Pac 10 Update

Oregon's offense is good. Real good. Their defense? We need more evidence.

The cumulative record of the seven Oregon victims to date: 16-28 (11-27 if we take out Stanford). So let's not get too ahead of ourselves with the Ducks, who still have Washington and Arizona at home and road games against USC, Cal and Oregon State this season.

Also, can UCLA go back to their normal uniforms? We have given up on Oregon and their ever-changing but always ridiculous Nike efforts. But the Bruins?

Pac 10 Embracing Rockies

With the smoke cleared from the recent conference expansion frenzy, it is time to evaluate some of the moves that did take place. The Pac 10 expanded by two, pulling in Colorado and Utah from the Big 12 and Mountain West conferences respectively.

Sportswriters are raving about the aggressiveness of the conference in landing these two programs and almost landing the package of four programs from the state of Texas, led by the University of Texas. The focus appears to be on television revenue, with the Pac 10 getting a boost from both the ability to add a playoff game and its expansion into the Salt Lake City and Denver markets. And bully for the conference, if that is all that being in a conference is all about.

But my focus as a blogger and fan of college football is on the product on the field, and I do not see an improvement in that regard. I liked that the Pac 10 members each played the other during the regular season. But that's gone. I liked that the Pac 10 did not have a championship game. But that's gone. I also liked that the conference featured any given team--well except for Washington State--having a shot against any other. It made for some compelling late night viewing last year. And while that level of competition is not gone, it is muddled.

To be honest, I do not know if the last two programs to join the ranks of the Pac 10 have been fully integrated yet. And Arizona State and Arizona have been in the conference for more than 30 years. This should help them in that the two Arizona schools are more similar to the newcomers that the others and may be able to develop rivalries with them that they could not with the California and Pacific Northwest schools. Of course, the two Arizona schools now have two more competitors for the second-tier California prospects, but recruiting is a job for the aggressive and it will be up to every Pac 10 school to fight off Utah and Colorado.

The other interesting question from all of this is to predict how good Utah, and Colorado, will be once they join the conference. With the Buffs it will come down to coaching as their current head man, Dan Hawkins, is on his last legs. This is his fifth year in Boulder and unless he pulls off a miraculous season, some new blood with better Pac 10 credentials will be on board for 2011. Colorado does play at Cal in September in what could be a sign of things to come. As for Utah, they certainly have a nice track record against BCS competition in recent years. They have an excellent program, with top-notch facilities, coaching, support and talent. They should do very well once they make the move, although the Utes do have one major adjustment to make. They will have to be able to handle a much tougher schedule that will no longer feature the number of weak opponents they currently face (through no fault of their own). Last year's squad, which never cracked the top 15, nonetheless was favored by 13 or more seven times. Having that many weaker opponents--and you must give them credit for getting business done against those squads--makes it not only easy to reach double digit wins on an annual basis, but also allows them to get up for the bigger games on the schedule without worry about dropping games in between. A similarly skilled Oregon State, by comparison, was favored by 13 or more only three times and one of those occasions was against a Washington team that had beaten USC. Utah will have a good test run this season once late October arrives as they play on the road at Air Force, TCU at home and on the road at Notre Dame in consecutive weeks. They then play at an improved San Diego State before tussling with rival BYU at home. That five-game slate should be a fine indicator of what to expect from the Utes in the Pac 10 for 2011.

Power Shift

Within three years of Alabama being put on probation, with scholarship losses, in 2001, SEC West rivals Auburn and LSU turned in glorious seasons with Louisiana State winning a share of a national title in 2003 and Auburn enjoying a 13-0 season in 2004. Coincidence? Maybe, but it is clear that the two sets of Tigers did benefit from their rival's self-inflicted misfortune. When a major power slumps, others benefit.

Who stands to gain the most from the recent sanctions leveled onto the Southern California program? The obvious answer is nearby UCLA, who has always gone head-to-toe with the Trojans for many of the star players produced by area high schools. Typically the Trojans win those battles, but the tide had turned a bit in recent years and coach Rick Neuheisel can smell blood. But the Bruins need to win, and win soon, to attract the type of player that was attracted to the great success enjoyed by USC the past 10 years. If the Bruins are indeed one of the programs gaining a major boost from this situation, we may not see the major bowl they gain for a couple of years. California, Oregon, and Oregon State may be the programs better suited to vault themselves up the rankings with help from USC's troubles. Also look out for Arizona and Stanford, two programs on the rise that may be able to cash in on better recruits and a better record against USC to move into the Top 10. It is not just a boost in recruiting that these squads hope to enjoy but more chances to beat the Trojans.

The other situation to monitor is with the national recruits who have recently chosen between powerhouses like USC, