Louis DeLuca / DMN
USC's Keyshawn Johnson had eight catches for a Cotton Bowl-record 222 yards and three touchdowns.Tech-nical knockout for USC
Three-TD burst propels Trojans in Cotton, 55-14
1/3/1995
Some dreams die hard. Others just die fast. Texas Tech knows.
Southern Cal's 55-14 victory Monday in the Mobil Cotton Bowl before a sellout crowd of 70,218 doesn't indicate how awesome USC was most of the time – or how awful Tech was. Trojans coach John Robinson staked an early claim to the Nobel Peace Prize for 1995 by going to a prevent offense midway in the second quarter with USC leading, 31-0.
Had Robinson allowed his Johnson Wax guys – quarterback Rob and wide receiver Keyshawn – and tailback Shawn Walters, USC might have approached triple digits. As it was, the Trojans' 55 points set a Cotton Bowl Classic record, and only Tech's score on the game's final play kept the Trojans from the largest victory margin.
Tech reached its first Cotton Bowl Classic in 56 years by virtue of Texas A&M's ineligibility, but saw its fondest hopes explode like a trick cigar in the first quarter. In a stunning 1 minute, 16 seconds, the Trojans applied a terrible, swift sword for a 21-0 lead that finished the Red Raiders for the day. It was 28-0 at the end of the first quarter, the Trojans had 235 yards to the Raiders' 17, and some Tech fans began leaving.
After the crushing defeat, Tech coach Spike Dykes offered a salute to the Trojans and a bit of salve for his players' battered pride.
"We played a team we couldn't beat once we got behind by so much so early," Dykes said. "Southern Cal has a great team and a class man coaching that team. The final score could have been much worse if he had wanted it to be.
"I told our players, `The only way you can fail is if you try. A lot of people go through life without ever trying, so they never risk failure.' The sun will come up tomorrow. There'll be another day and another game. Hopefully, we'll be better prepared."
Robinson, the consummate bowl veteran, also was gracious.
"We came here to have fun, and we did," said Robinson, actually referring to a week of good times in Dallas and not how his Trojans amassed 435 passing yards and 578 total yards while playing hard only the first third of the game. "If we played next week, it probably would be a much closer ball game."
Tech's most decisive performance occurred not on the playing field but on the tarmac behind the southwest corner of the end zone, where the school mascot, Raider Red, swapped punches with a couple of USC band members just before halftime.
Dallas police hustled Raider Red and the musician up the concrete ramp to their schools' respective locker rooms to cool off. Raider Red returned to the field early in the third quarter, waving to cheering Tech fans and triumphantly twirling his 6-guns. Ironically, Keyshawn Johnson had just grabbed a 22-yard touchdown pass from Rob Johnson to put USC ahead, 41-0.
Keyshawn, a 6-4, 205-pound junior, had a marvelous day: eight catches for a Cotton Bowl-record 222 yards and three touchdowns. Voted the game's Outstanding Offensive Player, he also was the most theatrical, bouncing up in the end zone to do a dance for the photographers after snagging a 12-yarder from Rob Johnson for the first-quarter TD that made it 28-0.
Texans figured heavily in USC's heroics. The Outstanding Defensive Player was senior cornerback John Herpin of La Porte, who intercepted a Zebbie Lethridge pass that bounced off the hands of receiver Matt DeBuc and raced 26 yards for the third TD in that 21-point, first-quarter explosion. Walters, a sophomore from Arlington Lamar, bolted 11 yards for the first touchdown and gained 62 yards on seven carries in the first quarter. Walters finished with 82 on 14.
"This shows the people of Texas that Texas players can go outside the state to play college football and do all right," Walters said proudly. Had there been voting for Outstanding Understatement, he might have won.
This mismatch, played out before a mostly silent crowd, ended the Southwest Conference's partnership with the Cotton Bowl Classic on the dreariest note possible. SWC representatives lost the last seven games. The once-proud league disbands after the 1995-96 academic year, with Tech joining Texas, A&M and Baylor in a move to the Big 12; SMU, TCU and Rice joining the Western Athletic Conference; and Houston entering a new league of metropolitan universities.
As Dykes said, there will be another day. The tattered SWC members can only hope it won't be like this one.
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