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Show Thursday quarterback SUSC vs. Adams State CEDAR CITY - An unprecedented occasion will be the goal of the Southern Utah State College football team this week when it travels to Alamosa, Colorado. The Thunderbirds have never won a football game in Alamosa, but their hoxs are high lor a new experience Saturday in a noon game against Adams State College. The contest will be broadcast live by Radio KSUI5 (590). "We' vi' played some Southern Colorado), the T-Birds could earn a piece of the title. If the 'Birds get any portion of the championship, and how much of a share depends on the other games. SUSC and Mesa are tied lor second place with 5-2 records. Highlands leads the league with a 6-1 mark. A Highlands victory Saturday leaves Mesa and the T-Birds to light for second place. If Highlands loses, then SUSC and the Mavericks could share the title glory with the Cowboys from New Mexico. "Our job is very simple," Bishop points out. "All we have to do is win." To win, Southern Utah will have to stop a strong Adams State rushing game led by junior Sam Armijo. who has been one of the R MAC'S top rushers all season. He averages just under 100 yards per game. Southern Utah will also have to contend with awfully good games in Alamosa, but we have never won there," Jack Bishop, SUSC coach explains. "A win this week could mean at least a share of the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference title; that's something else that we have never enjoyed." SUSC will take a 5-2 conference record into the game. Depending on what happens at Grand Junction, Colorado (where title contender NM Highlands hosts three of the league's top tacklers linebacker Phil DeLorenzo (14.7 tackles per game), tackle Calvin Mitchell (13.0), and defensive back Marty Heaton (11.0) "Adams State has a good defensive unit, but they have struggled with an on-again-off-again offense," Bishop explains. ex-plains. "They are particularly par-ticularly effective against the pass. We need to move the ball against them, if we expect ex-pect to win over there." Beaver vs. Kanab Playing the Kanab Cowboys this year in football has been about as much fun for opposing schools as meeting the Sioux was for that old cowboy and general, Mr. Custer. Kanab has been extremely ex-tremely tough this season and has steamrolled over most of their opposition. "We expect a tough game against Kanab," said Beaver coach Al Marshall. "They've beaten us twice this year." Though the Cowboys have downed the Beavers twice, in a Utah State championship contest anything can and often does happen. "They're basically a running team," explained ex-plained Marshall, discussing the Cowboys. "They do a super job." Though Kanab likes to run. they have had a well-balanced well-balanced a 1 1 ac k throughout the season and can throw the ball when they need to. The Beavers will be concentrating con-centrating on stopping the Cowboy running attack come Saturday. They have worked hard on defending against the run in their practice sessions this week. . The Beavers, in turn, will also concentrate on establishing an effective running and ball control game. To win they will need to play a very aggressive defense, similar to the way they played defensively against Park City, and force Kanab mistakes. Also Beaver will have to avoid mistakes of fensively and not give up the big play on defense to stay competitive. If they can force mistakes and capitalize on them, and then establish an effective ef-fective ball control game, Beaver could take home a state championship. On the other hand, Kanab is very capable and will be wanting badly to shoot down the Beavers. |