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© St. Petersburg Times, published December 30, 2001
Their names are Ahman Green, Mike Rozier and Tommie Frazier, Craig Erickson, Bernie Kosar and Ken Calhoun. And Bob Devaney and Tom Osborne, Howard Schnellenberger, Jimmy Johnson and Dennis Erickson. They played for or coached Nebraska or Miami and they wear national championship rings.
Now come Eric Crouch and Dahrran Diedrick, Ken Dorsey and Clinton Portis, Frank Solich and Larry Coker, players and coaches with a line to be filled in on their college football resumes.
As we look forward to the Nebraska's and Miami's first visit to the Rose Bowl with a national championship on the line, we look back at Cornhuskers and Hurricanes that preceded them.
Orange Bowl, Jan. 1, 1992
MIAMI 22, NEBRASKA 0
MIAMI -- Was it too much or not enough? Was Miami an awesome football machine deserving of the 1991 national championship, or simply a bully beating up an overmatched Nebraska?
When No. 1 Miami rode Orange Bowl MVP Larry Jones' 144 rushing yards, Carlos Huerta's three field goals and a ferocious defense led by sophomore Rusty Medearis' four sacks to the romp, it climaxed a 12-0 season. It was the 11th-ranked Cornhuskers' first shutout loss since 1973, 222 games earlier, and their first shutout in 30 bowl games.
Here, though, was the Hurricanes' quandary: a bigger winning margin and critics would say they had run up the score. A closer final score and other critics would say they didn't deserve the title if they couldn't convincingly put away a team not even in the Top 10.
And in the Rose Bowl earlier in the day, No. 2 Washington routed No. 4 Michigan 34-14 to stake its claim to the national championship. The Hurricanes and Huskies would have to wait one more day for the voters to decide who would finish No. 1.
Both did. The 60 writers and broadcasters on the AP panel gave Miami its half of the championship 1,472 points to 1,468 over Washington (and a 32-28 edge in first-place votes). The Huskies got the other half of the championship by a 1,4491/2-1,4401/2 margin (331/2-251/2 in first-place votes) over Miami in the USA Today/CNN poll of 60 coaches.
Miami coach Dennis Erickson said he had no problem sharing the championship. "You've got two great football teams and both of them went undefeated, which is hard enough to do," he said. "If someone won both polls, it would be unfair ... " Erickson paused, grinned and added, "... particularly if it were Washington."
-- Compiled by Bruce Lowitt.