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Rolling, rolling, rolling: Fui's touchdown a highlight favorite |
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JaredCowley | Sunday, November 5, 2006, 8:20 am
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Clip of sophomore running back's rolling touchdown run makes SportsCenter's top plays
Darnell Dickson and Jason Franchuk
DAILY HERALD
FORT COLLINS, Colo. — The only one on the field who thought he’d scored a touchdown was Fui Vakapuna himself.
The sophomore running back literally rolled over a Colorado State defender at the line of scrimmage and ran five yards for a score at the end of the first half of BYU’s 24-3 win. The officials seemed confused as to whether Vakapuna should have been ruled down at the 2-yard line or if he had scored a touchdown.
“I just went up to everybody and told them I scored,” Vakapuna said. “The ref right in front of me said, ‘Touchdown’ but he didn’t have my back. I guess the guys upstairs did. I didn’t hear a whistle.”
BYU head coach Bronco Mendenhall said he worked with the sideline official to save his timeout and not challenge the play.
“I called the linesman over and waited until there were three seconds on the play clock,” Mendenhall said. “Right then, he was buzzed from upstairs. I saw as Fui was tackled, he rolled over the player and his knee didn’t touch.”
Javan Hedlund of the Mountain West Conference contacted umpire Terry Leyden and gave this report on the play: “According to the official, the play was not blown dead, though the ball had been marked. If the whistle was not blown, the play is reviewable. Had the play been whistled dead, it would not have been a reviewable play.”
The play was good enough to earn the No. 4 spot on ESPN SportsCenter’s Top 10 plays of the day.
CSU coach Sonny Lubick was mystified by the score.
“I got it explained to me three times on the sideline,” he said. “And I’m sick of talking about it. (A referee) said there was no whistle blown. I said, ‘what’s that have to do with it?’”
Vakapuna, who scored twice against Colorado State, leads BYU in touchdowns this season with 11.
Are we there yet?: Vakapuna joked that receiver teammate Michael Reed should be punished after a late holding call canceled a touchdown run.
“I was thinking, ‘man, Curtis had it,’ ” Vakapuna said of Curtis Brown. “He would’ve been 37 yards closer to the school’s touchdown record, too.”
Brown had the score with 1:01 left as he ran untouched. But Reed was whistled. The only Cougar player who seemed to notice was tight end Daniel Coats, who waved the kicking team off the field.
Brown was actually credited with nine yards. He finished with 81 (on 16 carries). That puts the senior at 2,840 — 131 short of breaking the standard set by Jamal Willis (1991-94).
Brown has the next two games at home to become the record holder, Thursday against Wyoming and a Nov. 18 meeting with New Mexico.
The Cowboys have been the Mountain West’s top defensive team, statistically.
Quarterback John Beck is 50 yards shy of passing Jim McMahon (9,536) for second place on the career passing list. Beck has 9,487 after beating CSU by completing 22-of-30 passes.
Under pressure: BYU sacked Colorado State quarterback Caleb Hanie five times and pressured him throughout the game. Mendenhall said that was a big part of the game plan.
“We had a decent idea of how they would try to pass protect,” Mendenhall said. “We put two new things in on defense, and those two things allowed us to attack their protection. Our pressure early was a real deterrent for their vertical passing game later on.”
He said it: Lubick and Colorado State lost a third straight game to BYU.
“They’re the best team in the league,” Lubick said. “This team (BYU) is nice and strong. They harassed our quarterback. It looked like he was being harassed. They came with blitzes and that gets you out of your rhythm. I could tell we were not going to move the ball consistently.”
We thank you for your support: BYU junior linebacker Bryan Kehl said running over to the Cougar fans who follow the team on the road after the game is one of his favorite things to do.
“Our BYU fans support us and it’s great to go slap hands with them after the game,” he said. “They love it. We go over there and people start running down to the rail and the little kids are jumping up and down. Ten years ago, I was that little kid.”
No Technicolor, please: Before the game, The mtn. announcers were talking about how Mendenhall wasn’t feeling well. With the camera on him, Mendenhall confirmed that statement by, um, getting sick on camera.
“There’s no secrets, are there?” Mendenhall quipped after the game.
Gave it away: BYU, which came into the game No. 1 in the nation in turnover margin, gave up the ball one time and didn’t cause a single Colorado State turnover, although the Rams fumbled twice. BYU is now plus-11 in turnover margin.
Despite not causing a turnover, the BYU defense held Colorado State to 151 total yards, the fewest managed by the Rams since getting 139 in the 2002 Liberty Bowl against TCU.
Homecoming for two: Two BYU officials were more than a little happy to be in Fort Collins. It’s where Janie Penfield and Emily Deans played volleyball for CSU.
Penfield is now an associate athletic director who oversees women’s sports, while Deans is the director of athletic marketing.
Their coach at CSU, Tom Hilbert, was inducted during halftime into the school’s athletic hall of fame. He’s in his 10th year.
Extra Points: BYU senior wide receiver Brett Cooper was chosen by his teammates to carry the ‘Y’ flag onto the field. ... Colorado State won the coin toss and deferred to the second half, so BYU chose to receive. For the first time in three games, BYU didn’t score on its first possession. ... McKay Jacobson’s 105 receiving yards marked the second time this season a BYU receiver broke the 100-yard mark. Matt Allen had 108 yards receiving against Boston College on six catches. ... For the eighth straight game, BYU scored first. The Cougars also haven’t trailed at halftime in any game this season. |
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