DALE GRUMMERT SEATTLE -- For years, Washington State football coach Mike Price was understandably resistant to this idea of playing a home game 300 miles from home, no matter how lucrative.

The reasons are probably numerous, but he gave some indication of their source this week, even while gushing over the 67,000 fans expected to stream into Seahawk Stadium today for the Cougars' game against Nevada.

It's been a quarter of a century since the Cougars scheduled a game at Seattle that didn't involve arch-rival Washington, and Price was an assistant at WSU when the final two such games were played.

"That's why I didn't want to come back to Seattle," Price said in a jocular tone this week, referring chiefly to the 1974 debacle, "because it was 48-0 at halftime against Woody Hayes or something."

Well, memory has a way of exaggerating. Price seems to remember paltry crowds at these games, but the turnout exceeded what the Cougars would have attracted in Pullman. The USC game drew 37,268 and the Woody Hayes spanking was watched by 50,000.

But these games were at Husky Stadium, while the Dawgs were out of town, and "it wasn't real homey," Price said.

Today, by contrast, Price will have everything but a dog to carry in his slippers.

The capacity crowd will include the largest throng of Cougar partisans ever to attend an athletic event. The 1998 Rose Bowl drew 101,219, but half of them were Michigan fans.

"They're coming there to watch the Cougars play," Price said. "They're not coming there to watch some big-name school. If it was the University of Oregon, for example, maybe half the stadium would be Duck fans. That's not the case with Nevada. They're bringing up there a thousand people. There's going to be more crimson and gray than these kids have ever seen."

Much of Seattle's enthusiasm for this game can be attributed to the Cougars' unprecedented showing in the preseason polls and forecasts, a couple of which brazenly place WSU in the Fiesta Bowl, vying for the national championship.

Another lure is Seahawk Stadium itself, with its fan-friendly seating arrangement and its state-of-the-art video technology. This will be the first official event at the new venue, though the Seahawks have played two exhibition games there.

"It's spectacular," said Price, who visited the stadium early this week. "It's the most beautiful place you'll ever watch a football game in the United States, until the next new stadium is built."

Adding to the allure is the fact that this is a season opener, not one of those mid-October games in Seattle that Price remembers. Evidently, the fan turnout won't be affected by the Labor Day Weekend Factor -- fans snubbing football in favor of picnics and camping trips --that tends to limit opening-day crowds at Pullman.

"It's a lot more beneficial to play this weekend, when they (the Huskies) are out of town," Price said, "than it would be to play the fifth or sixth game of the year. I don't think the hype would be as much, the anticipation of the first game."

The only apparent drawback to this Cougs-in-Seattle bash is the fact that WSU fans in the Inland Northwest -- so dear to Price's heart -- don't get to watch it.

Unless Nevada is vastly improved since last year, the Cougars should win today by a margin comparable to Ohio State's romp in 1974.

But Price is counting on nothing. Asked if he would like to see the Cougars play in Seattle on a somewhat regular basis, he said, "We'll see. We'll see how it goes."

College football 2002 kicks off; Farm fresh Cougs; Freshman LB picks off 3 passes to help less-than-awesome Wazzu beat Nevada

DALE GRUMMERT SEATTLE -- How perfect. On a day when Washington State finally took its shtick to the big city, on a day when more than 60,000 fans poured into a spanking-new NFL stadium to watch the new and improved Cougars, the show was stolen by a modest farmboy whose family has yet to install a telephone.

Will Derting, a second-year freshman from tiny Okanogan (approximately), intercepted three passes and set a school record with a 98-yard runback Saturday in the Cougars' otherwise underwhelming 31-7 win over Nevada.

After the biggest preseason buildup in school history, and playing before a crowd of 63,588 in the first official game at Seahawks Stadium, the nationally 12th-ranked Cougars produced only 369 yards of offense against a Western Athletic Conference team with a supposedly miserable defense.

So the story line shifted abruptly to Derting, a backup outside linebacker whose rookie season in 2001 had ended with a knee injury in the first game.

Virtually every newspaper in Washington today will tell something of Derting's story -- that he grew up on a ranch 30 miles south of Okanogan, Wash., that his family didn't own a telephone because the lines didn't stretch that far into the wilderness, that once a week he would travel to his aunt's house in order to accept phone calls from football recruiters.

With the University of Washington playing in Michigan (and losing), the Cougars on this sunny afternoon were clearly the team of choice in this state. And if Heisman Trophy candidate Jason Gesser didn't quite provide the anticipated thrills, Derting rushed in to fill the breach.

His three interceptions all came in the second half, the first two on nearly identical crossing routes, with Derting making athletic but not exactly spectacular lunges to the ball.

The third one was the keeper -- a heads-up theft on the 2-yard line, after he had risen from a three-point stance at the line of scrimmage. He took his prize to the left sideline and found clear sailing to the end zone, lugging the ball so inexpertly that his teammates were torn between cheering and laughing.

