Pregame chatter stirring emotions

SCOTT CAIN
ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE

In their effort to downplay the personal streak running through tonight's game between Arkansas and Boise State, coaches Houston Nutt and Dirk Koetter took turns throwing roses at each other early this week.
It didn't take long for the petals to wilt.
One Boise State player called Nutt, the former Broncos coach who left for Arkansas after his first season, a used car salesman. A Boise, Idaho, newspaper columnist suggested that Nutt's coaching was more style than substance. A few Arkansas players quietly took offense on behalf of their coach but refused to fire back at the Broncos (2-0).
But well before the chatter started, this game had become personal to the Razorbacks (1-0), regardless of the opponent. It became an impending examination of pride after they handled, but hardly manhandled, Southwest Missouri State 38-0 two weeks ago.
Against a smaller team, the Razorbacks ran ineffectively. They rushed for 183 yards but 117 of those came in the fourth quarter with reserve players. Sophomore tailback Cedric Cobbs, whom Nutt and teammates have said is capable of rushing for 2,000 yards, gained a rather harmless 57.
Two weeks of intensified practices should repair the running game, the corrected version going on display at War Memorial Stadium tonight, players said.
"I feel if we do what we're supposed to, this will be a game we won't forget," Cobbs said, pausing for a moment and then continuing. "Meaning if I come out in the right frame of mind like I'm supposed to and the offensive line blocks like it's supposed to, it will be a decent game."
Cobbs attributed part of the sluggish start to not taking any hits during preseason practice and to the Bears stacking the line of scrimmage.
Arkansas players said they expect Boise State to crowd the line, too.
"But that doesn't matter," center Josh Melton said. "Even if they stack 10 or 11, we've got to be able to run. We know we've got a lot of weapons back there. If we give guys enough opportunities, somebody's going to break one."
Several Boise State players are capable of breaking big plays, too. Three receivers range in height from 6-2 to 6-5 and another, Lou Fanucchi, averages 22.6 yards per catch. Tailback Brock Forsey averages 7.8 yards per carry.
Most worrisome is quarterback Bart Hendricks because he is a threat throwing and running, Nutt said.
The Broncos don't lack confidence either, riding an eight-game winning streak, and they probably will not be intimidated by the crowd because they have played in hostile environments, Nutt said.
Boise State has traveled to Hawaii twice, UCLA, Utah, Washington State, Wisconsin and Arizona State since 1996. The Broncos won at Utah in 1998. The others were losses by an average of 27 points.
None of the losses was closer than a 28-24 heartbreaker in 1997 at Wisconsin. Nutt's team looked as if it would do the unthinkable until the Badgers scored with 49 seconds left.
Two months later, Nutt boarded a private plane in the early morning hours of Dec. 10, 1997, headed for Arkansas and had no reason to think he would ever stumble onto the same field with Boise State again.
Then associate athletic director Bill Gray stepped in.
Ordinarily, a nonconference opponent would come from somewhere in the region, like those from Louisiana, Texas and Tennessee in recent years.
Boise State, which returns to Arkansas in 2002, agreed to a contract when UA offered a $425,000 guarantee. Gray handles scheduling and looked to the West thinking the Broncos would generate more interest than usual in a nonconference game.
Gray was right. Much has been made this week of Nutt's one-year stopover in Boise. The Broncos went 4-7 and had regained a measure of competitiveness when Nutt jumped to his dream job.
Of Boise State's 44 players on the two-deep chart, Nutt coached or recruited 18, he said.
Several of the players said they didn't blame Nutt for leaving so abruptly. Some, like defensive tackle Brad Phillips, apparently never bought into Nutt's rah-rah routine.
"I do respect the guy, but he's a used car salesman," Phillips told the Idaho Statesman.
Broncos Athletic Director Gene Bleymaier said he doubted there were many players still around who knew Nutt and those who remained probably would not draw motivation from playing against his team. Bleymaier praised the "fantastic" job Nutt did winning over the Boise community.
Koetter complimented Nutt for initiating the rebuilding process but steered well clear of discussing any beat-the-old-coach feelings circulating on the team.
"We're looking at it as just a great opportunity for us to go in and compete with one of the top programs in the country, nothing more than that," Koetter said. "We don't have any visions of grandeur. I'm not going to say that we, as a Big West team, are going to go down there and physically overpower a team like Arkansas."
Nutt commended Koetter for taking Boise State to the championship level -- the Broncos won the Big West and Humanitarian Bowl last year -- and for developing quarterback Bart Hendricks.
Nutt said last week that hard feelings probably lingered among the older Broncos players because he left without speaking to them after Bleymaier discouraged him from addressing the team. Nutt said he was looking forward to seeing some of those players tonight, but he insisted that this game would not hold any more meaning than another.
"I'm always nervous before every game, but as far as the emotional side of it or the feeling of the past, not really," Nutt said. "I don't feel any ... nervousness."
OK, message conveyed. The two coaches don't want emotional subplots distracting from what ultimately will decide the game -- blocking, tackling and taking care of the ball.
But there's no escaping that this seems more like rivalry lite than a garden-variety nonconference game. The litmus test: Did the Southwest Missouri State game feel the same as this one to the Razorbacks? And for Boise State, did Northern Iowa inspire the same emotion that Arkansas has?
Of course not.
Still, for Arkansas the motivation reaches beyond Nutt's brief history with the opponent.
"As a team, we do have something to prove," Cobbs said. "If you go right down the line, each individual will tell you we've got something to prove, that we can run the ball and that we know our ability."

This article was published on Saturday, September 16, 2000

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