Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, September 10, 1993                   TAG: 9309090227
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV-14   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: RAY COX
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

WHO'D THINK SCORING SO OFTEN WOULD GET TEAM IN SO DEEP?

Cole, the Christiansburg High football coach, has been conjuring a new offense for the Blue Demons. Little did he know what terrible forces would be unleashed by his wizardry.

He found out last week.

All he could do was lash himself to the mast and roll with the deck on the heaving sea.

Lucky he didn't heave.

Still, this was the kind of trauma that Cole has spent a football lifetime with no stomach for.

Alleghany 57, Christiansburg 41.

Until now, football for Cole has been a simple proposition. On defense, you knock down anybody who is wearing a different-colored shirt than you and do it as violently as the felony laws allow. Offensively, you will assemble the biggest, meanest, least-attractive boys you can find to smoosh the enemy flatter than a pair of trousers in a steam press, then run a quick guy in behind them who can carry the football over the carcasses.

Power football, a man's game.

Knock 'em down, run 'em over, make 'em reach for the liniment and spend the next two months in the whirlpool.

So, then, how did he react to a season opener that featured 98 points, 739 yards of total offense, 14 touchdowns, six turnovers, and only four punts?

"Some of our fans told me it was a great game to watch," Cole said. "But it sure wasn't a great game to coach, unless you won."

Many more of those and Cole is going to be lying on a sofa in a darkened room, curtains drawn, discussing his life with a bearded gentleman in a white coat who questions softly and writes the responses on a clipboard while nodding gravely.

No, Cole didn't figure things would be this way when he installed the Wing-T offense in the offseason to disguise a shortage of size among his players.

All he did was talk to some coaches who were literate in the subtleties of the scheme, guys such as Joel Hicks at Pulaski County and Randy Flinchum at Abingdon, go to some clinics with Wing-T guru Tubby Raymond of the University of Delaware, and then plug it in.

The next thing Cole knows, he looks down and notices somebody has knotted the tail of a very ill-humored lion around his belt.

Don't be misled, the Wing-T is a nice little offense that when run correctly, will achieve all the desired results. The problem for Christiansburg in the Alleghany game was that the Wing-T was too effective.

When the offense you run moves the ball across the landscape as rapidly as the Blue Demons' Wing-T did last week, then eventually you're going to score and have to give the football to the other guys. For Christiansburg, that turned out to be very bad news indeed.

With defense like the Demons played last week, what they really needed was a Wing and a prayer.

"Defensively, I knew we weren't as strong as I want to be or as strong as we have been in the past," Cole said. "But we aren't 57 points bad."

Actually, the defense wasn't totally toothless. Two Mountaineers touchdowns resulted from Christiansburg's four turnovers. One of the TD's was a 90-yard fumble recovery by Mounties defensive end Todd Wheatley, who will never be mistaken for Carl Lewis.

"It took him forever," Cole said.

Chinese water torture, to be sure.

If you're Cole, this is no time to panic. But his experience can be instructive. When you set the sorcerer's cauldron to bubbling, be prepared for the consequences when cosmic forces are riled.

\ HE SAID IT: Scribe Ralph Berrier Jr., speculating on the reaction of the Giles football coaches when projected star lineman Jason Ratcliffe told them last year he would be disabled for the season after a trampoline mishap: "Trampoline? I said I wanted to see more trampling out there! Trampling! Trampling!"

\ EXPEDITING MATTERS: Pulaski County's 49-12 mauling of Anacostia might have ended some time Saturday morning had not coaches Joel Hicks of Pulaski County and Willie Stewart of Anacostia agreed to let the clock spin without cease in the second half. As it was, Anacostia ran but one running play after intermission.

Ray Cox covers New River Valley high-school sports for the Roanoke Times & World-News.