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Friday, November 27, 1998
Dad's support helps Jackson get through desert
storms
By Dave Caldwell
The Dallas Morning News
(KRT)
DALLAS - He always calls. Late. He always wants to talk football
with his father. Win or lose.
Sometimes, Courtney Jackson's Saturday night conversations
with his father Bobby are happy and upbeat. Just as often this
fall, the telephone conversations have been difficult, filled
with painful self-examination. Always during the tough calls,
Bobby Jackson poses a question.
"I ask him all the time, 'Is it worth it? Is it worth
this hurting, and that hurting? Is it worth it all?' And he always
says to me, 'Yeah. It's worth it,' " Bobby Jackson said.
Courtney Jackson, who played at DeSoto High School, is a junior
cornerback at Arizona State. With the possible exception of LSU,
there has been no more disappointing major-college team in the
nation this year than the Sun Devils. And you won't offend Jackson
by saying that.
Jackson is a starter on a team that started the season ranked
No. 8 and had the quite realistic goal of playing in its own home
stadium for the national championship Jan. 4. ASU lost its first
two games, fell out of the Top 25, lost two more, won three, lost
another.
Arizona State will take a 5-5 record into its regular-season
finale Friday against arch-rival Arizona. The Sun Devils have
to win the game to go to a bowl, and it won't be a good one. Courtney
Jackson is still unfailingly optimistic - sunny even.
"We're going to attack this game as if it's a national
championship game," he said.
It is important, anyway. Arizona State does have something
to play for beyond the regular season, and the Arizona game is
always the biggest on the schedule.
But Courtney Jackson also acknowledges that this season has
not been anything like what he thought it would be. He is dealing
with a bummer, and he said he has a tendency to take losses hard.
Part of his success as a football player is his passion.
"I take more blame than I necessarily cause," he
said.
"He wants to win so badly," Bobby Jackson said, "that
I think he tries to do more than he's supposed to do."
Through 10 games, he leads the team with three interceptions
and is fifth in tackles, with 43, but those numbers don't seem
to apply salve to the brush burn of each loss.
He was a redshirt freshman on the Arizona State team that played
for the national championship in the Rose Bowl (and lost to Ohio
State). His younger sister, Tamicha, is the point guard for the
Louisiana Tech team that lost to Tennessee in the women's national
championship game in March.
The Jacksons have had memorable athletic careers. They don't
get too thrilled about .500 seasons, in other words. When Courtney
Jackson returns to his apartment in Tempe, Ariz., late Saturday
nights, he has needed to unload his frustrations. Bobby Jackson's
phone in Dallas soon rings.
"Immediately after the game, it's pretty tough on him,"
Bobby Jackson said. "I tell him to sit back and try to put
it into perspective. I think that makes it a little bit more palatable."
A little bit. Arizona State has been bogged down by injuries
galore, but, to his credit, Jackson won't use them as an excuse.
Instead, Arizona State coach Bruce Snyder has told his team to
continue to focus on its next game.
"We've got to go out there and play for pride," Courtney
Jackson said.
Not exactly a newfangled thing to say. Except Jackson puts
some CONVICTION into it.
"Pride is so much of this," Jackson said. "This
is rivalry week. If we didn't have any losses, this game is just
as important."
So the Sun Devils will play on. And after the game, Bobby Jackson's
phone will ring, and a father and son will talk about a football
game, and about so much more than that.
(c) 1998, The Dallas Morning News.
Visit The Dallas Morning News on the World Wide Web at http://www.dallasnews.com/
Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Information Services.
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