Tigers must come back down to earth

DALLAS -- Football coaches always talk about trying to keep an even keel, never getting too high or too low. Missouri coach Gary Pinkel and Baylor coach Kevin Steele are both facing that challenge this week, albeit on different ends of the spectrum.

Pinkel's Tigers must come down from the thrill of a 33-20 victory over Big Ten champion Illinois. Steele's Bears are trying to recover from the agony of a 70-22 loss to Cal that wasn't even that close.

Had the Mizzou game been on campus instead of in St. Louis, the goalposts surely would've come down. Instead, the outpouring of enthusiasm has been through calls, e-mails and more.

"It's a bit overwhelming, kind of strange," said Pinkel, whose team went 4-7 last season, his first on campus. "Missouri fans are awesome, one of the reasons I came here. But it's only one game. That's all. One game.

"We've got a long season and we're nowhere near where we need to be to compete in this league."

Pinkel had a laundry list of problems: Two fumbles in critical situations, not enough physical play at times and big plays allowed on defense. He called the kicking game "embarrassing at some moments."

Part of that is surely coachspeak aimed at keeping players from getting big heads. Just because their next three foes are Ball State, Bowling Green and Troy State, the Tigers will be in trouble if they start thinking about being 4-0 when they play Oklahoma.

"It's absurd to think we're going to be overconfident," said Pinkel, who certainly remembers losing 20-13 to Bowling Green at home in last season's opener. "To even talk about it is ridiculous. We're not even close to good enough to consider being that."

Baylor's problem is quite the opposite.

The Bears have won just 10 games since 1997 and have lost 29 straight league games. Any hope that things would be different this fall vanished when they trailed 7-0 just 20 seconds into the opener, then 35-0 before the first quarter ended.

It's Steele's job to lift their spirits. And he'll try, as soon as he lifts his own.

During Monday's conference call with reporters, Steele compared getting over the Cal debacle to dealing with a death in the family.

"You've got to get up and keep fighting," said Steele, who also said he was feeling frustrated, embarrassed, angry and "very sick of it."

"We're almost a nightmare," said Steele, 6-28 since taking over in 1999.

He said it's been an emotional time since the final gun sounded Saturday. At a film session Sunday, "the leadership of this team stepped forth like no other time since we've been here," he said.

"We've got good kids, good players, but dadgumit we've got to win," Steele said. "That's the only thing that's going to get us to move forward."

HE CAN RELATE: Iowa State coach Dan McCarney has been in the same situation as Pinkel and Steele.

The Cyclones were perennial also-rans who were riding a 13-game winless skid when he started in 1995. After winning just six games his first three years, they've steadily improved the last four, winning nine games in 2000 and seven last season.

He recalls a 27-9 victory over rival Iowa, on the road in 1998, as a turning point. It showed that ISU could put things together, even though it took two more seasons to do it consistently.

He said Missouri may one day look back at the Illinois game with the same reverence.

"You start chipping away at things people don't think you can do," McCarney said. "The players see a reward for all their hard work and it starts paying off."

As for getting past a whipping like Baylor received, McCarney's suggestion came just shy of recommending burning the game film.

"The most important thing," he said, "is putting that thing behind you just as fast as you can."

QUOTEBOX: "I'm going to find out where the switch is. I'll let you know if I'm planning on shutting them off." -- Kansas coach Mark Mangino, whose Jayhawks play Saturday at UNLV's Sam Boyd Stadium, where a power outage forced last Saturday's game to be called midway through the fourth quarter.

OUT PATTERNS: The starting quarterback job is up for grabs at Kansas State, Texas A&M and Baylor. While no changes have been made yet, and might not be this weekend, the big switch could come by the time league play gets rolling in October...

Given the chance to play 12 games this season, several league teams filled in the extra game with a Division I-AA foe. On Saturday, Oklahoma State plays Northern Iowa, Baylor plays Samford and Iowa State plays Tennessee Tech -- all at home...

Two of the most high-profile programs in college football meet Saturday when Oklahoma plays Alabama. "When you look at the tradition of both schools, it's hard to believe we've only played twice," OU coach Bob Stoops said. Alabama won 17-0 in the 1963 Orange Bowl and they tied at 24 in the 1969 Bluebonnet Bowl...

High praise from Texas coach Mack Brown: "Chris Simms played as well as I've ever seen him. He didn't throw a bad pass all game."...

Colorado coach Gary Barnett said players expected to struggle excelled and those expected to excel struggled in the Buffs' opening loss...

Last week, Nebraska coach Frank Solich said team's make their most progress from the first game to the second. So, coach, how did the Cornhuskers do? "I thought we one-on-one pass-protected better," he said. "The thing we didn't do, though, was take care of the ball nearly as well. We kind of took a step back, to a degree. But I thought technically we did a better job."