Ot Gamble Falls Two Short

Duane Stewart doesn’t mind telling you: His first feeling was dread.

“I was hoping they’d just kick it,” he confessed, “and we’d score another touchdown and stop them the next time.”

Next time? Hey, Dick Tomey doesn’t believe in next time. You have to wonder if he believes in overtime. Arizona’s head coach is a man of depth, courage, vision - and he coaches as if he left the water on in the bathtub, with no beef from anyone with a deadline or a long drive home.

But overtime? If college football had comp time, Tomey would take that instead.

With no such option, he was going to bring Saturday’s lingering stalemate with Washington State to rapid resolution. He would not call the bet, but raise. If a PAT kick would keep the Wildcats alive for more overtime, a two-point conversion would make a statement - succeed or fail.

“We decided in the fourth quarter that we’d go for two,” said Tomey.

So here it was. One game. One play. One guy.

For the Wildcats, the guy was freshman quarterback Ortege Jenkins, nastier than a habanero pepper. For WSU, the guy was senior safety Duane Stewart, metaphors pending.

OK, the truth is, when Tomey sent Jenkins rolling right with instructions to run it in or throw it in, waiting with Stewart was cornerback LeJuan Gibbons. But Gibbons himself would tell you that, for the bulk of the afternoon, he had not been of much use. Used, perhaps, but not useful.

But on this one, last play he did precisely the right thing, he and Stewart. And so now WSU is 7-0 for the first time since 1930 - the last time it went to the Rose Bowl.

Tongues will wag over Wazzu’s narrow 35-34 escape, the first OT win in school history, and should.

Oy, the breakdowns. The penalties. The missed opportunities. The odyssey of stomach distress that is each Cougar punt return.

Who is that guy back deep? Shawn Tims, or Shawn Tums?

Even the tortuous 25-yard drive the Cougars completed in overtime for their first lead of the game took as many plays - seven - as all but one of their touchdown drives in regulation. More, if you want to include the three snaps erased by penalty flags. And twice the Cougs gave Arizona fourth-down clemency in overtime.

Maybe that’s why Tomey was so eager to go for two after Arizona’s OT touchdown: He couldn’t take it, either.

But then, this was the guy who ordered up a fake PAT kick in the fourth overtime against California last year in another gallant loss.

“So you know they’re going to do something tricky,” offered Stewart, “something to deceive us. We stopped their run all game long, so they’re not going to run.”

Not up the middle. So the fake handoff to Kelvin Eafon couldn’t have been more transparent.

And Stewart’s instinct not to bite couldn’t have been more prescient.

“Yeah,” Stewart said, “I think (Jenkins) was surprised to see us.”

And then he was swallowed, 2 yards short of where the Wildcats needed him to be.

“I thought I could have ran it in but they had two people out there,” Jenkins said. “It was hard to see the back-side tight end because the pursuit was coming my way. From what they told me, he was open, so I guess I just misread it.”

Of course, no Cougar cliffhanger from this point on is going to end with a mere tackle. That would be substandard, September drama.

In the grasp of Stewart and Gibbons, Jenkins shoved the ball toward the end zone, hoping for a teammate’s recovery and the same kind of brain cramp by the officials that allowed him to call off a play because of too much noise from end zone bleachers that were, for all purposes, empty.

“I was on the ground with him,” Stewart recalled, “and then I saw the ball in the end zone.

“I said, ‘Hold up, man, you threw that?’ And he was like, ‘Yup, I let it go.’ I just slapped him on the butt and told him, ‘Oh, man, you’re wrong for that.”’

At that point, a penalty flag landed at their feet. Gibbons, in keeping with his day, expected the worst.

“I thought, ‘Oh, man, we got to go through this again?”’ he said. “And I thought I’d probably be the person it’d be called on.”

But the flag was a mistake - it was supposed to be a beanbag, to mark the spot of the fumble. As referee Jim Fogltance explained afterward, if any other Wildcat besides Jenkins himself had recovered the fumble, the ball would be returned to where it left his possession. That would have ended the game, of course - the same way Gary Holmes’ recovery for the Cougars did.

“Another great feeling,” said Stewart. “Just like beating SC and UCLA. We hadn’t beaten Arizona since I’ve been here, so no matter how it looked, it feels great.”

When a team wins a game without once having the lead in the 60 scheduled minutes, you can make a case for this destiny business. As it happens, the Cougs realize it will get harder before it gets easier. Their traditional month of dread awaits, a good bit of their luck used up this day.

And yet …

“It has to be something special,” Gibbons insisted. “We win the close games. We dominate other games. We’re doing all the things it takes to win.”

Including finding the guy it takes to win.

For a time, the Cougs had that last year. Facing certain defeat against Cal, they watched quarterback Pat Barnes hand off to a running back who wasn’t there - and watched a fellow named Duane Stewart fall on the free ball.

Of course, Wazzu didn’t win a game after that. That’s where the story changes.

“All game long, I’m thinking I’m going to get a pick, a sack, something,” said Stewart, who was credited with just two tackles. “Finally, I thought I’m just going to hit him, strip the ball, anything. I just wanted to come through.

“This is the way you want to go out if you’re a senior - on a team like this. This is my last year. I don’t know if I’ll play any more after this, so the more wins the better, any way they come. I’ll take something like this every game.”

Every game. Every play. Every guy.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: PAC-10 STANDINGS League Overall W L PF PA W L Wash. St. 5 0 187 139 7 0 Washington 4 0 159 62 6 1 UCLA 4 1 182 122 6 2 Arizona St. 3 1 93 57 5 2 Stanford 2 2 121 132 4 3 USC 2 2 79 102 4 3 Oregon 1 4 131 154 4 4 Arizona 1 4 126 171 3 5 Oregon St. 0 4 61 119 3 4 California 0 4 74 155 2 5

Saturday’s results WSU St. 35, Arizona 34 (OT) Southern Cal 24, Oregon 22 UCLA 35, California 17 Washington 45, Oregon St. 17

The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = John Blanchette The Spokesman-Review