The Mad, Mad Punter Of Louisville

"Coach," said Marcus calmly, "they've been watching you talk to me. They see you pointing down there. I think I'd better kick it to the left."

"Now listen, Marcus, just—" Corso changed his mind. "Please, just go in and kick the damn ball."

Marcus punted—to the left—48 yards to the Tulsa 11. The game ended shortly afterward, Louisville a 14-8 winner. Corso said he was not surprised. "Marcus was ready," he said. "I had him primed."

The next Saturday Marcus kicked three field goals against Marshall. Louisville won 16-14.

About the hair, Corso can relax a little. It is shorter now and the beard is gone. "The mother of a girl I date had told me many times that she could cut hair," says Marcus. "I said mine was getting raggedy at the ends. It was bothering me, because of trying to get it all inside the helmet. So I said, 'How about if you just trim the ends?' She started cutting. When I got up I almost fell through the floor. She had cut off two inches. The beard and mustache I shaved off myself. Since then I'm growing a goatee and another mustache."

So Corso is delighted with Marcus and can hardly wait for the proper moment to spring the new play he has devised. The play calls for Marcus to enter the lineup as a flankerback. When the huddle breaks, Marcus careens toward the sideline, doing cartwheels and flips. And while the unsuspecting rival players and everybody else watches what appears to be a hippie football player gone mad, the Louisville quarterback quickly takes the ball and....