"I didn't want to mess with it -- I had it and I was just running," Derting said. "I was just squeezing it as hard as I could."

It was WSU's longest interception return since a 93-yarder by Lionel Thomas in 1969, though Curt Newton did return a PAT pass 100 yards in 1990.

These plays were not meaningless sideshows, since the Cougars led only 14-7 in the third quarter when Derting's first interception occurred.

Gesser, the Cougars' accomplished senior quarterback, completed 17 of 29 passes for 242 yards and a touchdown, with no interceptions, but his performance, like that of most of the offensive players, was rough around the edges.

"We weren't too impressive," coach Mike Price admitted. "Our goal was 400 yards, and we didn't get that. We're just scratching the surface. We can build off that. No one's got a big head around here now."

Pullman High graduate J.D. Morscheck, a junior defensive end for Nevada, was the team's co-leader in tackles with five, and the Wolf Pack repeatedly got a hand on Gesser's passes, nearly intercepting bobbled balls more than once.

"We played well," Nevada coach Chris Tormey said. "We have a lot of young players on defense and we did a decent job against a good offense."

Two WSU offensive players who rose above mediocrity were wide receiver Jerome Riley, who caught five passes for 117 yards and a TD, and new tailback Jonathan Smith, who came off the bench to rush for 50 yards and two touchdowns on 10 carries.

The Washington State defense more or less met expectations, allowing only 282 yards, and tackle Rien Long played superbly in the first quarter.

Nevada's new quarterback, Zack Threadgill, passed 17-for-30 for 155 yards, performing competently when Derting wasn't in his line of vision.

In the end, though, Derting was in everyone's line of vision, from one side of Washington to the other.

WSU--Riley 44 pass from Gesser (Dunning kick), 14:52.
WSU--J.Smith 2 run (Dunning kick), :27.

WSU--J.Smith 2 run (Dunning kick), 14:31.
WSU--FG Dunning 40, 11:07.
WSU--Derting 98 interception return (Dunning kick), 6:42.

RUSHING--Nevada, Kretschmer 26-67, Milton 9-28, Burleson 3-12, Threadgill 4-5, Rowe 4-(minus 4). WSU, Smith 10-50, Tippins 5-21, Miller 1-16, Kegel 1-6, Green 6-5, Anderson 2-4, Gesser 1-4, Dunning 1-2.

PASSING--Nevada, Threadgill 17-30-3-155, Rowe 3-5-0-19. WSU, Gesser 17-29-0-242, Kegel 2-4-0-19.

RECEIVING--Nevada, Fleming 8-58, Burleson 7-72, Bythwood 2-14, Mann 1-12, Milton 1-9, Streelman 1-9. WSU, Darling 6-31, Riley 5-117, Henderson 3-32, Harvey 2-35, Lunde 1-45, Bush 1-1, Smith 1-0.

Nevada coach lauds unprecedented Coug talent
Hothanded Derting becomes a media darling

SEATTLE -- WSU coaches, players and fans -- despite the crimson-sided 31-7 score -- expected more in their season opener Saturday. Nevada's head coach, however, assures that greatness is just a matter of time with this Cougar team.

Wolfpack Drops Season Opener At Washington State, 31-7

SEATTLE (AP) - Jonathan Smith had two short touchdown runs and Will Derting returned one of his three interceptions for a school-record 98-yard score as 12th-ranked Washington State opened with a 31-7 victory over Nevada on Saturday.

Jason Gesser, whose Heisman campaign began in July with a poster put up on the side of grain elevator in Dusty, Wash., recovered from a slow start to complete 17 of 29 passes for 242 yards and a touchdown.

Zack Threadgill was 17-of-30 for 155 yards for Nevada, but he was intercepted three times - all by Derting, who's an outside linebacker.

Derting's third interception was the big one, and it came as Nevada was threatening to score. The Wolf Pack had advanced to the Cougars' 10-yard line with 6:45 left when Derting stepped in front of Threadgill's pass at the 2. Derting rumbled down the left sideline for the touchdown.

Nevada, a 27-point underdog, used a variety of formations and kept the ball for nearly 12 minutes in the first quarter. The Wolf Pack took a 7-0 lead on a 7-yard run by Chance Kretschmer.

Gesser threw a 44-yard touchdown pass to Jerome Riley in the second quarter to tie it at 7-all. Riley finished with five catches for 117 yards.

Smith provided the go-ahead score to put the Cougars up 14-7 just before the half. The seven play, 67-yard drive was helped by Nevada penalties for pass interference and roughing the passer.

Smith, a junior transfer who practiced sparingly because of an injury, had 10 carries for 50 yards. Both his touchdowns were from 2 yards out.

