Turnarounds in Football

It can't accurately be said -- yet -- that this weekend's football results for San Diego State and the San Diego Chargers represent turnarounds, but both teams appear to be just entering the long curve and starting to rotate the steering wheel. For the Aztecs, it's a good thing. Not so for the Bolts.

SDSU's 27-24 comeback victory over Wyoming was the best Aztecs game at Qualcomm Stadium in about 11 years, probably since that scintillating 28-24 conquest of an undefeated and ranked Cowboys team in 1996, which I've listed as one of the programs Top 10 all-time wins.

State began the season with a small, young and confused defense that couldn't stop anyone. There were some baby steps of improvement, but in the past few weeks, it's become apparent that this unit can stop most of the teams in the Mountain West Conference. That's light years ahead of where it was at the beginning of the season.

The offense, unfortunately, has not improved at all. In fact, it has probably regressed somewhat. The offensive line was expected to be a weak point, and it remains so: unable to generate a running game and barely unable to protect QB Kevin O'Connell. If the senior signal-caller didn't have some of the best legs in college football, he'd be dead. O'Connell, who was pretty good at the beginning of the season, missed on 12 straight passes before offensive coordinator Del Miller had his troops go into a no-huddle attack. That played right to O'Connell's leadership strengths and forced him into a passing rhythm. Look for more of that in the week ahead.

Cautious optimism? Of the people who played key roles in the win, CB Vonnie Holmes, LB Russell Allen and DE Siaosi Fifita are juniors; WR Roberto Wallace, LB Luke Laologi, CB Aaron Moore and DE Jonathan Soto are sophomores; and S Martrell Fantroy, RB Brandon Sullivan, LB Andrew Preston, C Trask Iosefa and WR Vincent Brown -- who caught the winning TD -- are freshmen. There's a lot of good college football to come at The Q in future seasons.

Not so sure about whether pro football will be similarly good.

The Chargers not only got blown out in a 35-17 embarrassment at what had been a 2-5 Minnesota squad, but their defense got blown off the ball. Rookie RB Adrian Peterson did not gain 296 yards rushing all by himself. The Vikings offensive line physically dominated the Chargers front seven in a manner rarely seen in the NFL, let alone against the traditionally stingy Bolts.

This, even with the Vikings offering very little in the way of a passing threat behind QB Brooks Bollinger. In it's first seven games, the Vikes had scored more than 17 points just twice.

The Chargers were just as weak on offense. Against a defense that had distinguished itself against the run, but was vulnerable to the pass, QB Philip Rivers was 19-42 throwing for just 197 yards. RB LaDainian Tomlinson gained 2.5 yards per rush.

The Chargers were outscored 28-3 in the final half-hour. Ugly.

Waving goodbye to a three-game winning streak against bad teams, the Chargers are now 4-4 and face a slate that includes Indianapolis, at Jacksonville, Baltimore, at Kansas City where they rarely play well, at Tennessee and home against improved Detroit. They're tied in the standings with Kansas City, which will own the tiebreaker if they beat the Chargers in their rematch.

Suddenly, where once the only important thing for the Chargers was to make the Super Bowl, the chances of just making the playoffs are beginning to dim.

For both the Aztecs and the Chargers, the curve leading to the turnaround -- both good and bad -- is just beginning. Both could change course quickly: the Aztecs will be in trouble if O'Connell can't get back to his early-season accuracy and if an improved defensive line has trouble with large blockers of TCU or BYU, of if the Las Vegas curse rears its head for a third time; the Chargers if the play of the lines improve and if coach Norv Turner can show some guts and pull Rivers in favor of Billy Volek when the offense stalls.

Anyway, this is why the play the games on the field instead of on paper, I suppose. Teams, and opponents, are always in a state of flux, moving up and down. Turnarounds are always much closer than we think.