Cal already dips into QB reserves
Sept. 7, 2005 12:00 AM
When this season kicked off, California coach Jeff Tedford had to worry about replacing Aaron Rodgers, the gifted quarterback who led the Golden Bears to 10 wins a year ago.
Now Tedford has to find a replacement for Rodgers' replacement. Matt Longshore, who won the starting job in camp, broke his left ankle late in the first half of Cal's 41-3 victory over Division I-AA Sacramento State Saturday and is expected to miss the rest of the season.
Tedford has named Joseph Ayoob, a junior college transfer, to start the Golden Bears' Pac-10 opener at Washington Saturday. This hasn't fired up fans who watched Ayoob go 0 for 10 in his major-college debut last weekend.
"We've got to give him a chance," Tedford said Tuesday on the Pac-10's weekly media teleconference. "We had Kyle Boller here and we had Aaron Rodgers, so people get used to almost perfection. When our people have come to expect perfection out of that position, of course when you miss some (passes) they're going to be saying, 'What's going on?' But we need to have patience."
Tedford chose Ayoob over Steve Levy, who completed 2 of 7 passes for 52 yards and a touchdown last weekend. Levy is a junior who lettered at fullback a year ago but switched to quarterback last spring, just in case.
Southern California coach Pete Carroll reacted sharply to a report in the Los Angeles Daily News that tailback LenDale White is unhappy about his role. The newspaper reported that White was "angry and upset . . . because he clearly took a back seat to tailback Reggie Bush" in USC's 63-17 victory at Hawaii.
The Daily News said White, who has been a stalwart short-yardage back, was peeved that he didn't get the call when Bush scored from a yard out in the third quarter.
"That's what happens when you've got the Heisman Trophy tailback on the team," White told the newspaper, referring to Bush, a Heisman finalist last year. "I don't worry about it. I don't talk to Pete (Carroll) and I don't talk to (running backs coach Todd McNair) about my carries ever. I have no clue at all what's going on. You've got Bush on the team, and that's what happens."
Bush finished with 12 carries and White with 13.
Carroll dismissed the notion that there's trouble in Troy.
"It was a great effort on the part of the media to try to get them to say something they wanted them to say, and they wouldn't do it," Carroll said.
Oregon State place-kicker Alexis Serna had a little better opener this year. A year ago, Serna missed three extra points in the Beavers' 22-21 overtime loss at Louisiana State. On Saturday, he nailed all five extra points and a pair of field goals in a 41-14 win over Division I-AA Portland State.