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g THE GAMECOCK *Mondav. November 3. 2003 GAME SCHEDULE CROSS COUNTRY at SEC Championships in Athens, Ga„ 9 a.m. Monday f ONTAfT ITS *■ MEN’S GOLF at Hawaii/Turtle Bay Intercollegiate, VjVJxX liAVJ 1 U O Kahuka, Hawaii, Monday and Tuesday Story ideas? Questions? Comments? MEN’S SOCCER vs. College of Charleston, 7 p.m. Tuesday E-mail us at gamecocksports@hotmail.com VOLLEYBALL at Kentucky, 7 p.m. Wednesday Carolina conies up empty GAME 9 @ <5444*0 40 Ole Miss IM&AA (7-2, 5-0 SEC) SOUNDBITE “You’re supposed to play hard when you’re down. I’m proud that they hung in there.” LOU HOLTZ - ■ USC HEAD COACH BY THE NUMBERS 298 USC quarterback Dondrial Pinkins threw for a career-high . 298 yards, including four touchdowns. He hooked up with Matthew Thomas for a 98-yard touchdown in the fourth quarter. 89 Freshman wide receiver Noah Whiteside caught three passes for 89 yards and the first two touchdowns of his career. The scores were from 30 yards and 20 yards out. 26 The Gamecocks scored 26 unanswered points in the second half to pull within three. USC trailed 43-14 with 3:58 left in the third quarter, but Ole Miss’ offense stalled after that. t • The USC defense couldn’t keep its hands wrapped around Ole Miss’ Tremaine Turner, left, who picked up 117 yards rushing. Gamecocks’ late-game rally not enough to down powerful Rebels BY JAY POU THE GAMECOCK The No. 20 Ole Miss Rebels (7-2, 5-0 SEC) held off a late Gamecock rally in Oxford, Miss., to beat Carolina 43-40 and deny them the sixth win they needed to become bowl-eligible. Heisman Trophy candidate Eli Manning threw for 391 yards and three first-half touchdowns in an offensive effort that proved too much for the Gamecocks (5 4,2-4) to match despite scoring 26 unanswered second-half points. A bright spot for the Gamecocks was the play they re ceived from the young players. Freshmen Cory Boyd, Demetris Summers and Noah Whiteside all scored touchdowns. Dondrial Pinkins threw a career-high 298 yards and four touchdowns, in cluding a 98-yard score to Matthew Thomas. Sophomore de fensive end Moe Thompson fin ished with two sacks on the de fensive side. • Head coach Lou Holtz was glad his team came back at the end, but was not happy about the game’s overall outcome. “You’re supposed to play hard when you’re down,” Holtz said af ter the game. “I’m proud that they hung in there.” Carolina got-off to a bad start on the game’s opening possession when wide receiver Troy Williamson ran into teammate Matthew Thomas during the opening kickoff return, burying the,Gamecocks at the Ole Miss 15 yard line. After recovering a muffed punt, the Rebels took over with good field position and capitalized quickly with a 5-yard touchdown pass from Manning to wide re ceiver Chris Collins, who set a school record for career receiv ing yards during the game. The Gamecocks responded im mediately, however, by putting together a drive that ended with an 11-yard touchdown by Summers on a screen pass from Pinkins. The Rebels came right back with another scoring drive, capped off by a 15-yard Manning touchdown pass to Collins. The next drive would be huge for the Gamecocks, with Whiteside catching a 30-yard bomb from Pinkins on a one-play scoring drive that took eight sec onds off the clock. At the end of the first quar ter, the score was tied at 14, but Ole Miss again struck quickly, this time with a 4-yard touch down run by Tremaine Turner, who finished with a career-high 117 yards on 25 carries. Trailing by a score of 21-14, Carolina looked to strike back with an other score. However, the Carolina drive was cut short by a questionable safety call, giv ing the Rebels a 23-14 lead and the ball. On first down, the ball slipped • ♦ FOOTBALL, SEE PAGE 9 PHOTO BY TRISHA SHADWELL/THE GAMECOCK USC sophomore Ryan Deter rushes past a Wildcat defender in the Gamecocks’ 2-1 overtime loss on Halloween at Stone Stadium. Men’s soccer loses at home BY STEPHEN DEMEDIS THE (iAMECOUK In heartbreaking fashion, the Davidson Wildcats (11-4-2) handed the USC men’s soccer team (8-6-1) its sixth loss of the season Friday night at Stone Stadium. The game ended in double overtime with a 2-1 score and puts Carolina in a must-win sit uation in each of its three re maining games. Play ended in the 105th minute when Davidson’s Nick Hansell, a Columbia native, drew freshman goalkeeper Brad Guzan out of the net and lobbed a shot past him. The goal came 20 minutes af ter Davidson tied the game in the 85th minute. Sophomore Matt Allen came off the bench for