Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
College football
High-scoring Golden Hurricane, MVP Evans pummel Chippewas
Tulsa cruises in Miami Beach Bowl. Up next: Boca Raton Bowl.
MIAMI — It is too short a history to speak in terms of tradition. But the pattern in this football festival inside a baseball stadium known as the Miami Beach Bowl has been of high-scoring, try-to-keep-up affairs.
Defense? We don’t need no stinking defense. Memphis and BYU combined for 103 points in the inaugural 2014 affair, Western Kentucky and South Florida for 90 a year ago.
Monday’s third installment at Marlins Park promised more of the same with relentless Tulsa averaging 41 points a game and Central Michigan led by pro prospect quarterback Cooper Rush.
Tulsa held up its end of the bargain in a 55-10 blowout for its 10th bowl win and 10th 10-win season (first since 2011) in front of a sparse crowd of 15,262.
Senior quarterback Dane Evans outshone Rush, passing for 304 yards and five touchdowns to become Tulsa’s career leader in total offense and surpass the school record with 84 touchdown passes. He was selected MVP of the game after leading an offense that amassed 581 yards and kept the metal marlins on the home run sculpture spinning at a dizzying pace with the barrage of scoring.
“Being a kid playing baseball I always dreamed I’d get to play in a big-league stadium,” Evans said. “I didn’t know it would be football. [Sunday] when we came here I rounded the bases on a home run trot, and I
“I found a baseball in center. Thanks, Giancarlo [Stanton]. He probably hit it out there.”
Dane Evans, Tulsa QB, on his pregame find
feel like this game was kind of a home run trot and we just went out and took care of business.”
Before leaving his mark on the ballpark, Evans said, “I found a baseball in center. Thanks, Giancarlo [Stanton]. He probably hit it out there.”
While Stanton has had some eye-popping moments there for the Marlins, consider this one: The Golden Hurricane became the first team in FBS Division-1 history with a 3,000 yard-passer, two 1,000-yard rushers and two 1,000-yard receivers.
They needed wide receiver Joshua Atkinson to get at least 78 yards for the final piece of the puzzle. The senior from Carrollton, Texas, reached the milestone on a 30-yard reception with more than five minutes left in the half, and finished with 131 yards on 12 receptions including a touchdown.
“It’s the first time ever since — when did they start playing football, in the late 1800’s? It’s the first time in NCAA history that’s happened,” Evans said. “That’s pretty cool.”
Keevan Lucas, another senior receiver, caught touchdown tosses of 13, 28 and 11 yards to tie the Tulsa mark with 32 career TD receptions. That put him in notable company with NFL Hall-of-Famer Steve Largent and former Miami Dolphin Howard Twilley.
This game was mostly about numerical achievement in the absence of more discernible stakes or any significant history between the teams. Neither team won its conference this season and they had split the only previous meetings in 1986 and ’87.
Call this the Illogical Geography Bowl, taking place several miles away from Miami Beach on the site of the former home of the University of Miami Hurricanes, and won by a team from the middle of the country inexplicably bearing a tropical cyclone moniker.
Surprisingly, Tulsa’s name predates Miami’s, dating to 1922. According to lore, thenTulsa coach Howard Acher considered the more Oklahoma appropriate Golden Tornadoes because his team had been described as “roaring through opponents.” But Georgia Tech already had that name at the time, so Acher’s players made the meteorological leap to Golden Hurricane — gold referring to their jerseys.
Tulsa fans had the right setting to wave hurricane warning flags while their gold-helmeted team roared convincingly through the mismatched Chippewas, who ended 6-7 under former Miami Dolphins special teams coach John Bonamego.
The Golden Hurricane (10-3) swept down the field on their initial possession with their longest scoring drive of the season, both in plays (17) and distance (93 yards). Atkinson had six catches for 44 yards, including the last five for the initial score.
Evans threw 13 yards to Lucas and 4 yards to Chris Minter, and had another would-be touchdown toss called back by penalty as the Golden Hurricane rolled to a 27-3 lead at the half with 327 yards of offense.
Tulsa’s second-year coach Philip Montgomery said his team was looking for more than dazzling numbers.
“This is a really good football team. I don’t know if we’ve gotten the respect across the country that we deserve,” he said. “We play with a chip on our shoulder. You saw that tonight.”
Central Michigan quarterback Rush also had a statement to make but it didn’t come out well. The 6-foot-3, 230-pounder is rated by CBSSports.com as the No. 8 quarterback in the upcoming NFL draft.
Although headed to the East-West Shrine Game, he did little to enhance his draft status, throwing three interceptions, one returned 66 yards for a touchdown by Jesse Brubaker and another picked off in the end zone.
Rush came in with 12,653 career passing yards, more than any other active major college player and needing 253 yards to become the alltime leader in the MidAmerican Conference. He fell short, finishing with 241 yards.
Bonamego called on his experience of 16 years as a special teams coach in the NFL to dial up an onside kick to open the second half, which succeeded. Instead of providing a lift for Central Michigan, the possession netted only 8 yards before Rush was sacked on fourth down.
The air came out of the Chippewas’ hopes after that as the Golden Hurricane roared through, true to their name.
“They just wear you down,” Bonamego said.