Columnist Steve Guiremand: ‘Halo rule’ lacks teeth, leads to headhunting

Steve Guiremand

Friday, Oct. 26, 2001 | 10:57 a.m.

Steve Guiremand covers college football for the Sun. His Around Campus column appears on Friday during football season. Reach him at 259-2324 or steveg@lasvegassun.com.

When the NCAA's football rules committee gets together again after the season, one of the first things it should focus on is the two-yard "halo rule" installed supposedly to protect punt returners.

It just isn't working.

More and more teams are telling their gunners -- the two outside men on coverage who go streaking down the field at the returnee -- to take their best shots and not worry about getting flagged for five yards. Meanwhile, the returners are basically sitting ducks who are very prone to serious injury.

Just ask Boise State's Tim Gilligan.

The 5-foot-9, 163-pounder from Elko High School got blasted by Tulsa's Jermaine Hope long before the ball arrived in an Oct. 13 game. Hope, who was ejected and later reprimanded for the cheap shot, was so unaffected by the penalty that he actually slapped hands with Golden Hurricane head coach Keith Burns as he came off the field.

But that was just a love tap compared to the shot Gilligan would take six days later on national TV in the Broncos' 35-30 upset of No. 8 Fresno State.

Bulldog sophomore Kendall Edwards, who earlier this year broke the hand of Oregon State punt returner Terrell Roberts when he crashed into him before the ball arrived, this time went full speed into Gilligan, who was still gazing into the sky and waiting for the ball to come down.

As cheap shots go, it was about as bad as it gets. Edwards' helmet crashed into Gilligan's exposed throat. Amazingly, Gilligan got up and jogged to the sidelines a few seconds later.

"I wanted to show it would take more than that to keep me down," Gilligan told the Idaho Statesman.

Still, Gilligan was very fortunate he wasn't severely injured.

"I'm lucky I didn't get everything crushed in my neck," he said. "I thought he broke my windpipe. I couldn't breathe at all. I tried to talk to the trainers, and I couldn't talk."

Gilligan said he "had a feeling it was going to happen" because of Edwards' big hit against Oregon State and his reputation as a headhunter.

"But I didn't think it would be that deliberate," he said. "I don't know why someone would do that. It's disrespecting the opponent, the rules of the game and the game itself."

Hey, Tim, it's Fresno State we're talking about here. You know, the land of the non-qualifiers. Some of the players probably would have trouble reading any book, much less a rule book.

WAC commissioner Karl Benson this week suspended Edwards, a key member of Fresno State's secondary, for tonight's crucial game at pass-happy Hawaii.

"This type of play cannot and will not be tolerated in the WAC, and it has no place in college football," Benson said.

"Yeah, it causes a problem," Fresno State coach Pat Hill said. "He's one of our best football players. There's nothing we can do about it. It was the decision of the commissioner, and we just have to live with it."

So much for being remorseful, huh?

Boise State coach Dan Hawkins said he called Grant Teaff, president of the American Football Coaches Association, about extending the halo to five yards -- picture Dominique Dorsey with a five-yard halo, Rebel fans -- and increasing the penalty to 15 yards. In severe cases such as the Edwards incident, he wants the team penalized 30 yards.

"Five yards is nothing," Hawkins said of the current halo penalty. "Why not (hit them early)? You kick the ball out of bounds on the kickoff and the ball goes to the 35. You rip somebody's neck off, and it's a five-yard penalty."

Hopefully the rule will be stiffened -- before somebody gets killed.

Fashion police

On the Notre Dame campus before last Saturday's game against USC, it wasn't hard to notice one of the more popular green T-shirts being worn by Irish fans.

It read "Dump Davie" on the front and "Save Irish Football" on the back.

Evidently I wasn't the only one to notice the shirts.

The South Bend Tribune reported this week that an overzealous usher at Notre Dame Stadium actually ejected three fans for wearing the shirts. The paper said other fans were also asked to cover up their anti-Davie shirts, which apparently were purchased from an anti-Bob Davie website that has popped up.

"No denying it did happen," Dennis Moore, Notre Dame's director of public information, told the Tribune. "He just made a mistake in judgement."

Touchy, touchy. But if you have never seen any of the ushers at Notre Dame, some look like they probably hung out with Frank Leahy and Knute Rockne. And their No. 1 commandment is probably, "Thou Shalt Not Use Thy Notre Dame Football Coach's Name in Vain."

By the way, there also was a rare smattering of boos for Davie when he was introduced at the team's Friday night pep rally at the Joyce Center.

Brain cramp

One shudders to think what would have happened if one of those hard-core Notre Dame Stadium ushers had been working at the Sun Bowl in El Paso on Saturday night when San Jose State running back Jarmar Julien decided to, uh, how should we put this -- water the turf -- near the end of the Spartans' 40-28 victory over the Miners.

Julien was issued a warning citation for disorderly conduct by UTEP campus police after urinating in the southwest corner of the Sun Bowl surface. Three campus officers went into the Spartan locker room to cite Julien. At least one said he observed Julien.

"After the game we cooperated fully with the authorities concerning the incident in question," said San Jose State coach Fitz Hill.

So what happened?

"Jarmar did not play in the final stages of the game because he was suffering from cramps," Hill said. "He needed to use the restroom but was unable to get to the locker room in time to use the facilities. Jarmar's set of circumstances was explained to the authorities. He was issued a written warning. It is regrettable what happened."

Cramps? Now that is very creative spin-doctoring.

By the way, the win over the Miners was the first in Hill's six-game head-coaching career.

Once around the MWC

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