Vanderbilt and Kansas State went bowling while Notre Dame stayed home; Herschel Walker took the money and ran after vowing he wouldn't; Cal beat the band—and Stanford—with the whackiest kickoff...

Having molded remarkable teams and young men at Grambling since 1941, Eddie Robinson is closing in on Bear Bryant's record for career victories

RECEIVERS

More and more, runners like Oklahoma's Marcus Dupree (below) are using backfields as launching pads for rocketing to TDs and first downs in short-yardage situations—that is, when the defense...

Probably the first man to run a play designed to send him leaping over the line of scrimmage was Leonard Coffman, a fullback in General Bob Neyland's single wing at Tennessee. At Neyland's behest,...

The best news is that NFL 1983 will not bring a repeat of the ugly strike that ravaged the 1982 schedule. However, the season promises to provide collisions off the field as well as on, because of...

This will be the kind of season Michigan Coach Bo Schembechler loves. That means, after four years of gushing over his All-Every-thing flanker, Anthony Carter, who's now playing for the USFL...

Not the victory but the action; not the goal but the game; in the deed the glory reads the inscription on the facade of Nebraska's Memorial Stadium in Lincoln. That's high-minded stuff, but it's...

Arizona fans and players are fuming, and it's not over the $1 million the Wildcats stand to lose in TV revenues as punishment for 31 infractions from 1971 through '79. Sure, the money would be...

A couple of years ago the late Bear Bryant advised Pat Dye, one of his former assistant coaches at Alabama, not to forsake the top position at Wyoming for the same slot at Auburn. Bryant told Dye...

Fullbacks are sprouting in the Longhorn backfield faster than massage parlors in Austin, or, as Ervin (Blue) Davis says, "We've got more fullbacks than a skunk's got funk." Davis is one of Texas'...

The Seminole Graveyard—six by 30 feet and rimmed by a low hedge—lies just beyond a practice field at Florida State. In it are buried chunks of real and artificial turf, each with its own...

A day after Oklahoma lost 32-21 to Arizona State in the Fiesta Bowl last Jan. 1, Defensive Back Scott Case was looking ahead to this fall. "I don't see any reason we shouldn't be national...

Down by three at Clemson, fourth down, four yards to go and 39 seconds to play, North Carolina Coach Dick Crum had two choices: to kick an easy 31-yard field goal, which would have given the Tar...

It may be time for Traveler III, USC's mascot, to change his pregame routine. Instead of galloping full tilt straight down the field like a tailback, perhaps he could run a 10-yard hook-and-go or...

The word is that Notre Dame Coach Gerry Faust must win at least eight games this year and take the Irish to a major bowl, or the ghost of Rockne will descend from heaven and beat him to a pulp....

The strike is history, but for Pete Rozelle the headaches keep getting worse, chief among them the NFL's increasing drug troubles and not just one but two rival football leagues

Mark Robinson. Penn State's All-America safety, is approaching the Nittany Lions' defense of their national championship with a Businesslike attitude. "A lot of kids just go out for football for...

Two years ago, after LSU finished 3-7-1, its most dismal showing since 1956, folks in the bayous were ready to treat Coach Jerry Stovall, who had then completed two seasons, as if he were just...

Mike Tomczak, Ohio State's junior quarterback, looks like the prototypical all-American boy: brown eyes, apple cheeks, short hair. At Thornton Fractional North High in Chicago, he played football...

In May, Georgia Coach Vince Dooley spent two weeks vacationing in the People's Republic of China, where there are one billion people who have never heard of Herschel Walker. He toured the...

One day late in June, Alabama Coach Ray Perkins was being interviewed in his office by a writer—while talking to a rich booster on the telephone, signing letters that would go out to hundreds of...

What passes for high drama in Iowa? Consider the Cedar Rapids Community Theatre's sold-out staging of A Roast of Coach Hayden Fry last May. Normally you don't get roasted unless you're a revered...

UCLA Coach Terry Donahue sat in his office and stared at a clipping from a Nebraska newspaper that listed the Huskers' spring depth chart. "Ten fullbacks? Seven nose-guards?" he said in amazement....

