THE CONNECTION ON Greg Croshaw's cell phone was starting to break up somewhere north of Scipio. Like one of his All-America running backs, he seemed well within range, a clear-shot all the way, and suddenly he was gone. Nothing remained but dead air.
He was on the road, returning to Dixie College from a two-day football recruiting swing to Salt Lake City, hoping to stockpile a few more running backs, which has become fairly routine. Because in a part of the country where the forward pass is as revered as ice cream and Ronald Reagan, Croshaw stands out like a fever blister. Given the choice, he'd rather cram the football down your throat than lob it over your head, any day.Under Croshaw's coaching, Dixie has become among the supreme junior college running-back destinations in the nation. If you want to play pass-and-catch, you're better off going to one of the countless schools that live and die by the air. But if you want to play what former UTEP coach Bill Yung used to call "smash-mouth, snot-bubble football," you go to Dixie.
Croshaw noted when he came to St. George 15 years ago that many colleges were already taking their cue from BYU, filling the air with footballs. You didn't need a college degree to be a coach, you needed an FAA license. Since then, little has changed. Ricks, Snow and Weber State wouldn't know a running play if it were tattooed on their foreheads. Certain coaches at Utah and Utah State have served mostly as air traffic controllers. And despite the recent success with the running game at BYU, the Cougars are still among the most pass-oriented teams in America.
Seeing the crowds line up to recruit quarterbacks and receivers, Croshaw decided to do something novel: run the football. Like buying a tube of Brylcreem, it seemed a quaint, perfunctory gesture. But before long, the Rebels were winning and opponents were having trouble handling them.
"It's interesting, because Snow, Ricks and most of the other people in the league throw 40, 50 times a game," said Croshaw. "We figured our way to do it would be to run, and we've been quite successful."
Dixie has become a household name to any running back headed to junior college. The Rebels had the nation's No. 1 junior college rusher, Rodrick Johnson (2,338), this season. The second-place rusher was a whopping 857 yards behind. Johnson was named NJCAA Player of the Year - the third Dixie player in the last seven years be so honored.
Johnson isn't the first Dixie running back to draw national attention. Croshaw's offensive attack has produced a truckload of All-America running backs, including Marcus Brown, Wilson Kavaka, Thor Christensen, Kalin Hall, Fine Unga, Zed Robinson, Archie Amerson, Corey Dillon, Kelvin Minefee and Johnson. Two years ago, the star player was Amerson, who went on to Northern Arizona, led the nation in rushing this year and was named the winner of the 1996 Walter Payton Award as the top Division I-AA player of the year. Dillon, who played at Washington this season, carried for 222 yards in a single quarter and was named first team all-Pac 10. Kavaka and Hall went on to play in the same backfield for the CFL's Las Vegas Posse. Minefee broke O.J. Simpson's all-college record for touchdowns in a season.
Croshaw's ground-based approach hasn't just piled up numbers. Dixie finished the season ranked third in the nation for the sixth time. His teams have finished second once and in the top 15 thirteen times. He has a 129-38-1 record and is 10-2 record in bowls.
Curiously, several of the aforementioned rushing stars had only one year to perform at tailback. They began playing fullback, linebacker or strong safety before moving to tailback for their sophomore season. Johnson was a blocking fullback for Dillon a year ago; Minefee blocked for Unga before moving to tailback. All of which is part of Croshaw's master plan.
"I think it teaches them the system. If I could do it every year, I would," said Croshaw. "It makes them appreciate what the fullback is going through."
Croshaw began with backs from Nevada and Utah and now has a nationwide recruiting base. This year he's looking at players from Flordia, New Jersey and Washington. Running backs from coast to coast are being told by their coaches to get out a Rand-McNally and look up St. George. Even BYU's promising freshman Ronney Jenkins considered attending. While Jenkins was being recruited by BYU, UCLA, Nebrasca, USC, Colorado and Washington, his high school coach was inquiring if Dixie would have Jenkins if he didn't make it with a major college.
So the next time you see a junior college transfer making noise as a major college running back, check out his credentials. Odds are good he played at Dixie first. If his idea of fun is making like an all-terrain vehicle, he probably didn't attend some low-impact, high-altitude passing school. He went to the one place where nobody has to ask: "Where's the beef?"