defense for 123 rushing yards on 21 carries: “It came down to the last 30 minutes if we wanted to go to a bowl game. The second half we just had to go out and do it, and we did.”
Stanford rolled up 260 of its 461 total yards after intermission and burned the Cougars’ banged-up defense with big play after big play.
Butterfield, who completed 19 of 31 passes for 320 yards, picked unmercifully on true freshman cornerback Andesola Moronkola, who was pressed into service when starter Shad Hinchen suffered a concussion early in the third quarter.
He threw touchdown passes of 35 yards to Brian Manning, 25 yards to Bookman and 54 yards to Harris and humbled what had been a proud Cougars defense.
WSU had two of Butterfield’s touchdown passes well covered, but the Cardinal receivers won the battle for the football in each case and went on to score.
On the long bomb to Harris, the Cougars had three defenders in position to make either a deflection or interception and all three ended up on their backsides as Harris made the catch.
“It’s a shame,” WSU defensive coordinator Bill Doba said. “We had a chance to win. I thought our offense really came and played well. They were moving it up and down the field, but we just didn’t hold up our end.”
Injuries played a key role in the vulnerability of Doba’s defense. Along with Hinchen, he lost defensive end Dwayne Sanders to a re- injured ankle and played the entire game without starting defensive tackle Gary Holmes, who also has an ankle sprain.
“It looked like a Walla Walla JV game when I looked out there once,” Doba said.
And the injury situation was even worse on the offensive side of the football where the Cougars lost Deeds, starting running back Frank Madu, starting tackle Ricky Austin and backup tight end David Knuff to injuries.
At one time, the Cougars offense was playing with an all-freshman backfield and four other sophomores on the field.
“At times, I looked around and we just had a rag-tag, thrown-together crew out there,” Scukanec said. “But we still played hard and I think that bodes well for the upcoming seasons.”
Price said he expects all of his injured players - except Deeds - to be back for next Saturday’s Apple Cup season finale against Washington in Seattle.
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color photo