WHALE OF A HUSKY : USC Looks for Ways to Handle 300-Pound Dennis Brown

Attention Larry Smith: If you’re looking for a way to stop Dennis Brown, the University of Washington’s 300-pound-plus defensive tackle, when your USC Trojans face him Saturday at the Coliseum, try throwing a 6-foot, 180-pounder at him.

One with quick moves, lots of teeth and a fin .

It worked last spring in Florida, where where Brown, there to be photographed for a magazine’s All-American team layout, finally met his match on a fishing trip. He caught a hammerhead shark, but not without a furious struggle.

Brown was out in a boat with a fellow lineman, Lester Archambeau of Stanford.

“All of a sudden, we saw a shark,” Brown said. “It went down, my line just took off and, half an hour later, I had a shark. I tell you, it was tougher than any offensive lineman I’ve had to face.”

The shark’s 6-foot, 180-pound dimensions resemble those of many a quarterback pursued by Brown, but this was definitely not an opponent he’d consider sacking.

Instead, Brown threw the big fish back in.

“They told me that if I was to mount it, it would cost like $1,000,” he said. “I didn’t have that, being a poor, black kid from L.A.”

The need to escape that poor environment is the primary reason Brown wound up at Washington.

A three-year star at Long Beach Jordan High School, Brown had all the honors--prep All-American, all-state, all-city, all-conference, all-league--that go with the territory. As a senior, he collected 15 sacks.

But he also collected some bad friends along the way.

“I considered going to SC real strongly,” he said. “I talked to a lot of people, but mostly my grandmother. She was telling me, ‘If you stay around here, you probably won’t get as much accomplished as if you went away. Get away from some of the things that are going on in L.A.’ I wasn’t involved in gangs, but the crowd I hung around with . . . “

So off Brown went to the Great Northwest, where he was soon being compared with the great Husky linemen of the past--Reggie Rogers, Ron Holmes and Doug Martin.

“It’s good to be mentioned in the same sentence (with those guys),” Brown said. “It makes me feel good to be compared. But there’s always a lot of pressure on me, too.”

Especially when he didn’t always produce at the level of his renowned predecessors.

An ankle injury slowed Brown in his freshman season. In his second year, he started every game and put together impressive numbers. He led the club in sacks with nine, had 10 tackles in one game and finished the year with 19 tackles for losses, totaling 97 yards, both figures just short of team records--21 and 98--held by Holmes.

But last year, there were new problems--academic, family and, finally, physical. A knee injury severely hampered him at season’s end.

It was a miserable year overall for the Husky defense. The team was last in the Pac-10 in stopping the run. Stopping is probably not the best term to use in this case. Opponents averaged 201 yards rushing against Washington.

Brown came back unhurt and his team came back strong this season, beating Texas A&M; and Purdue in its first two games. But then Washington was nipped by Arizona, 20-17, and blown out last week by Colorado, 45-28. The Buffaloes totally buffaloed the Husky defense, rushing for 420 yards.

“We’ve definitely got to bounce back,” Brown said. “After all the flak we took last year, we were feeling pretty good the first two games (this season), because we were doing some good things. But the last two games, we’ve gone into last year’s mode.”

The Washington defense might not have had much of a day against Colorado, but Smith had nothing but rave reviews for Brown’s performance in the game film.

“I think (Brown) is comparable to the best we’ve seen,” Smith said. “He’s really got quick feet. He steps around and, a lot of times, nobody even touches him. He has the ability to come up out of a stance and avoid the run block or the pass block and be across the line of scrimmage just like that. He’s extremely effective. He’s big. He’s strong.

“I saw him take one of the Colorado linemen--Colorado’s got a pretty doggone good offensive line--he just took a guy and boom, just like a flea,” Smith said, flicking a finger like a man disposing of a piece of lint. “I was amazed. It was a tackle. It wasn’t a guard. He just flicked the guy off with one arm.”

Does that mean Brown can look forward to a long afternoon of double-teaming Saturday?

“I don’t think you have to double-team him,” Smith said. “But you sure have to be aware of where he is on the field.”

That shouldn’t be too hard, considering Brown stands 6-4 and weighs more than 300 pounds. He’s not saying just how much more but don’t be surprised if he weighs himself on a truck scale. He says he likes it that way.

“I play my best when I’m about 300 or a little bit over,” he said. “Last year, I was down around 280 and I got pushed around a lot with all those double teams.”

One of Brown’s close friends wouldn’t mind seeing a double team Saturday. USC guard Mark Tucker counts Brown as a good buddy, but not when they face each other across the line.

“I’ve never seen someone as big move as quick,” Tucker said.

When these two face one another, it’s a mind game. Brown likes to talk. Tucker likes to concentrate.

The conversation usually goes as follows:

Brown: “How are things goin’?”

Tucker: “I’m not going to talk. I’ve got to think about things.”

Brown: “Don’t you know the plays yet? What’s the big thing?”

Tucker just shakes his head and hopes Brown doesn’t finish his sentence looking back over his shoulder as he heads into the Trojan backfield.

“He’s real down to earth,” Tucker said of Brown. “He’s not arrogant at all.”

Tucker will not start the game because of an ankle injury, but is expected to play.

A big factor in Brown’s renewed enthusiasm this year is his improved family situation. The death of his grandmother several years ago was a devastating blow. His mother has also died, and a brother.

But he has renewed his once-dormant relationship with his father, filling a deep void. Jerome Brown, a Los Angeles roofing contractor, decided his relationship with Dennis is so important, he packed up and moved to Seattle to live with the Washington lineman.

“The pressure mounts up,” Brown said, “so it’s good to go home and sit down and talk to him. He puts it in perspective for me.”

Dennis Brown has big shoulders, but he’s carrying a lot on them--the pressure of being the key block in the bid to rebuild a once-mighty defense, the pressure of living up to press clippings, the pressure of living up to a tradition of great linemen, and the pressure of staying good enough to become a first-round draft choice of a National Football League team next spring, as many are predicting.

But when it all becomes overwhelming, Brown can just think back to last spring. No matter how tough the opponent, he knows it’ll never be tougher than the day he truly snatched victory from the jaws of, well, Jaws.