THE ROWDIES were out in force again in Provo Saturday. No doubt you've already heard. It got so loud at one stage that Dee Dowis, a quarterback from the Air Force Academy, said he couldn't hear himself yell out signals, and you know how the Academy is particular about only admitting cadets with perfect hearing.

Dowis turned to the game referee, Jack Baker, and said, "Hey, this is deafening, sir," or something like that. Somehow, through the din, Baker heard him - and agreed. He wound up throwing no less than four yellow flags on the crowd - for unruly and disruptive conduct. In Provo, it was believed to be a first offense. In or out of the stadium.You can imagine what would happen if they allowed caffeine.

All this noise took place while a football game was going on, BYU vs. the Air Force. Since the game pitted the top two teams in the WAC, and since it was one of those mid-November days made especially for football, a record crowd crowded into Cougar Stadium. Most of them were locals.

There wasn't much for the hometown fans to cheer about at the first of the game, when Air Force and Dowis took control. But then the momentum started to shift, and there was something to cheer about. Well, at least to a point.

The point was when Baker started throwing those flags around.

At first, the crowd didn't know quite what to do. It was kind of flattering in a way. BYU's crowds have been accused of a lot of things over the years, but being a first cousin to a rock concert hasn't been one of them. Boisterous isn't their middle name. Under the cloak of anonymity, various BYU coaches through the years have wondered why the people in Provo don't SPEAK UP.

They didn't even start to boo at BYU until about five years ago, and only then after an administration appeal to cease and desist failed and it was widely rationalized that booing in the latter end of the 20th Century isn't nearly as rude as it used to be.

But with his first flag, thrown in the second quarter, Baker had their attention. It cost the Cougars five yards. Let's hear it for that?

The second, third and fourth flags came later, toward the end of the fourth quarter. The crowd was a little looser now, chiefly because BYU held a 38-20 lead. They kept on cheering at first, but Dowis kept throwing his hands in the air, and Baker kept throwing his flags, and soon it was quiet enough for Dowis to walk up behind his center and say, "Excuse me, I'd like to check out this book."

Amid all this peace and quiet, and buoyed by the extra yards via penalty, Air Force scored a touchdown, and then, after another too-much-crowd-noise penalty, scored a two-point PAT.

Now it's 38-28 and Jack Baker is about as popular in Provo as a Democrat.

The crowd realizes not only is it now totally out of the running for the Chevrolet Player of the Game award, but that the Falcons could now . . . are in a position . . . just might be able . . . to win this thing.

After a successful Air Force onsides kick, Dowis marches goalward once again. When he gets to the south end zone, scene of the last flags, the people stand en masse and wave their arms up and down, like a hawk trying to take flight, or a linebacker telling them to pipe down. That's it. Nobody's saying NOTHIN'.

No flags, of course. But Dowis scores and it's 38-35, and in the north end zone the Falcon band and a group of loyal uniform-wearing supporters are heard for the first time.

Now you're saying to yourself, "OMYGOSH, the flags on the crowd cost BYU the game!"

But that's only if you weren't there, because if you were, you know that Ty Detmer, the BYU quarterback, came back with a terrific last minute, win-icing touchdown pass to Chris Smith, as if the whole thing was masterminded so he could do his Houdini impersonation one more week.

The Falcons left the field an unhappy bunch, but not without their quarterback knowing he can play a crowd, in more ways than one.

As for Baker, he left the field only after a consultation with BYU Coach LaVell Edwards, who interrupted his postgame celebration long enough to block the field referee's hasty departure.

Edwards isn't noted for being excessively loud or talkative, either, but he had something to say.

Which was? "I'd rather not say," he said.

But the general feeling all around - on the BYU side, anyway - was that Baker didn't know decent volume when he heard it.

"It was louder than this last week," said backup BYU quarterback Sean Covey, a man attuned to crowd chatter.

"I could talk to Rocky (Biegel) during the loudest of it, and he was five yards away," said BYU linebacker Bob Davis.

"Dowis milked that ref beautifully," said Pete Witbeck, BYU's associate athletic director.

"That quarterback of theirs just outsmarted the refs," said Rex Lee, BYU's president.

And it almost worked. It came close enough that BYU athletic director Glen Tuckett was heard to say, "We will not allow Jack Baker to work here again." Obviously, that man is way too conservative for Provo. Don't give them a Jack. He does not know how to party.