MONROE, La. -- Somebody get The Rock.

Four hours before the I-A season kicked off, Todd Graham summoned the inspirational slab that will help guide Tulsa football this season.

While his Golden Hurricane noshed on the pregame meal, a GA fetched a 30-pound flat piece of stone. Ten Commandments? No, 109 words chiseled into faux granite.

"I want my guys to play better than they actually are," said Graham, a former East Central (Okla.) defensive back.

If an inscribed tablet manufactured by a cemetery headstone company can do that, maybe Graham is more of a miracle worker than he seems.

The 42-year-old head coach wants to make Tulsa the next Boise State. He wants to do it with a crazy-ass offensive philosophy. He wants to do it with trick plays. He wants to do it with freshmen. The first career catches by Tulsa receivers Trae Johnson and A.J. Whitmore went for touchdowns on Thursday night.

He wants to beat the big boys. First slugs first, though. Tulsa's season -- one that it hopes ends in Louisiana (namely the Sugar Bowl) -- started in Louisiana with a 35-17 thrashing of Louisiana-Monroe.

"He tells us that we're going to go undefeated," Whitmore said.

That's Graham wants to do while inviting the world in. Two cameramen and a reporter were in the pregame locker room documenting every move The Rock made.

The Rock is not a good talker, but it does say a lot:

The Rock represents years of hard work and sacrifice that young men have put forth in their journey to victory. Each grain of this rock represents a Hurricane football player that has come before you and for those who will follow. The Rock signifies our commitment to approach competition with a hard edge mentality every day. Our championship dedication allows us to belong to something larger than ourselves. Similar to this rock our championship program will last forever. This Rock belongs to the hardest working most disciplined best-conditioned football team in America. The Rock is our program and all that we stand for. The Rock is Golden Hurricane football.

Graham has had The Rock in some form or another since 1995 when he coached at Allen (Texas) High School. It travels with Graham's teams like an extra equipment bag -- on flights, in the locker room, on the field during the walk-through.

Sure, it's hokey but so is half of college football. Cast your minds back eight months.

"Boise State was the most incredible sports event in the 25 years in college football," Graham said. "It didn't just happen, those guys have a plan."

So does Knute Rockne in khakis and a polo shirt. If Boise can do it, so can the school with the smallest enrollment in I-A. If all goes to plan, Graham will have the Hurricane playing for a BCS bowl in a couple of years and use the bounce to head to, say, an Ole Miss.

AD Bubba Cunningham knows this. It's inevitable. Part of Tulsa's history is losing coaches -- and bouncing back. Basketball has mostly thrived despite losing the likes of Nolan Richardson, Tubby Smith, Steve Robinson and Bill Self.

"I think it's an advantage," Cunningham said. "It's (excellence) hard to sustain. Who would have thought the coach at Kentucky (Smith) would ever leave to go to Minnesota? I think the fans were kind of tired. You can count the Bowdens, the Paternos on one hand."

Tulsa president Steadman Upham has to know what's coming. He was in Tokyo last year with the secretary of education and casually mentioned to the Rice president that he was gunning for his coach.

"If we lose Steve Kragthorpe," Upham said. "We're coming after Todd."

Kragthorpe indeed went to Louisville. Less than two days later, after only one season at Rice, Graham left for Tulsa. Why not? Even though the job was in the same conference, it was a step up. Graham had been with Kragthorpe as Tulsa's defensive coordinator. The comfort factor alone was a bonus. Graham had recruited several of the Tulsa players.

Kragthorpe had helped turn the program around leading it to three bowls in four seasons. Now it's crazy, old Todd's turn. First thing he did was hire Gus Malzahn, whose play-calling abilities had been neutered at Arkansas. What you saw Thursday night was Gus' first real gameplan since he coached Springdale (Ark.) High School.

"It looks like backyard football, or recess," said fifth-year senior quarterback Paul Smith, "but it works."

How about 86 plays -- 13 shy of the school record -- and 523 total yards? Eight different players caught passes. Six players shared 55 rushes. Squint and you could have imagined Darren McFadden running two plays out of the Wildcat formation (direct snap to running back) on Thursday night.

Nothing has changed except Malzahn's freedom. He has it now on the sidelines.

"In the first quarter we saw them (defense) grabbing their knees," Whitmore said.

Halftime was a geography lesson. There was Malzahn gesturing at a dry erase board with talk of "Omaha", "Bama", "Florida" and "Washington". What did it mean? The Hurricane had run 47 plays, gained 269 yards and trailed 17-14 to a Sun Belt team.

It should be noted that the new Boise was not welcome here. At one point in the first quarter, the pointing fingers of taunting frat boys in the stands were about four feet from the back of one Hurricane's head. Security quickly moved in but the real need was spell check.

One salute to a cable network read:

Excellance
Starts
Preciseley
Now

Nothing like a Louisiana-Monroe education, or a disgusted Tulsa coach.

"This team's not any good," Graham said of the Warhawks at halftime.

Then he proved it. The plan was to neutralize the blitz and power run the Warhawks into submission. It worked. Second-half shutout, 216 rushing yards for a so-called finesse offense.

Steve August sure was beaming about being undefeated. The former Tulsa All-American offensive tackle was chosen by Graham as a honorary captain.

"He always talks about all these things he's going to do," August said.

Last year at Rice, a player sometimes came back from the warmup to find some Owl honorary captain sitting in his locker. What followed was an emotional bonding between former and current Owls. It worked as Rice went to its first bowl in 45 years.

On Wednesday, August and defensive back Steve Craver carried The Rock during the walk-through. The team linked arms and walked 100 yards, spending "the first 50 yards thinking about the price that's been paid," Graham said, "and the last 50 yards, what we're going to do to honor that commitment."

In one end zone, August spoke briefly.

"My voice was cracking a little bit," said August, who played for more than a decade in the NFL.

August knew this was stuff you can't get in the pros what with the dogfighting, holdouts and baby daddies. It's stuff that is still pure and good and right, at least on opening night.

"The difference between us and Oklahoma is we can't get the big defensive linemen and offensive linemen," Graham said in a rare moment of frustration. "They're going to go to the top 30 schools. How do you overcome that?"

Pound The Rock, baby. Pound The Rock.