They’re Happier in Obscurity

They are still trying and still losing often. The only difference is hardly anyone notices this season.

The Prairie View Panthers were a weekly trivia question last season when they were blazing toward the nation’s longest college football losing streak.

The Panthers ended the streak at 80 with a 14-12 victory over Langston on Sept. 26, 1998. Now they’ve returned to the anonymity of being weekly underdogs in the Division I-AA Southwestern Athletic Conference.

“People always ask me, ‘How do you get them up?’ ” interim Coach Clifton Gilliard said. “We never have a down practice. They come back week after week and they see the vision that one day it will happen.”

The Panthers won for only the third time this decade on Saturday, a 21-20 victory over Panhandle State. Prairie View improved its record to a lofty 2-5.

“It felt great to win that game,” Gilliard said.

“We are going for 5-5 now. That’s the best we can do and that’s their goal.”

A better way to sum up the futility: Prairie View has won three games since Oct. 28, 1989, when they beat Mississippi Valley, 21-12. Langston defeated the Panthers, 19-18, the following week to begin the long losing streak.

Talent and numbers keep the Panthers down. The school awards only 15 scholarships. Most of their opponents in the conference play with 65 scholarships.

The Panthers start games with fresh legs but by the fourth quarter they’re worn down.

“It’s been that and it’s still that,” Gilliard said. “That’s what’s haunting us right now. The only thing that will bring about change is a few more scholarships.”

The Panthers have scored 64 points this season but only 20 in the second half.

Prairie View was close for a half with Alabama A&M; earlier in the season, but ended up losing, 27-3.

“We’ve had our chances this season,” Gilliard said. “With nine minutes to go in the fourth quarter, it’s still 14-0 against Alabama A&M.; I felt we could have beaten Southern but we ran out of gas, had too many turnovers and couldn’t put points on the board.”

Southern won, 42-0, one of three shutouts against the Panthers this season.

Wide receiver Deontay Wilson is the Panthers’ leading receiver and ranks No. 6 in the SWAC with 21 catches for 334 yards and three touchdowns.

“This year, we expect to win,” Wilson said. “We feel hungrier, but we have had more injuries than last year and without scholarships that’s keeping us down. We play well for a half and then we aren’t as explosive in the second half.”

Interim athletic director Walter Redd, who has been at the school for almost 50 years, wants his beloved Panthers to be known for something other than losing.

After all, the Panthers were big winners in the 1950s, winning a national title in 1958.

“We had one of the best records anywhere during the glory years of Prairie View,” Redd said.

IT HAS BEEN A LONG TIME COMING

Speaking of going a long time between victories, Miami, 31-28 winners over Boston College on Saturday, hadn’t beaten a Division I-A team since August. Since beating Ohio State in the kickoff classic, the Hurricanes have beaten I-AA Florida A&M;, lost three times and had three off weeks--the most recent last Saturday when Hurricane Irene forced postponement of the game against Temple until Dec. 4.

MOVING UP IS HARD TO DO

After losing to Marshall, 59-3, and falling to 0-7 on the season, Buffalo Coach Craig Cirbus defended the school’s decision to move up to I-A without having established a winning program at the lower level.

“I was hired to build a program and the university made a decision that we belong in Division I-A,” said Cirbus, a former assistant at Penn State. “We have a long way to go. I’m not flinching, not at all.”

If Cirbus desired some motivation, he just needed to look across the field Saturday. Marshall Coach Bob Pruett led the Thundering Herd to a 10-3 record and the school’s first bowl appearance in 1997, the Herd’s first season in Division I-A. Marshall won the Division I-AA national title in 1996.

“The people in Buffalo have to have patience,” Pruett said.

“Just saying you’re going to be Division I-A is not enough.”

THIS HARD LAND

Princeton kicker Taylor Northrup didn’t exactly have a Rhodes’ Scholar day for the Tigers in a 13-6 loss to Harvard. In fact, he had a day best forgotten.

The Tigers had tied the score at 6-6 when Northrup kicked a 52-yard field goal with 3:34 remaining in the game. It was his career best, the longest field goal for Princeton in 34 years and just shy of the school record of 54 yards.

But Northrup turned from hero to goat on the ensuing kickoff as he slipped and fell while kicking off and Harvard took over on its 42. Quarterback Brad Wilford then directed an eight-play drive for the winning points.

HAPPY IN OBSCURITY, PART II

Paul Smith compiled 527 all-purpose yards Saturday in Gettysburg’s 42-28 victory over Muhlenberg at Gettysburg, Pa., becoming the NCAA Division III career leader with 8,496.

Smith broke the Division III record of 7,970 set by Coe’s Carey Bender from 1991-94. Smith’s 390 rushing yards in 45 carries Saturday was the fifth-highest total in Division III history. Dane Brown of Marietta set the record of 441 in 1996.

Smith is second on the NCAA all-divisions all-purpose yardage list behind Brian Shay, who had 9,301 for Division II Emporia State from 1995-98.

GOURDINE’S OUT FOR THE SEASON

San Diego State’s Damon Gourdine tore ligaments in his left foot during Saturday’s 38-16 loss at Utah, a season- and career-ending injury for the all-purpose senior.

Team officials said Gourdine will undergo surgery early next week.

In 29 games with the Aztecs after one season at El Camino Junior College, Gourdine caught 114 passes for 1,370 yards and 12 touchdowns.

RIVALRY GOES ON HIATUS

In many ways, Nebraska-Texas is the hot new rivalry in college football even thought it’s already over.

It has everything: revenge, respect (and disrespect), two ranked teams and three victories by underdog Texas in the last four years that ended Nebraska streaks.

The only problem is the series went on hold after Saturday’s 24-20 win by Texas. Because of the split between the Big 12 North and South divisions, the teams aren’t scheduled to meet again during the regular season until 2002.

They could play each other in the conference title game during the off years and possibly even meet again at the end of this season.

“If we’re good enough,” Texas Coach Mack Brown said.

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Austin City Limits

Since 1992, Nebraska has lost only six games in the regular season, compiling a 72-6 record in that time. Three of those losses have come to Texas. A look at the few blemishes on the Cornhusker regular-season record:

1993 (11-0 in regular season)

1994 (12-0)

1995 (12-0)

1996 (10-2)

Lost to Arizona State, 19-0

Lost to Texas, 37-27

1997 (12-0)

1998 (9-3)

Lost to Texas A&M;, 28-21

Lost to Texas, 20-16

Lost to Kansas State, 40-30

1999 (6-1)

Lost to Texas, 24-20

--Compiled by Houston Mitchell