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Even underdogs have their days By
Ferd Lewis
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"So, basically, the season opener (against Hawai'i) is a preseason game for Florida and the Gators should already be scheming for Miami ..."
— Joseph Goodman blog in the Miami Herald.
Among "four early games that could get uglier than Oregon's uniforms."
— Los Angeles Times.
"Biggest mismatch" involving a Western Athletic Conference team.
Like a lot of people lately, Don Botelho acknowledges that the University of Hawai'i football team is a heavy underdog to Florida in its season opener Saturday.
Indeed, the Gators and their Heisman Trophy quarterback, Tim Tebow, are a 34 1/2-point — and rising — favorites on many of the betting lines and prognosticators have been getting in their licks. The Miami Herald, among them, says, "Here's hoping Hawai'i's players treat fans inside Ben Hill Griffin Stadium to their pregame haka, the Warriors' version of a traditional Maori war dance. It will be the most exciting part of the game."
Such dire forecasts bring back memories for Botelho. Pleasant ones, actually, of a moment in UH history worth reflecting upon as the Warriors take up the considerable challenge of fifth-ranked Florida.
Botelho was a two-way performer on the 28-man UH team that went to Nebraska in 1955 as a 40-point underdog to the Cornhuskers. At the time, some thought it wouldn't be that close. Ten months earlier, much the same UH team had been shellacked 50-0 by a Cornhusker team on the way to the Orange Bowl in the 1954 finale at Honolulu Stadium.
"Everybody thought we were going there to get routed," Botelho recalls. Coach Hank Vasconcellos termed UH "a belittled team that was expected to provide a warmup." Above a headline in a Nebraska paper that proclaimed "Hawaii Plays Nebraska" was another one that billed the game as "Scrimmage Before Ohio State."
The morning of the game, Botelho recalls, Vasconcellos called the team together and held up the newspaper. Then, he "took out a $25,000 check" that represented the guarantee for UH. "He told us, 'This is what we came for, we can go home now,' " Botelho said.
"I think that loosened everybody up."
What followed was among UH's finest hours as the Cornhuskers did not get past midfield until well into the second half. Ultimately, UH left with the $25,000 check — and a 6-0 victory.
This isn't to say that if the current coach, Greg McMackin, merely waves around a facsimile of the $600,000 guarantee the Warriors are due to collect and some clippings, that UH will shock the world.
But as Botelho, now the Interscholastic League of Honolulu executive director, would tell them, "they've got a shot against Florida. You've always got a shot."
That is the legacy of '55.
Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8044.
