Oct. 2, 2000

Editor's Note: Articles such as this one by Dave Campbell appear in each edition of the Baylor Bear Insider Report, available upon membership in the Baylor Bear Foundation. For information on joining the Bear Foundation, click here.

Last Saturday night, before an announced crowd of 31,126, the Baylor Bears did something few mortals can ever do. For about 30 dismaying minutes, they made time run in reverse.

Yes, for two quarters of play they turned the clock all the way back to those dreary final seasons of the last century when they fielded one of the worst defenses in all of college football.

And come to think of it, their offense at crunch time Saturday night also often had the distinct look and flavor of 1999.

And likewise their kicking game.

They did that on a night when the table was set for something special: Floyd Casey Stadium was celebrating its 50th birthday.

On Sept. 30, 1950, the Bears inaugurated their brand spanking new stadium with a 34-7 victory over the University of Houston. Last Saturday night, Sept. 30, 2000, the Bears left their fans disappointed and hushed by losing to the Iowa State Cyclones, 31-17.

Zounds. Someone turn that clock forward, please.

This 14-point loss was Baylor's fifth straight setback in a Big 12 Conference opener and came against a team that had won only one road game in conference play since the Big 12 Conference was formed. But what frustrated and silenced Baylor partisans so much was not the Bears' two-touchdown loss to the still-unbeaten and obviously-improved Cyclones -- after all, the oddsmakers picked them to lose by a 12-point margin -- but rather how inept they looked for as long as it mattered.

Falling behind by a 31-3 margin at halftime, they had all the markings of a team that had forgotten how to tackle, how to block, how to protect the passer, how to refrain from turning over the football, how to score after getting a first down at the enemy 3-yard line, how to stop an opponent on third-and-long -- in short, how to win.

No question, this was Baylor's worst performance of the season. The Bears' one-sided loss to Minnesota came at a time when they were still numb after seeing their play-making quarterback, junior Greg Cicero, go down for the season with a broken collarbone. But this time, when the game was on the line, they just didn't execute.

Result: Iowa State went home with the most decisive road victory the Cyclones have ever recorded in Big 12 play. They are now 4-0 for only the fourth time since 1938.

At game's end, a somber Kevin Steele looked for positives where he could find them.

"I'm proud of the way we came back in the second half and fought," he said of the Bears' performance in the final 30 minutes during which they blanked the visitors while scoring a pair of touchdowns themselves. "We grew up some," Steele continued, "but it's a shame that we had to grow up with a 31-3 deficit. That's pretty tough to overcome." The halftime deficit was Baylor's biggest since the Bears found themselves trailing Kansas State by a 34-0 score last Oct. 30.

While Iowa State is hardly Kansas State, Steele did observe: "Iowa State is a good football team, and they have come a long way. But we sure did a lot of things to shoot ourselves in the foot tonight."

Steele had in mind the two first-quarter Baylor fumbles that set up the Cyclones' first 10 points, the Bruin defensive breakdowns that enabled the visitors to score touchdowns on their last three possessions of the first half (the last TD drive needing only 32 seconds and four plays to move 55 yards), and an Iowa State punt return of 39 yards that gave coach Dan McCarney's team some delicious field position which the Cyclones promptly cashed in.

But most of all he had in mind the sight of a Baylor defensive collapse, and especially the play of a not-so-good ol' Baylor line that was not worth singing about in any shape, form or fashion. Baylor's defensive line just got manhandled at the tell-tale times,, that's all.

To be sure, those Bruins up front are young (two sophs and a redshirt freshman plus an erratic junior who splits time with another soph), but still . . .

Much too often the Iowa State blockers gave Cyclone ball carriers plenty of running room. Much too often Baylor defenders would get there and still not make the tackle. They probably missed more tackles Saturday night than in Baylor's first three games combined. And as a former NFL standout was saying in the press box at halftime, "If you can't tackle, you can't play this game."

Beneficiary of all this running room and sloppy tackling was a once unheralded Dallas Carter ball carrier named Ennis Haywood, a 5-11, 206-pound junior. When recruited by the Cyclones, nobody on this side of the Red River thought Iowa State had landed anyone special. As best anyone can remember, Haywood only made one campus visit at recruiting time -- to Ames. A good back, yes, but another Walter Payton? You gotta be kidding. But at times against the Bears he looked like Walter Payton. He gathered an unacceptable 241 rushing yards on 39 carries, caught two passes for another 43 yards, and scored two touchdowns on runs of 3 and 9 yards. He averaged 6.2 yards per rush. He flat embarrassed Bruin defenders, that's all. Incidentally, that was the first time a Baylor defense had given up 200 yards rushing since Oklahoma's De'Mond Parker got 207 in 1998.

Of course, a reserve Cyclone, Hiawatha Rutland, averaged 4.5, and cool, calm and collected senior quarterback Sage Rosenfels turned runner six times and averaged 6.3.

Rosenfels ran the old option play like he invented it, and the Bears usually defended it like they had never seen it before, and you can imagine the result of that.

