Donahue Terry

How fitting that UCLA and Kansas will finish their seasons today in the Aloha Bowl. Because it's aloha, or fond farewell, to UCLA Coach Terry Donahue, who'll be retiring after today, leaving the job he has held for 20 years to become an analyst for CBS on college-football telecasts. And it's aloha to Kansas Coach Glen Mason, who'll be quitting after today, leaving the job he has held for eight years to become coach at Georgia.

How fitting that UCLA and Kansas will finish their seasons today in the Aloha Bowl. Because it's aloha, or fond farewell, to UCLA Coach Terry Donahue, who'll be retiring after today, leaving the job he has held for 20 years to become an analyst for CBS on college-football telecasts. And it's aloha to Kansas Coach Glen Mason, who'll be quitting after today, leaving the job he has held for eight years to become coach at Georgia.

Ted Tollner took USC to a Rose Bowl with a third-string quarterback. Larry Smith was perhaps a Rodney Peete interception away from a national championship. John Robinson snapped a 12-year winless streak against Notre Dame. Of course, when these coaches hit the inevitable "ebb" that is the flow of the ultra-competitive Pac 10, they got dumped by ultra-impatient USC administrators (that's you, Mike "I Just Want Good Coaching" Garrett). Now, for perhaps the first time since the '50s, USC really does have a bad coach.

Terry Donahue turned down an offer by Jerry Jones to become the coach of the Dallas Cowboys, several sources have said, and money appears to be at the root of the problem. Negotiations were broken off by Donahue once the subject of money came up. One source said Jones offered Donahue about $500,000 a year, half what Donahue thought the job would pay. Another source said Donahue at no time mentioned money.

Nobody could be absolutely certain what Terry Donahue was going to say. Not UCLA Chancellor Charles Young, seated to the left of his football coach in the press room at the J.D. Morgan Center on Monday afternoon, waiting to see if Donahue would really follow through on his decision to resign after 20 years on the job to accept a position with CBS as a college football analyst.

Each college football coach does this thing during the week before every game, where he meets with the press to see how many important bits of information, interesting opinions and sparkling insights he can withhold.

It's a good time to be USC's quarterback, as Rodney Peete, a former USC quarterback, found out. And it's not a bad time to be Peete, either. Peete, now a regular on FSN's "Best Damn Sports Show Period," hung out with Matt Leinart on campus last Friday. They were shooting a segment that will be a part of tonight's "Best Damn Sports Show Period" episode. It will be televised on FSN West at 9 and 11:30.

There will be a semblance of the USC-UCLA rivalry tonight when the Trojans meet Arizona State at Sun Devil Stadium. Consider: --John Cooper, ASU's new coach, was an assistant at UCLA under Tommy Prothro in 1965 and 1966. --A young defensive tackle, Terry Donahue, was on the team at the time. --Cooper said that Donahue, UCLA's coach, helped him get the Arizona State job after turning it down himself. --Cooper said that he stresses fundamentals that are identical to Prothro's techniques.

In a precedent-setting decision with broad ramifications, a state appeals court ruled Wednesday that the constitutionally protected religious rights of a Downey couple would be violated if they were compelled to rent an apartment to an unmarried couple. The appeals court said that, while landlords John and Agnes Donahue had violated state discrimination laws, they were entitled to an exemption because of their "sincerely held religious belief that fornication and its facilitation are sins."