IT WAS A real Mickey Mouse press conference. For the first time in his career, LaVell Edwards was escorted to the podium by Daisy Duck. Florida State Coach Bobby Bowden was escorted by Minnie Mouse, the first lady of Disneyland.
Whether that means anything about the pecking order heading into the second annual Disneyland Pigskin Classic remains to be seen.Edwards' BYU Cougars and Bowden's Seminoles meet at 7 p.m. MDT tonight in Anaheim Stadium, just down the street from the Magic Kingdom. Go to the Matterhorn and turn south.
With Disneyland being the sponsor of this particular preseason bowl game, the pregame festivities have been, well, animated. There was a fashion show at the Disneyland Hotel, an official golf tournament, a kickoff luncheon, also at the Disneyland Hotel, and a tailgate bash last night in the parking lot just outside the gate to Disneyland (entertainment, appearances by your favorite players, a rumor that Burt Reynolds, a Florida State alum, might appear, speeches, bands . . . all for only $55 a person).
There is even an official Disneyland Pigskin Classic song. It was sung and performed by the Disneyland cheerleaders and marching band at Wednesday's press conference, held just across the drawbridge from Sleeping Beauty's Castle. The chorus goes, It's the Disneyland Pigskin Classic, An All-American Game." Sing it the way Annette would have sung it.
Jack Lindquist, the president of Disneyland as well as the president of the Orange County Sports Association, officially greeted BYU and Florida State to this happy place called Disneyland. He said tonight's game will cap a "weeklong celebration of football frenzy."
Saying it in front of a princess' castle and just across the way from Carefree Corner at the end of Main Street USA, Lindquist's speech, enthusiastic though it was, didn't exactly give off a Win One For the Gipper type of a mood.
Still, the Disneyland people are all smiles because 1) The game won't be played at Disneyland, 2) Their park will get plenty of name recognition on tonight's nationwide TV telecast (instead of the winning quarterback walking off the field and saying he's going to Disneyland, both quarterbacks, it will be noted, went to Disneyland before the game), and 3) There is a lot of interest across the country in Florida State vs. BYU, no matter who's sponsoring the game or where they're playing it.
Top ranked Florida State brings virtually all of its 1990 team back to assume the pole position in the race for the national championship while BYU brings virtually none of its 1990 team with the one notable and glaring exception of Heisman Trophy winning quarterback Ty Detmer.
That makes Florida State and Detmer a pair of prime targets coming into the 1991 season. Shoot either one of them down and you've got something to talk about. As Bowden said at the press conference, "Sure, we're a target, we're No. 1." And of Detmer he said, "Naturally, he's (Detmer) going to be a target too. He's wearing the hat. That makes him more inviting - not that that means you can do anything about it."
Therein lies the intrigue of Disneyland Pigskin Classic II - how will the Seminoles and how will Detmer react now that they're marked men? "Let's tee it up and find out," Edwards, his ties still close to the golf season, said Wednesday. The BYU coach said he has tried to avoid treating this opener like a bowl game even if the atmosphere and activities are more like New Year's Day than Labor Day.
"But we have so many kids who have never traveled before, we could be going to Laramie and they'd think it was a bowl game," he said.
As for Bowden's team, the Florida State coach said the Seminoles are going to have to treat every game this season like a bowl game - at least as long as they're ranked No. 1 and everyone's getting ready for them like Schwarzkopf and Cheney got ready for Hussein.
"I think we've got a football team that's got national championship potential," Bowden said. "But so do a lot of the teams we play."
You've got to hand it to the Disney people. They know an adventure when they see one. Tonight. Live from Anaheim Stadium: The Heisman Trophy Winner and His Young Friends versus The Best Team in America. When the game's over, maybe they'll turn it into a ride.