the Wildcats and scored off a corner kick. Senior David Peoples passed the ball into the box, and the ball was nearly cleared several times before Allen finished it off. Carolina’s lone score came on a gocll by freshman Ayo Akinsete, the team’s leading scorer. The forward gave Carolina the lead with his sev enth goal of the year on a shot from 25 yards out in the 40th minute. “It’s a very difficult loss and hard way to lose,” USC head coach Mark Berson said. “I thought that we really came out strong and gave a great effort. It is just disappointing to surren der the lead and then lose in overtime.” Despite several opportunities, including shots that hit the post and cross bar, Carolina was nev er able to add an insurance goal. This lack of offensive production has plagued the Gamecocks for the past eight games. At the start of the season, Carolina outscored its opponents 20-2 in the first seven games, but the team’s offensive production hit a roadblock. In the past eight games, the team has been outscored 13-2 and, as a result, has won only once. To counter this scoring slump, the team has changed its lineup and playing style. From the first whistle in the Davidson game, Carolina came out attack ing and took several shots on ♦ SOCCER, SEE PAGE 9 Finally, NFL gets down to business BRAD SENKIW GAMECOCKSPORTS@HOTMAIL.COM Pro football offers loads of surprises, questions. Isn’t this a great time of the year? Baseball is over, the NBA has begun, the college football bowl picture is getting clearer, and the NFL season finally started this weekend. That’s right, all 32 teams kicked off the “real” season yesterday. All games up to this point weren’t to tally worthless, but now we can see who the real pretenders and contenders will be. With another exciting year of parity swinging away, it’s time for me to do all the analyzing that will lead us to January. So, here’s a host of sur prises and screw-ups. First, is anyone not yet im pressed with the Kansas City rViiofo? Uormoil’c crourc HqH the week off to sit back and ask themselves what in the world they are doing undefeated and con tending for a trip to the Super Bowl. As far as Priest Holmes goes. I said in August that he woulc bounce back from last season’s in jury and dominate once again. The only thing that worries me about this team is Trent Green, but he’ll be all right if he keeps getting the ball to Johnnie Morton and Tony Gonzalez and doesn’t turn into Kurt Warner. Oh, wait — he was supposed to be Warner a few years ago. Anyway, this team seems to be eerily similar to Vermeil’s old St. Louis teams, which just put up hoards of touchdowns and asked the defense to get a couple stops a game. The Chiefs should be building something here, at least until Vermeil has his first emo tional breakdown, drowns him^ self in his own tears and retired again. I have to give mad props to two remarkably good coaches. Bill Parcells has taken a team that could care less about winning and turned it into a team that Terry Glenn can succeed witn. mat s ex tremely frightening. So, with the big win over its rival, the Cowboys are sitting pretty in the NFC East. Also, Bill Belichick has played a great doctor this season, patching up a New England Patriots team that should win the division. This is just another team that seems to rally around banged up players and keep winning. Probably the biggest disap^ pointment so far comes from last season’s Super Bowl teams, the Raiders and the Bucs. Figuring out why they aren’t getting it done is easy. Oakland is as old as dirt, which will help it get plenty of young talent in this year’s draft, while Tampa Bay’s gigan tic head finally popped when it re alized that it has a bull’s-eye on its back. Another team that makes me scratch my head is the Redskins. The ol’ ball coach in Washington thought he had it together for the first couple of games, with Patrick Ramsey looking like the next Mark Kypien. umoriunateiy, ne started looking like Mark Rypien and the Redskins’ ground attack is playing in Carolina right now. Did everyone expect Donovan* McNabb to lead a bad Eagle teai^ to the Super Bowl just because Rush Limbaugh said something stupid? Philadelphia just has no receivers and an inconsistent run ning game. Guess Andy Reid will be looking to land himself a job in Arizona or Chicago next season. Anyway, the season won’t be a bore, so go ahead and prepare yourself for a Kansas City Minnesota Super Bowl for all the marbles. If not those two teams, then 1 really hate parity._ Senkiw ii'a fourth-year print { journalism student.