Eating Crow
By George P. Edmonston. Jr.

OSU's greatest sports moment of the 20th century occurred just 15 years ago, and it happened out of town!

Traveling to Seattle on the team bus that Friday, Oct. 19, 1985, Oregon State's players and coaches tried to forget their last three games and to concentrate on the one just ahead.

It wasn't easy.

The Beavers had been greatly embarrassed, and it hurt.

Against Washington State the week before, the score had been 34-0. Before that, Southern Cal had humiliated them, 63-0. In OSU's long and storied football past, no Beaver team had ever given up 97 points in back-to-back games.

Before USC there had been Grambling, a so-called "breather" Division II school out of the Southwest Athletic Conference of the deep south. The Tigers from north Louisiana showed no mercy, whipping OSU, 27-6. Six points in three games. The defense had given up 124 points. Only two OSU teams, in 1954 and 1974, had done worse over a three-game stretch.

And it wasn't just the mounting losses that hurt. Across the board, negative numbers on the program were starting to pile up.

By 1985, the Beavers had suffered through 14 straight losing seasons, a school record. It had been 20 years since they had gone to a bowl (1964 Rose Bowl), and that one had ended in a 34-6 Michigan rout. From 1972 through the 1985 season, the Beavers had won but 21 games, with seven of those victories coming before 1974.

Directing the 1985 team was first-year head coach Dave Kragthorpe, an older, experienced mentor who had won a Division I-AA National Championship a few years earlier at Idaho State and was considered an offensive whiz.

Freshman quarterback Rich Gonzales proved the difference by throwing for one touchdown and running for another.

Using a BYU-type passing offense that seemed to confuse opponents at first, OSU jumped out to 2-0, its best start since 1967. By the Grambling contest on Sept. 28, the new "Air Express" offense was having trouble getting back off the ground.

And now it was time for the Pac-10 leading Washington Huskies, and the players let their minds move forward to the friends, family and fans waiting for them in Seattle. No one was ready to admit he or she probably was living through what may have been the lowest moment of the century for OSU football. A bottoming out. But light sometimes has a way of penetrating even the darkest corners of a room. Before the weekend was over, Dave Kragthorpe and his team would establish for all time an example of what it means to be Beaver proud.

OSU football during the 20th century has blessed its fans with many great teams and many incredible moments.

In a period stretching over three years, F.S. Norcross' boys from 1906 to 1908 gave up a total of four points in 72 quarters of football, the entire lot coming in a loss to Willamette to end the 1906 season.

Who could forget Paul Schissler's squads of the 1920s and his upset wins over New York University and Marquette?

Using only 11 men the full 60 minutes, Lon Stiner's fabled 1933 "Iron Men" tied defending national champion USC in Portland to stop the Trojans' No. 1 ranking and 25-game winning streak.

The 1942 Rose Bowl team was no slouch either, pulling off an upset of Duke in Durham that had all the experts scratching their heads.

Terry Baker's 99-yard run to win the Liberty Bowl in 1962 and his subsequent winning of the

Heisman Trophy are all huge moments in OSU's football past.

What about Tommy Prothro's 1957 or 1962 teams? So tough. So competitive.

How about Dee Andros and his 1967 "Giant Killers?" The 1999 "No Looking Back" kids who turned in OSU's first winning season in 28 years and first bowl game in 35 years?

And how many of you would vote for OSU's 1998 Civil War overtime victory over the Ducks as the Game of the Century?

To be sure, any of these great moments could qualify as OSU's best sports story of the last hundred years.

Against opponents the two previous weeks, the Beavers had been outscored 0-97. Against the Huskies, they would play historic football.

But not mine.

I've always been a sucker for tales of courage and never-say-die, of individuals overcoming great odds to achieve the impossible: David vs. Goliath, King Leonidas and his 300 Spartans at Thermopylae, Joshua Chamberlain at the Little Round Top.

