Troy Davis

Larry Chisolm, the first black district attorney in Chatham County, Ga., was sitting in his modern, sixth-floor office, tolerating an interview but declining to speak about the problem that he may have to address soon -- the one that could come to define and complicate the rest of his young political career. It is a problem he inherited. The problem of death row inmate Troy Davis.

A federal appeals court gave a late reprieve to a man set to be executed Monday for the 1989 killing of an off-duty police officer in a case in which several witnesses have changed their accounts of the crime. Troy Davis, 40, was scheduled to die for the murder of Savannah Police Officer Mark MacPhail. But the three-judge panel of the U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals stayed the execution and ordered his attorneys to prove whether he can meet "stringent requirements" to press his appeal.

What: "First Time," part of "Sports Theater With Shaquille O'Neal" series Where: Nickelodeon When: Saturday, 9 p.m. (Repeats Tuesday, 7 p.m., and Oct. 19, 8 p.m.) Need a lift? This one-hour dramatic special should do it. It's a fictional story about a 13-year-old African American youngster, Troy Davis, who lives in Brooklyn near Ebbets Field in 1947 and dreams of playing shortstop for the Dodgers. His dream is shattered when he learns his skin is the wrong color.

Troy Davis gave a sellout homecoming crowd of 44,941 plenty to cheer about Saturday as he ran for 378 yards--the third-best rushing mark in major-college history--and four touchdowns to lead Iowa State past Missouri, 45-31. Davis, a 5-foot-8, 190-pound junior, carried 41 times and scored the go-ahead touchdown on a 40-yard run in the fourth quarter. He also scored on runs of one, 38 and 30 yards as Iowa State (2-2 overall) won its Big 12 opener.

Iowa State's Troy Davis became only the fifth player in Division I-A to rush for 2,000 yards, but Brock Olivo had a bigger day and Missouri defeated the Cyclones, 45-31, Saturday at Columbia, Mo. Davis had 180 yards in 24 carries to finish with 2,010 and join Barry Sanders, Marcus Allen, Mike Rozier and Rashaan Salaam--all Heisman Trophy winners--in the 2,000-yard club. Both teams finish the season 3-8 overall and 6-1 in the Big Eight.

Thank you, Allan Malamud [Dec. 5], for reconfirming my belief that the Heisman Trophy is the worst award in all of sports. My reasons: 1. If your colleagues vote as you have, Troy Davis will be the first 2,000-yard rusher in college football history not to receive the trophy, even though he ran behind, in your words, "a less-than-stellar line." 2. I must disagree that a lot of other quarterbacks would have Danny Wuerffel's statistics. Steve Spurrier does have a pass-happy system, but, come on, somebody has to throw the ball and no one has done it better than Wuerffel.

Think about 2,000 yards. That's 20 football fields, one sitting next to the other. You start running from the end zone of the first one and head for the end zone of the last one. It's a daunting trip built on handoff after handoff, runs off tackle and guard, trap plays up the middle. And when it's over, waiting at the last yard, there is the Heisman Trophy, testimony that in that season, running the equivalent of 20 football fields made you the best college football player in America.