CINCINNATI (AP) -Ten months ago, receiver Mardy Gilyard had a tough decision.
He had emerged as one of the Big East’s top playmakers in 2008, helping Cincinnati win its first league title during his junior season. Should he stay for one more year or head off to the NFL?
His family in Florida left it up to him.
“I really, really thought about it extremely hard,” Gilyard said. “My mom said, ‘I want to see you get as much school as you can.’ My dad was like, ‘It’s your decision, son. I know the kind of person you are. You want to take care of us, but we’ll be all right. Another year is not going to hurt.”’
Gilyard looked at the other receivers that would be available in the draft last April and decided he’d be better off returning for one more year and honing his skills. He leads the Big East in most receiving categories and ranks 13th nationally in yards receiving per game.
There have been no second thoughts about the decision to stay. Instead, Gilyard has relished everything about his senior season, with the Bearcats staying in contention for another league title heading into December.
“I’ve been talking with the guys all season, saying, ‘Dang, what are we going to do when we hit that last game?”’ Gilyard said. “We thought we’d never leave. We thought that day would never come. Now, it’s here. I’m down about it.
“I’m relishing every millisecond to second to hour to day. I’m hoping it can drag on as long as it can. I’m loving playing college football. That’s the whole reason I came back.”
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LANGUAGE ARTS: West Virginia coach Bill Stewart has probably used up most of his vocabulary by now in pregame pep talks. However, he saves some choice words when playing Pittsburgh in the Backyard Brawl.
“I say some things at some games probably more colorful than I do at other games. This is going to be one of those colorful games,” Stewart said. “What you have to do is try to challenge them and be yourself. Don’t be fake and something that you aren’t. Tell them what they need to do, tell them how to do it and then go tell them that you have their back and that they have your full support. If you do that, the team will play for you.”
Stewart will get some motivational help on Thursday night when his seniors address the team, a tradition on the night before the last home game of the season. West Virginia meets No. 8 Pittsburgh on Friday night in Morgantown, W.Va.
“I don’t know how I’m going to hold up Thursday night when our seniors talk,” he said. “When they look at you, and tears are coming down their faces, and they say ‘thank you’ for recruiting me and giving me a shot when no one else did – it’s tough.”
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MARRONE THE MAGICIAN: Since taking over at Syracuse 11 months ago, head coach Doug Marrone has had 20 scholarship players leave the team and he’s lost 10 others to season-ending injuries.
That’s meant a lot of juggling, but one move Marrone made before the season is paying big dividends – switching junior Doug Hogue from tailback to linebacker.
“One of the things we wanted to do at linebacker was create more speed,” Marrone said. “We knew we had a lot of competition at the running back position and we looked at Doug as someone who was recruited as a linebacker. I don’t know what happened last year, I wasn’t here, but obviously when we took Doug and put him on the defensive side of the ball, it’s everything that we thought.”
And then some.
Hogue had a school-record 6.5 tackles for loss on Saturday in Syracuse’s 31-13 upset of then-No. 25 Rutgers, including 3.5 sacks. He also forced a fumble to earn national defensive player of the week honors.
Hogue ranks 15th nationally and second in the Big East in sacks per game (.86) and is tied for 15th in the country and tops in the conference with 1.45 tackles for loss per game.
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LEARNING FROM THE BEST: Connecticut football coach Randy Edsall says one of the perks of working at UConn is having the opportunity to learn from some of the best coaches in the country, including Hall of Fame basketball coaches Jim Calhoun and Geno Auriemma.
“I’m just proud to be associated with those people, because when you watch their games and you watch them coach, you don’t have to ask them questions,” Edsall said. “You can just watch them.”
Edsall said by just observing, he’s learned a lot about handling people and different situations.
“Watching Geno, I’ve been able to pick up some things that he’s done,” he said.
Then with a smile, he added, “Watching Jim, I’ve picked up some new words in my vocabulary.”
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WATCHING B.J.: South Florida’s B.J. Daniels became the first player in Big East history to pass for more than 300 yards and also run for 100-plus in the same game when he threw for 304 and ran for 141 more in last week’s 34-22 win over Louisville. The performance was good enough for Daniels to be selected as the Big East’s Offensive Player of the Week.
he red-shirt freshman said: “OK.”
Just OK?
“Yeah,” he added, laughing.
Grothe, who’s been helping Daniels during the transition, gives his replacement higher marks.
“He’s doing better than a lot of people expected – progressing, learning from his mistakes. He’s going to be really good in the future,” said Grothe.
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LAST HURRAH: Trent Guy never expected his career at Louisville to end with a whimper.
The senior wide receiver/kick returner is one of four Cardinals left over from the 2006 Big East championship team that won the Orange Bowl. Guy admits standing on the field after Louisville knocked off Wake Forest to finish a 12-1 season he never thought that would be the only bowl appearance of his career.
“I thought we were just getting started,” Guy said.
But coach Bobby Petrino left abruptly for the NFL a few days later, and replacement Steve Kragthorpe has been unable to duplicate Petrino’s success.
Louisville is just 15-20 over the last three years and are assured of their second straight losing season. Still, Guy believes Kragthorpe should be retained.
“Coach K is a great man,” Guy said. “People may not know that outside of this program, but I’ve been with him for three years now. He doesn’t only want you to succeed on the football field but on life as a man.”
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AP Sports Writers John Kekis in Syracuse, NY, Fred Goodall in Tampa, Fla., Will Graves in Louisville, Ky., John Raby in Morgantown, WV, and Associated Press writer Pat Eaton-Robb in Storrs, Conn., contributed to this report.
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