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OSU’s Rolle, other players from Florida ready for ’Canes

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By Tom Archdeacon, Staff Writer 9:49 PM Saturday, September 4, 2010

COLUMBUS — Standing there in his Ohio State uniform — after a night of plenty of sweat, highlight reel effort and convincing victory — he remembered back to just before he became a Buckeye.

Back to when his friends called him Mr. Hurricane. “I loved the Miami Hurricanes,” Brian Rolle, the highly-touted OSU linebacker and captain from Immokalee, Fla., was saying after returning an interception 30 yards for a score in OSU’s 45-7 season-opening victory over Marshall in steamy Ohio Stadium, Thursday, Sept. 2.

“Miami was the team I liked growing up ... and it was the only place I wanted to go,” he said. “I didn’t even think about being recruited. I just said, ‘I’m going to Miami.’

“In high school, I wore my Miami stuff every day. My friend Richardson always called me Mr. Hurricane because that’s all I wore.

“I went to a lot of their games — I mean a lot — and those guys had swagger. You’d see guys out there like Antrell Rolle, Maurice Sikes, Sean Taylor ... and when somebody would make a big play, they were always celebrating, always having fun. That’s what I like about them. And if you watched me in high school, I was a guy who liked to bounce around and have fun.”

But by November of his senior year, Miami still hadn’t offered him a scholarship and he said he was sad: “I talked to my high school coach about it ... and it was like a blessing from God because I was looked at by other schools.”

And once he accepted Ohio State’s invitation to come to its Michigan game, he said he was hooked: “I called my mother that night and said, ‘I’m gonna be a Buckeye.’ ... And today I wouldn’t change a thing.”

Then, with a moment’s reflection on this Saturday’s game — when No. 13 Miami comes in to play the No. 2 Bucks — he had to smile: “This is why I tell everybody, ‘This one is personal for me.’ ”

In a game drawing the attention of the college football world — a game with a festering back story and plenty of current familiarity — Miami versus OSU is “personal” for lots of folks.

Eight seasons ago, OSU and Miami met in the Fiesta Bowl’s national title game. The Canes were the defending national champs, were riding a 34-game winning streak and had a roster full of future pros. Ohio State, though unbeaten, was an 111/2-point underdog.

In what ended up one of the greatest championship games in history, OSU edged Miami, 31-24, in double overtime. The Hurricanes appeared to have the game won at the end of the first OT when Miami’s Glenn Sharpe batted away Bucks’ pass on fourth-and-one.

Although the side judge ruled the ball incomplete, another official eventually tossed a pass interference flag. OSU tied the game, went on to win and, at least in South Florida, the game is forever remembered for its overtime controversy.

While OSU quarterback Terrelle Pryor thought current Miami players wouldn’t be caught up in the past, Rolle — who remembers watching the game with his family and being “mad” — shook his head: “When I go back home, people say, ‘We can’t wait to that game. We’re gonna get you back.”

OSU center Mike Brewster from Orlando agreed: “They’re going to be looking at it as payback for ’02.”

In fact — after Miami’s 45-0 victory over Florida A&M in its season opener Thursday — a couple of Hurricane players told reporters how former Canes had returned to campus over the summer and singled out this game as the one where a Miami victory could help right a past wrong.

All that adds to the build-up, said Bucks’ senior cornerback and captain Chimdi Ckekwa from Clermont, Fla. He said with eight Florida players on the Bucks’ roster, the storied history of both programs and especially the memories of the last time the two teams met in Arizona, that makes this the kind of stage “every player dreams about.”

Rolle echoed those thoughts: “It’s a game most teams don’t get to play anymore. Two teams steeped in tradition. Two teams that have won many national championships and have a lot of guys in the NFL. ... It will be a lot of fun.

“Playing against USC last year was a lot like this. Those guys have swagger. That was a physical, fast game. We know what it’s like to play against teams like them.

“I watched the (ESPN) documentary on Miami. They invented swagger — so they say. They’ll come in and talk trash and push. A lot of teams come in here and do it. Marshall did it today. ... But you just can’t let ’em get in your head. ... And if our defense comes out with some swagger we have and we play physical, I feel it will be no contest.”

Brewster doesn’t go that far: “Two teams with a lot of veterans, a lot of starts under guys’ belts, it should be a dog fight. You have to bring it every play and if you don’t, you’d better get out of the way.”

Unlike Rolle and Chekwa — neither of whom got offers from the Hurricanes — Brewster was recruited hard by Miami: “They offered me when I was a sophomore in high school or something like that ... but it just wasn’t the place for me.

“I just had very good relationships with the guys who came in (here) like Terrelle and J.B. (Shugarts) and Mike (Adams). That was probably the big thing. ... And, obviously, the best decision I ever made was to come here.”

So he doesn’t like palm trees and sun-tanned girls? Brewster started laughing: “Don’t get me wrong. I’ve had a nice stay up here. It’s been a nice four-year vacation. ... (But) I’m moving back to Florida when I’m done.”

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