With all due respect to the great players and teams we've mentioned here and many others we haven't, there was one element they all seemed to share in common that forced me to eliminate them as the subject for this retrospective.

What was different was this: OSU fielded some pretty good teams during these historic years. Let's face it: losers don't generate that many fond memories. The expectation was that these guys would win, and most of the time they did.

In 1942 and then again in 1965, OSU was good enough to go to the Rose Bowl. In the days when there were only four major bowls for postseason play, getting invited meant you were one of the best eight teams in the country. In 1962, OSU had Terry Baker, winner of the Heisman Trophy.

he 1967 squad, to say the least, was a very good team, also with excellent talent, including two-sport All-American Jess Lewis, who anchored that year's "Giant Killer" defense that helped record upsets against three top-5 opponents.

All during the week the coaches had stressed that the game they were about to play would not be about winning and losing. It would be about becoming a better team. Kragthorpe said he wanted everyone to play well enough to move OSU football up another notch. It was the kind of coach's pep talk you hear when you play for a program on the rebuild.

For OSU to "move its program up" against UW, the Beavers would have do so with their two best offensive weapons riding the bench with injuries, quarterback Erik Wilhelm (out for the season) and Reggie Bynum, the Pac-10's leading receiver.

In Wilhelm's place would be freshman Rich Gonzales, a backup quarterback who had taken a total of nine snaps with the first unit the entire year.

When the betting line came on the game in Las Vegas, everyone had a chuckle. Oddsmakers had the Huskies as 38-point favorites. As the spread hit the newsrooms of Seattle, insults began flying off keyboards and news desks left and right, as one sportswriter after another rushed to see who could fire the next insult at the visiting "country cousins" from Corvallis.

As soon as OSU stepped off the bus at the hotel, fans began passing around a newspaper, folded to an editorial in the sports section of the Seattle Post- Intelligencer.

"Oregon State plays football pretty much the way Barney Fife played a deputy sheriff on Mayberry. They have ceased being a joke. They are not only an embarrassment to themselves and their fans ... they are an embarrassment to the Pac-10."

The words were those of PI columnist Steve Rudman. They cut into the team's pride like a butcher knife.

"If Dave Kragthorpe can just make the Beavers halfway competitive, he will be doing the whole conference a very big favor. Beaverball, after all, is a blight that has gone on long enough."

That night, as the team settled into its hotel rooms for the evening, local TV sports shows continued the barrage.

On one station, UW head coach Don James was saying he expected the game against the Beavers to offer his reserve quarterback Chris Chandler a chance for some playing time.

Another sportscaster, referring to Washington's bye the weekend after OSU, slyly remarked it was as if the Huskies had two weeks off to prepare for the rest of the season, a season they fully expected to cap off with a trip to Pasadena on New Year's day.

By the time of the game, everyone from Corvallis knew Steve Rudman's editorial by heart. Kragthorpe used it with much effectiveness in his pre-game talk to his players. On this day, OSU's new head coach would not have to use any extra emotion in his voice to get his players ready to rumble. Rudman had taken care of that. Beaver radio announcer Darrell Aune kept his listeners entertained (and stirred up) before kickoff by sharing large excerpts of Rudman's prose over the air.

To add insult to injury, the Huskies seemed reluctant during pre-game drills to do anything but watch OSU. To the guys from Corvallis, the message was subtle but clear: we don't have to warm up to beat you.

As the Beavers at last jogged down the ramp and out on to the field at huge Husky Stadium, the home team, using the same ramp and bunched in a group just to their rear, began barking at them like dogs.

It was the final straw. As OSU took the field for the kickoff, everyone, from the waterboy on up, was ready for war.

Even so, Washington struck first with a field goal in the opening quarter to take a 3-0 lead. It was a prize of sorts for Lewis and the defense. Washington started this particular series of downs with a first and 10 from the Beaver 27. The defense that had allowed 97 points in two games had held, at least for now.

Then, Gonzales went to work, stunning the highly partisan crowd of 56,544 with a 43-yard touchdown strike to Darvin Malone for a 7-3 OSU lead.