A year ago Jeff Hostetler was an unknown quantity. A 6'3", 212-pound transfer from Penn State who looked more like a linebacker than a quarterback, he faced the task of succeeding West Virginia's...

He drives a big-wheeled Bronco, license plate TERP QB, and he has been called Boomer since before he was born because of his ferocious kicks while in the womb. Norman Julius Esiason (pronounced...

This is a fable, the story of the ant and the grasshopper. Two years ago the Red Raiders fell on times as hard as the flat cap rock of west Texas. Their coach, Rex Dockery, had hopped to Memphis...

ACC

"What he is," says Boston College Coach Jack Bicknell of his quarterback, junior Doug Flutie, "is a lesson in recruiting—look beyond the computer stuff, listen to high school coaches." Flutie,...

Colgate was rolling along with a 5-1 record last October, when its president, George D. Langdon Jr., announced that because of a conflict between playoff dates and exams, the Red Raiders would not...

Pete Muldoon of Holy Cross hit 58.8% of his passes last year to lead the Crusaders to their best record—8-3—in 30 years. Coach Rick Carter, in the third year of a five-year contract, considered...

An his 13 years at UC-Davis, Jim Sochor has become the winningest active coach in Division II (102-30-4) and has sent seven players to the NFL, including Quarterback Ken O'Brien, whom the Jets...

The intimidation starts with his name. "I've been The Grock ever since I can remember," says Bob Grock, a senior defensive end for Plymouth (N.H.) State College who last season led the Panthers in...

Since 1922 the Texas A&M student body—a.k.a. the Twelfth Man—has stood ready to serve the Aggie football squad. This season 15 diehards will get a chance to "splatter people" on the kickoff team

College football's main event, the action between the sidelines, is at times upstaged by what happens beyond the stripes. There you'll find such diversions as the Texas-size Texas band, 12 of...

The wildest kickoff return in history began when Kevin Moen of Cal fielded a Stanford squib (right) and ended, five laterals and a felled trombone player later, amid hysteria

3—Ronald C. Modra6—Lane Stewart16—Tony Tomsic20—John D. Hanlon22—Andy Hayt (left), James Drake24, 25—Anthony Neste26, 27—Manny Rubio28-31—Richard Mackson32, 33—Anthony Neste34—John Biever38,...

Nowhere is the action more fierce than in that combat zone outside the tackles where running backs, pulling guards, linebackers and defensive backs collide at top speed. Here, with a well-timed...

Few plays in football unfold more dramatically than the sweep to the corner. "They say the game has changed," says Reggie McKenzie, a Buffalo Bill last year and now a Seattle Seahawk, "but one...

John Madden has burst upon the American scene as few others in sport, but contrary to his bull-in-a-beer-ad image, he loves nothing more than good quiet conversation, and his skill as a...

NEW YORK JETS

New York Jets 11-5Miami 11-5New England 7-9Buffalo 7-9Baltimore 5-11

"I learned pretty quick that I couldn't eat and paint at the same time," says Tom Vanderschmidt of his days as an aspiring abstract expressionist in 1950s New York City. "Between classes at Cooper...

PITTSBURGH STEELERS

Pittsburgh 10-6Cincinnati 10-6Cleveland 7-9Houston 3-13

LOS ANGELES RAIDERS

L.A. Raiders 11-5San Diego 10-6Denver 9-7Seattle 6-10Kansas City 5-11

DALLAS COWBOYS

Dallas 11-5Washington 11-5New York Giants 8-8St. Louis 8-8Philadelphia 6-10

GREEN BAY PACKERS

Green Bay 9-7Minnesota 9-7Detroit 7-9Chicago 7-9Tampa Bay 5-11

My father's passions were football, golf, my mother, gin (the drink and the game), baseball and newspapers. His philosophy for raising children was that they should be treated like...

SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS

San Francisco 9-7New Orleans 8-8Atlanta 8-8L.A. Rams 6-10

Hail the "impact player," NFL lingo for the little speedster who can amass big yardage running, catching passes and returning kicks

When John Riggins said he wanted the ball in last year's NFL playoffs, the Redskins went along, and he reeled in the Super Bowl crown