All in all, Iowa State rushed for 308 yards and threw for 167 and also had 138 yards in punt and kickoff returns. Teams just don't win when they surrender yardage in such chunks. If the Cyclones had not been flagged fairly frequently -- 12 times for 120 steps in lost yardage -- I fear the final score would have been worse. The Cyclones were rather unhappy that it wasn't worse. They thought they mostly stopped themselves in the second half.

But make no mistake, Iowa State deserved to win. The Cyclones were much the better team. "Overall," said Steele Sunday after viewing the game tape probably a dozen times, "after the sting and the frustration, you have to deal with reality, and the reality is that we're 15 games into something that was a major undertaking from the start (when he was hired). And we're 2 and 2 this season. That's the reality."

Those Baylor fans who are vocal in their displeasure about the Bears' difficult Saturdays might also want to recall the words of Alabama's former national championship coach Gene Stallings. After Stallings had removed his name from the Baylor coaching hunt two Decembers ago, he told the INSIDER that he felt it would take at least four years to build the Bears up to the level where they could be appropriately competitive, and he didn't have that kind of time to give the job.

Steele is a year and four games into that task. And it is true that the Bears were playing an Iowa State team that is in its sixth season under Dan McCarney, a team that only lost to powerful Kansas State last year by a 35-28 score, one that forced Texas to kick an 18-yard field goal as time expired to escape with a 44-41 victory, one that now has 24 seniors on the team -- in McCarney's words, "the best group of seniors we've had since I've been here."

Those determined seniors didn't come to Waco to lose.

They were quick to take advantage of those times when Baylor's run defense, in Steele's words, "was atrocious." Offensively, the Baylor coach found "some positive things in it, but also some huge negatives." He noted the Bruin pass protection "eroded" as the game went on. Holding a 31-3 advantage, the Cyclones threw "every kind of blitz you can see" against the young Bruin defense. In such situations, he said, "they've got more cards to play than you do. You just can't put yourself in that situation."

Reality is that redshirt freshman quarterback Guy Tomcheck, who handled every Baylor snap Saturday night, came back to earth after his big game against South Florida. He completed only one of his seven aerial attempts in the first half while giving up an interception, and he was 0-for-9 in the fourth quarter after the Bears had pulled to within 31-17.

He finished with a statistical line that read 8 for 27 for 161 yards, one touchdown (a nice sideline throw that Reggie Newhouse, rapidly becoming Baylor's most productive and dangerous receiver, turned into a thrilling 54-yard scoring play) and one interception. And he was sacked five times for 28 yards in losses.

Newhouse had two grabs for 57 yards, Lanny O'Steen two for 42 and Andra Fuller two for 21. Darrell Bush, Baylor's leading rusher (84 yards on 20 carries and one TD) turned a screen pass into a 21-yard gain and Elijah Burkins turned a screen into a 20-yarder.

This was a game that threatened to get out of hand early, and then did get out of hand during a 5 minute and 17 second spread late in the second quarter.

When all that had been recorded, it was difficult to remember the game actually started on a favorable note for the Bears. They opened the game on defense, and after surrendering 35 yards on the Cyclones' first five snaps (an omen of things to come) they forced a fumble that Eric Giddens recovered at the Baylor 45. On the turnover, Iowa State's dangerous J.J. Moses caught a pass for a 21-yard gain but then was stripped of the ball by Baylor's outstanding freshman defensive back Bobby Hart.

Given that good field position, the Bears drove for a first down and appeared to be on their way for another, at the Cyclone 41, when freshman tailback Jonathan Golden fumbled and Ryan Harklau recovered for the visitors.

From there the Cyclones started turning the Baylor defense every which way but loose. The big play was a 28-yard completion to Haywood that carried to the Baylor 10. But the Bears got tough at that point and made Iowa State settle for a 20-yard field goal kicked by Mike McKnight.

So that turn of events was hardly lethal from Baylor's point of view, and the way the Bears held the Cyclones once they reached the Bruin 3-yard line was encouraging. But worse things were right around the corner. Returning the ensuing kickoff, Elijah Burkins fumbled at the Baylor 25 and that time the visitors scored in four plays. Haywood plowed ahead for the final 3.

Baylor's reply was a blistering one -- 75 yards in 13 plays (and aided by two major penalty calls against the Cyclones) to the Iowa State 3-yard line. You just knew the Bears were about to narrow their deficit to three points. Instead, Bush got stuffed on two running plays, a Tomcheck pass fell incomplete on third down, and they had to opt for Daniel Andino's 20-yard field goal. Iowa State had manufactured a moral victory.

With 11:03 left in the second quarter, the visitors started tearing up the pea patch. They took over following a Baylor punt at their own 39 and went the distance in 14 plays. Rosenfels was highly impressive on that drive, and letter perfect on the payoff play, a quarterback option that left the ball in Haywood's hands for a 9-yard scoring jaunt.