Kretschmer, last season's NCAA rushing leader with 1,732 yards, ran 26 times for 67 yards.

Each team netted 108 rushing yards, while Washington State had a 261-174 edge in passing. The game was slowed by penalties, with the Wolf Pack being penalized 67 yards on eight flags, while Washington State was called nine times for 80 yards.

Nevada held a nearly 2-1 advantage in time of possession.

It was the first meeting of the teams and the first time WSU played someone other than Washington in Seattle since a matchup with USC in the old Kingdome in 1976.

A crowd of 63,588 turned out at Seahawks Stadium, and Washington State officials billed it as the largest pro-Cougars crowd to watch the team.

By JOHN K. WILEY
Associated Press Writer

Lewiston Tribune Online 09/02/02

Cougs feel at home in Huskyville

by Dale Grummert

SEATTLE -- Well, let's do an inventory of Seattle iconography this weekend, just to make sure the place is upholding its reputation.

A coffeehouse on every corner. Check.

Alienated youth on the Ave. Check.

A certain attitude. Know what I mean? A Seattitude.

Check.

Foreboding clouds.

Check. (On Sunday anyway.)

Huskies everywhere.

Oops.

Anybody seen the Huskies?

I don't mean the actual athletes. Obviously, the actual athletes were playing 12-man football in Michigan. I mean the proud and the many -- the logo-bearing citizens, the purple and gold rank and file, who normally are found guarding the streets and sampling the cappuccino.

They've been sent into hiding, it seems, and not merely to nurse their wounds after a last-moment field goal in Ann Arbor on Saturday had pinned their heroes with a 31-29 loss.

I suspect they are simmering in disgust somewhere while this unprecedented horde of Cougars is invading their city.

They are everywhere, these Cougars, drinking the coffee, haunting the pubs, exuding the Seattitude.

It's not that Washington State's 31-7 win over Nevada, on an admittedly beautiful day in Seattle, was something to crow about. At times, this new media darling of a football team, ranked 12th nationally and picked to win the Pac-10 Conference, fizzled like a firecracker in the Seattle rain.

The Cougars are 1-0 and the Huskies aren't -- but even that's slightly missing the point.

The point is, the Cougars have strength in numbers. In Seattle. For the first time ever.

Sixty-thousand of these creatures gravitated Saturday into what can only be called the Stadium District of Seattle, that area south of Pioneer Square where Seahawks Stadium and Safeco Field have appeared magically in the last two years, as if sprouting from the scattered seeds of the uprooted Kingdome.

They are strangely inviting, these elaborate, Disneylandish structures, separated by a vendor-lined alley that reminds you of a carnival midway.

The Seahawks venue, which had staged nothing but two exhibition games prior to this WSU-Nevada ground-breaker, is pleasing despite some geometrical oddities -- for example, a precarious-looking section of seats on the north side that rises tongue-like against the downtown skyline, surmounted by a video screen.

Seattle, after all, is not a city of clean, classical lines. It's a city of curves and arabesques, a city of hills and water and hidden perils.

But there were no perils for the Cougars on this day. No Huskies in sight.

Here they came, all these Wazzu fans -- hesitantly at first, then more boldly as they saw their numbers swell. Into the stadium they streamed -- a stadium financed, you know, by a WSU graduate, Paul Allen, and bearing no affiliation to that august university a mile or two to the north.

It was the largest collection of Cougars ever assembled at one site.

From where did they come? Probably not very far. It's true that Interstate-90 on Friday was more or less a wagon train of Cougars, crossing the state to watch the first WSU "home" game in Seattle since 1976.

According to Washington State, however, the "Cougar family" -- alumni, students, parents of students and donors -- includes almost 78,000 members in the three western Washington counties of King, Pierce and Snohomish.

Those were the people watching this game, by and large. It wasn't quite a Pullman crowd. It wasn't quite old enough, and not quite young enough. It was mostly 20-, 30- and 40-somethings, a yuppier and more urban crowd than the ones you find at Martin Stadium.

Yet they were Cougars. They were loud and zealous and not very well-orchestrated. The WSU offense had trouble hearing Jason Gesser's signals, and that's not supposed to happen at a home game.

But the Cougars won. They sputtered and they underachieved, but they improved in the second half and won by a convincing margin. They would doubtless retain their national ranking, and the Huskies would doubtless tumble.

And their fans? They had a look in their eyes. They planned to turn Seattle on its ear that night.

"Sixty-thousand Cougars," WSU center Tyler Hunt said, pondering the implications of that number. "We may not get invited here next year, after tonight."

After postgame interviews, a group of WSU reporters was waiting for the press-box elevator when we were addressed briefly by a security guard who appears destined to become a Seahawks Stadium "character." He wore thick glasses and spoke in a curious manner without making eye contact. He looked like a cross between, oh, Billy Bob Thornton and Stephen Hawking.

