Columnist Steve Guiremand: Baylor’s bonehead move earned spot in history

Steve Guiremand

Friday, Sept. 17, 1999 | 9:55 a.m.

Steve Guiremand's college football column appears Friday. Reach him at 259-2324 or steveg@lasvegassun.com

Just when you thought you'd seen everything.

Almost a week later, it's still difficult to comprehend the end of UNLV's 27-24 win at Baylor last Saturday night in Waco.

Kevin Steele's coaching boner for the millennium and Kevin Thomas' subsequent 100-yard fumble return on the final play of the game has to rate as one of the top four or five greatest finishes in college football history, right there with Doug Flutie's Hail Mary pass to Gerald Phelan at Miami, Kordell Stewart's Hail Mary pass to Michael Westbrook at Michigan, and Cal's wild lateral-filled kickoff return through the Stanford band in The Big Game.

It marked the first time since the NCAA started keeping count (1971) that a team with both the lead and the ball lost a game on the final play of regulation.

Two teams had previously won with defensive touchdowns on the final play, but both were tied at the time. Kentucky beat Vanderbilt, 14-7, on an interception return in 1971, and Utah topped Minnesota, 35-29, on a 91-yard return of a blocked field goal in 1990.

But Baylor and Steele, who bypassed the traditional kneel-down in the final seconds to try to score one more touchdown, will go down in history as the only Division I team to choke away a lead on its last offensive play of the game.

Steele, the man who almost had his eyes pop out on national TV last year thanks to a choke hold by Carolina Panthers' linebacker Kevin Greene, has rightly received his share of criticism for his boneheaded coaching move.

But he did make a valid point afterward. It was a one-in-a-million play that just happened to go against the Bears.

Give a lot of credit to UNLV coach John Robinson, his staff and the 11 defensive players on the field at the time for not throwing in the towel like a lot of teams -- including the 1998 Rebels -- would have done in the same situation.

Robinson and defensive coordinator Jeff McInerney coached this one right down to the final second, urging their tiring defenders to "make a play."

Defensive backs Quincy Sanders and Andre Hilliard did just that, stopping tailback Darrell Bush a yard short of the end zone and standing him up so that linebacker Tyler Brickell could come in and swat away the ball. And an alert Kevin Thomas was there to pick up the pigskin and do his Carl Lewis impression up the left sideline for the game-winning touchdown.

If just one of those players, not to mention the seven others on the field who did their jobs, too, didn't give it 100 percent at the end, Steele wouldn't be regarded as the biggest boob in college coaching today and Baylor would have gone home celebrating a 31-21 victory.

That final play should be shown by every parent to their kids and every youth league coach to his players as a textbook example of why you don't ever quit in competitive sports, no matter how dire the circumstances appear.

Crazy? You bet. Will we ever see another one? Doubtful.

But then who would have ever thought we would have seen this one?

* WHAT LETDOWN? Don't expect No. 1 Florida State, and particularly starting quarterback Chris Weinke, to have any kind of letdown following last week's big ACC win over Georgia Tech.

The Seminoles will be trying to avenge last year's 24-7 loss at North Carolina State, a game Weinke threw a school-record six interceptions in.

Weinke said this week that he received 160 e-mail messages and more than 50 disturbing phone calls after that game.

"I kept a few e-mails just as motivation," he said. "I wanted to remember what a few of these people said so I can continue proving them wrong."

Around the MWC

* AIR FORCE: Falcons lead the nation in offense with 584 yards per game heading into Saturday's contest at Washington.

* BYU: Cougars and Washington have agreed to renew their rivalry with games in 2008 and 2010. Washington leads the series, 4-2.

* COLORADO STATE: Going into Thursday night's loss to BYU, opponents had run 49 more plays than the Rams in the first two games.

* NEW MEXICO: Senior defensive back Brian Urlacher has caught four passes this season in spot offensive duty, three of which were for touchdowns.

* SAN DIEGO STATE: Aztecs (1-1), who face USC at the Coliseum on Saturday afternoon, have lost 25 straight nonconference road games dating to a 1981 win at Oklahoma State.

* UNLV: Rebels will be trying to go 3-0 for only fifth time in school history and first time since 1984 when they host Iowa State.

* UTAH: Utes coach Ron McBride, whose squad faces in-state rival Utah State Saturday, is concerned about the effects of a bye week following season-opening 27-7 win at Washington State. "It's like starting over for us," he said.

* WYOMING: Cowboys have already allowed 17 sacks in two games after yielding just 20 in 11 games in 1998.

Around the nation

* ACC: Conference school presidents met Monday and Tuesday in Tallahassee with expansion leading the agenda. Florida State is pushing to expand to a 10- or 12-team conference with Miami the top team on the wish-list. Syracuse and Boston College have also been mentioned as possibilities.

* BIG EAST: Hurricane Floyd caused No. 8 Miami to alter its practice schedule for its game against No. 3 Penn State. Butch Davis moved the usual Tuesday practice to Monday, the usual Wednesday practice to early Tuesday morning (when classes were canceled) and the usual Thursday practice was moved to Wednesday night. "It's difficult, but it's something you have to adjust to," Miami quarterback Kenny Kelly said.

* BIG TEN: Michigan State (2-0) has outscored Notre Dame, 68-30, in their last two meetings. If the Spartans win again Saturday in South Bend, they will join USC as the only school to have a three-game win streak over the Irish since 1987.

* BIG 12: Baylor coach Kevin Steele said he will no longer answer questions about his decision to not take a knee in the final seconds of last week's stunning 27-24 loss to UNLV. Steele also said he refused to blame running back Darrell Bush for the fumble on the play.

* BIG WEST: Nevada-Reno, which plays Oregon at Autzen Stadium on Saturday, has not defeated a Pac-10 team since 1947, a span of 52 years. Last win? 13-6 over Oregon.

* CONFERENCE USA: Southern Miss, which travels to No. 4 Nebraska, is 1-20 against Top 25 teams since Jeff Bower took over in 1991.

* INDEPENDENTS: Notre Dame, which has won 10 in a row at home, will play its next five games -- Michigan State, Oklahoma, Arizona State, USC and Navy -- at Notre Dame Stadium.

* MAC: Marshall, which is ranked No. 25 in the coaches' poll this week for the first time in school history, gets a chance to avenge the only blemish on last year's 12-1 record when it hosts Bowling Green on Saturday. The Falcons whipped the Herd, 34-13, last year.

* MOUNTAIN WEST: MWC is 4-2 vs. conferences affiliated with the Bowl Championship Series, including 2-0 vs. both the Big 12 and Pac-10.

* PAC-10: UCLA's defense has allowed 38 or more points in three of its last four games (49-45 loss at Miami, 38-31 Rose Bowl loss to Wisconsin and last week's 42-20 loss at Ohio State). Maybe some Bruin defenders deserve those handicap parking stickers after all.

* SEC: Fun-N-Gun? How about Run-N-Fun? Florida is 52-1 under Steve Spurrier when a back rushes for at least 100 yards in a game and 74-1 when Gators outrush an opponent.

* WAC: How's this for irony? Hawaii, which had the nation's longest Division I losing streak (19 games), was the only conference team to win last week. And the Rainbows needed to rally to defeat Division I-AA Eastern Illinois, 31-27.