Down by a 17-3 margin, the Bears went nowhere on their next possession and Adam Styles' punt was of the line drive variety, little hang time, difficult to cover. The mercurial Moses (3 catches for 76 yards and 4punt returns for 86 steps) returned the kick 39 yards to the Baylor 33 before Styles tackled him, staving off disaster temporarily. But the Cyclones still scored in seven plays as Rosenfels completed passes of 13 and 15 yards and then Haywood broke several tackles and ran nine yards to the Baylor 1-yard line. Joe Woodley got the last yard with 1:37 left in the second half.

That Cyclones drive needed only two minutes and 57 seconds. The next one was much faster. Tomcheck threw a deep pass into double coverage, Dustin Avey picked it off at the Iowa State 45, and in four plays the Cyclones made it a 31-3 game. The knockout was a pass, Rosenfels to Moses, that netted 38 yards and left the Bruin defense looking a little foolish.

At that stage, most observers figured it was all over. Indeed, some in the press box were predicting Iowa State was en route to a 50-point margin of victory. Instead, the Cyclones got considerable yardage in the final 30 minutes (190 steps and eight first downs), managed to miss two relatively easy field goals after driving to the Baylor 20- and 22-yard lines, and wound up with no additional points.

The Bears, meanwhile, regrouped well at halftime and came out full of vim and vigor. "They had some fire and fight to them," said Steele. They zipped 80 yards in six plays for a touchdown on their first possession of the third quarter, the big play being the 54-yard Tomcheck-Newhouse connection which found Baylor's sophomore receiver showing good speed after the catch. On their next possession the Bears drove 65 yards in 12 plays to the Iowa State 3-yard line but got turned away with nothing when a flurry of passes failed. And on their third possession that moved 80 yards in eight plays for another touchdown. Bush blasted over at right tackle for the final yard.

Thus, at the 12:11 mark of the final period, the Bears had made it a 31-17 game and would have turned it into a 31-24 contest if they had not failed earlier in the red zone. But after that last touchdown drive they did nothing, just a series of three-and-outs as Tomcheck kept missing on his passes or his receivers kept dropping his throws or the visitors kept sacking him. It was not pretty.

But what was pretty, or at least exciting, was the play that kept alive the long drive that put nothing on the scoreboard. Facing a fourth-and-5 at the Iowa State 42, the Bears lined up as if to punt. But the snap went to an up man, Matt Amendola, instead. Amendola is a former high school quarterback. He got the snap, started to his right as if to try to run for the first down, then at the last second optioned off to fleet linebacker Derrick Cash, a former high school tailback who plays on the punt protection team. Cash got the ball, eluded a tackler, and ran 19 yards for a first down to the Iowa State 23 as the crowd roared.

Baylor fans would have roared even louder if that drive had netted a touchdown. Unfortunately, it netted nothing. Among other things, Baylor's goal-line offense Saturday night left much to be desired.

In 1860, Elizabeth Akers Allen penned those familiar lines:

"Backward, turn backward, O time in your flight,
"Make me a child again just for tonight."

Noble sentiments, those. But the Baylor Bears will tell you it's best to keep looking forward. That's where this young team's future has to be.

A few moments after Iowa State's 31-17 victory over Baylor had become official Saturday night, coach Kevin Steele declared: "We have to stop the run and we're giving up too much return yardage. That's the tale of this game." And he also said, "We left some points on the table (by not scoring touchdowns after twice reaching the Iowa State 3-yard line), and we didn't tackle well. There are some things we have to improve on and improve on them fast because these are Big 12 games now."

After viewing the game tape Sunday, he agreed the Bears tackled very poorly ("atrocious," he said), especially in the first half, and he told reporters he felt the poor defense was the result of both mental mistakes "and we started playing cautious. Iowa State is pretty big. They pushed us around pretty good."

He noted the team's kickoff coverage was good but the punt coverage was dismal "and it's magnified when you lose. But we have to rectify that."

He said the Saturday game plan was to use true freshman Kerry Dixon at quarterback "fairly early in the game, for him to go in on the fourth series." But about then the visitors forged ahead, 17-3, and Steele decided to stay with the strong-armed Tomcheck. "I felt we needed to throw it and try to get some points, try to make it a 17-10 game," he said. But Tomcheck missed on his next two passes, then threw an interception, and on the final play of the half he got sacked. Behind by 28 points at the half, Steele decided to try to make the most of Tomcheck's arm after that and thus Dixon did not play at all.

He said the Bears regrouped at halftime, refocused, and "they came out and fought in the second half, they fought hard. We just left ourselves in too big of a hole, although I will say this: we had our chances (to get back in the game)."

He said he was not criticizing the defensive linemen the Bears already have -- almost all of them are sophs or redshirt freshmen -- but "we've got to get ourselves some defensive linemen. We've got to get bigger mass, bigger type guys inside." And that, he indicated, will be a recruiting priority.

He said the Bears came out of the Saturday night game with no additional significant injuries.

Editor's Note: Articles such as this one by Dave Campbell appear in each edition of the Baylor Bear Insider Report, available upon membership in the Baylor Bear Foundation. For information on joining the Bear Foundation, click here.