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Y. Dream Is Over, But Season Isn't
Deseret News
Dec. 10, 2001
By Jeff Call PROVO, Utah - BYU's magical run and its 14-game winning streak are over. The Cougars are glad their season is not. In the wake of Saturday's 72-45 thrashing at Hawaii, BYU saw its once-perfect record wrecked. The Cougars plummeted in the national rankings on Sunday, from No. 9 to 19 in the AP poll. All those attorneys who reportedly wanted to sue the Bowl Championship Series on BYU's behalf will have to find other ambulances to chase. Still, the Cougars (12-1) will have a chance to finish 2001 on a positive note when they face No. 23 Louisville (10-2) in three weeks in Memphis. Question is, can BYU recover from this devastating blow? Will its top three offensive players - Brandon Doman, Luke Staley and Reno Mahe - be healthy by New Year's Eve? Back in Honolulu, the dazed Cougars hardly knew how to act after the rout. It had been more than 13 months since they had lost a football game. They say they will not let the embarrassing defeat, which was seen (most of it, anyway) on national television, overshadow what they have accomplished. "There are too many good things that happened this year for it to go down the drain with a loss like this," said senior quarterback Charlie Peterson, who filled in well for an injured Doman. "This one stings a little. It was my last regular-season game as a senior," said center Jason Scukanec. "We had a chance to do something real special and it didn't happen. But 12-1 is not a bad gig. There are a lot of teams that would like to be where we're at." BYU's 13th game proved to be very unlucky, not to mention disastrous. It wasn't all that surprising that the Cougars lost. They departed for Hawaii, just days after returning from Mississippi State, without All-America running back Luke Staley, and there may have been some lingering disappointment about being snubbed by the BCS. What was surprising was how they lost. Hawaii dominated BYU in practically every phase of the game. Yet the Cougars refused to make excuses for their performance, choosing instead to praise the Warriors. "It doesn't do any good to cry and whine about it," Scukanec said. "You have to take it like a man. You win like a man, you lose like a man. They beat us, and my hat's off to them." Now, BYU wants to forget about it. Or try to. "We won the conference, we're going to the Liberty Bowl," Crowton said. "We need to learn from this game and move forward. I don't want to overanalyze it. We got beat by a good football team." The Cougars will take a few days off before resuming practice on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, Crowton said. "I'm anxious to practice," Doman said. "Obviously, we're anxious to get another game. We don't want to finish like this."
NOTES: Chad Owens' 74-yard punt return for a Hawaii touchdown marked the first time a BYU team had given up a punt for a TD since 1987 against New Mexico . . . The BYU-Hawaii game lasted four hours, 24 minutes - nearly the same amount of time it takes to fly from Honolulu to the mainland . . . One bright spot for the Cougars was the play of safety Aaron Francisco. It was homecoming for Francisco, who played at Kahuku High School in Laie and had helped his team win last year's state championship at Aloha Stadium. On Saturday against Hawaii, the true freshman recorded an interception in the first quarter, setting up BYU's first touchdown, then recovered a fumble in the second quarter at the BYU six-yard line . . . The 72 points given up to Hawaii was the most in BYU history. The previous high was 68 at UCLA in 1993 . . . That number of points allowed provided quite a bookend to the season. BYU opened by scoring 70 against Tulane and closed it by surrendering 72.
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