Apropos of nothing, he alluded to Washington State's scheduled game at Ohio State on Sept. 14, and he seemed to be delivering his verdict on the pallid performance he had just seen.

"We'll see how you do against the Buckeyes in two weeks, in Columbus," he said slowly and precisely. "If you win there, then I'll believe you'll be the Pac-10 champions."

And I got the distinct feeling I had finally found a Husky.

NOTES -- Cougars wide receiver Trandon Harvey sprained a posterior cruciate ligament in a knee and is questionable for a game against Idaho on Saturday. Listed as probable with bruised shoulders are safety Erik Coleman and linebacker Pat Bennett.

Cougfan.com

Posted Sep 2, 2002

WHAT THEY'RE SAYING
Quotable quotes, quips and other chatter

By San Cho
CF.C Correspondent

SEATTLE -- Size and spirit of the crowd, coupled with Will Derting's heroics, all the talk on Planet Coug.

"How perfect. On a day when Washington State finally took its shtick to the big city, on a day when more than 60,000 fans poured into a spanking-new NFL stadium to watch the new and improved Cougars, the show was stolen by a modest farmboy whose family has yet to install a telephone." Dale Grummert, Lewiston Morning Tribune

"The best part: Will Derting being the star of the game with three interceptions. The redshirt freshman is a typical Cougar: from a small town (Okanogan) with rural interests. Derting enjoys roping, welding, hunting, and frankly I don't. He also was the two-time grand champion of Beef Fitting and Showing at the Okanogan County Fair, whatever in the world that means. I think it has something to do with a cow, but I really don't want to know any more about it than that."
Jim Moore, Seattle P-I

"Derting is a throwback Cougar. Three uncles, three aunts and four cousins, inclduing Cousin Ace, went to WSU. His hobbies are roping, welding and hunting. He's majoring in agriculture. He's as country as Waylon Jennings, and as Cougar as Chad Eaton."
Steve Kelley, Seattle Times

"As for the WSU running game, that looked more like a vintage Pinto." Carter Strickland, Spokesman-Review

"I think we shocked them. We came out and we scored the first touchdown of the game. At that point, our confidence was through the roof and we knew we could play with these guys. It was a good game going into halftime. We came into the locker room and I don't know what it was -- their adjustments or our adjustments -- but they just came out and outplayed us in the second half." Nevada receiver Nate Burleson

"Is this Nevada or a bowl game?"
Craig Smith, Seattle Times, upon entering the post-game media room and encountering a battalion of journalists.

"They came shoulder-to-shoulder -- the hearty Coug fans who doggedly come to nearly every home game and the casual West Side alums who may not make it back to Pullman more than once every 10 years. They piled into Paul Allen's new football palace down on the waterfront as if it was a two-holer at the Lentil Festival chili feed and they rocked the joint -- 63,588 strong, not a sellout but a smashing success almost beyond the comprehension of any Coug with a sense of history. "
John Blanchette, Spokesman-Review

"We were expected to get trampled. I don't think they expected a game from us. I think they thought they could look past us. It opened their eyes wide. They are a good offense, but we are not afraid of any offense. We can compete with anybody."
Nevada cornerback Marlon McLaughlin

"Oops. Must have made a wrong turn somewhere. At least that's what you would have thought hanging around downtown's southern corridor yesterday. The area around Seahawks Stadium resembled Pullman, with crimson and gray flowing off the highway, onto the streets and into the stadium."
Jayda Evans, Seattle Times

"Boy, what a difference driving over to the stadium this morning compared to our last few trips to Seattle. Everybody was waving and cheering. We're usually getting heckled and flipped off when we drive up (to Husky Stadium)." Mike Price before Saturday's game.

"I've been to a lot of great events. At Oklahoma, there's a sea of red. At Ohio State, there's a sea of red. When I walked in here and saw all that crimson, I was so excited I actually got goosebumps."
Craig Ehlo, WSU hoop great, walking into Seahawks Stadium on Saturday.

"You can bet that if Nevada quarterback Zack Threadgill had a bad dream last night, Will Derting was in it." Chad Hartley, Reno-Gazette Journal

	Nev	WSU
First downs	19	18
Rushes-yards	46-108	27-108
Passing	174	261
Comp-Att-Int	20-35-3	19-33-0
Return Yards	105	77
Punts-Avg.	8-36	4-47
Fumbles-Lost	1-0	2-2
Penalties-Yards	8-67	9-80
Time of Possession	39:15	20:45

Cougars, Vandals both go metro; 67,000 to be on hand for WSU's 'home' game vs. Nevada in Seattle

College football 2002 kicks off; Farm fresh Cougs; Freshman LB picks off 3 passes to help less-than-awesome Wazzu beat Nevada

Wolfpack Drops Season Opener At Washington State, 31-7

Cougs feel at home in Huskyville