Receiving the kickoff, Washington marched 80 yards in 15 plays for a score, putting the home team ahead 10-7. Now it was the Beavers' turn to answer. The best they could do was a fourth down and 20 from their own 28. A strong Husky rush forced punter Glenn Pena to make a desperate run for a first down. He was tackled 10 yards short, and Washington had the ball on the Beaver 38. OSU fans braced for an onslaught.

Sometimes in a game, a little thing can happen to give an underdog hope. With first and goal from the eight, Washington tried blowing OSU off the ball. Loss of two. On the next play, safety Reggie Hawkins intercepted a pass in the end zone, and the Beavers were back in business. Taking over on their own 20, the Beavers drove 80 yards on seven pass completions and finished off the drive with a spectacular 20-yard touchdown scamper by Gonzales. OSU 14-10.

At halftime, a Seattle sportswriter in the press box turned around to a Beaver contingent sitting nearby and asked, "When's the real Oregon State gonna show up?"

The third quarter produced a Husky touchdown and the lead, 17-13. Three points to make up. Corvallis' "country cousins" still had a chance, but somebody was going to have to step up big.

Again, the defense turned the trick, and it happened with 1:32 remaining in the third quarter. UW was sitting pretty with first and goal from the one yard line. A score this late in the game probably would cause OSU to cave in. If ever there were a time for the Huskies to make good the brag of their local sports scribes, it was right now.

Washington tried twice to ram the ball down OSU's throat. The Beaver defensive front proved uncrackable. On third down, tailback Vance Weathersby fumbled, and OSU's Lavance Northington recovered. Linebacker Osia Lewis had delivered the knockout blow, one of 19 tackles he served up that day. Yes, a knockout blow. Weathersby had to leave the game.

With 7:59 remaining in the fourth quarter, UW upped its lead again with a field goal, 20-14. From this point on, OSU's defense would rise up and play some of the most historic minutes ever put in by an Orange and Black team.

At 1:29 left in the game, the Huskies were deep in their own territory, out of downs and forced to punt. Always taking great pride in their special teams play, they anticipated nothing out of the ordinary.

OSU's Andre Todd didn't see it that way. Tearing into the backfield and rushing straight for the ball, Todd extended his arms and felt his hand "pulsate." He knew instantly what he had done. He watched the pigskin fly back toward the end zone to his left.

The problem was, it was heading straight for the back of the end zone. If it skipped over the line, the Beavers were done and they knew it. The most they could get would be a safety, two points. They needed six.

Hearts stopped. Time stood still. A giant gasp rose in the air from 55,000 mouths.

Please don't let the damned thing go out of the end zone.

Pleeeeaasse ...
... and then suddenly, as if hitting an invisible wall, suddenly, as if the hand of an F. S. Norcross or a Wes Schulmerich had reached out to deflect it, the ball did what footballs sometimes do: it took this funny dart and became a traitor to the Husky cause. Northington pounced on it, and that was that. Holy jumpin' up and down Martha, touchdown Beavers! Do you believe in miracles?

The extra point by Jim Nielsen was good and proved to be the winner.

One last UW try for a score ended at midfield, and the game was over. OSU's defense had held again. Pandemonium reigned as the Beavers left the field. "You can blame this one on your media," jubilant OSU players yelled as they filed toward the locker room.

It didn't take long for the local news, now singing a different tune, to tell them exactly what they had done. No team in college football history had ever beaten a 38-point spread...the biggest upset ever. Somehow, this didn't seem as important as the statement OSU had just made out on the field: that they belonged, that on any given Saturday they could play with the big dogs.

A few doors down, Dave Kragthorpe sat at a table staring out at a room full of empty chairs. He was waiting to answer questions from the Seattle media. They never bothered to show up. Could be ... crow tastes better when taken alone.

This story originally appeared in the Corvallis Gazette-Times Oct. 7, 1999. Used by permission.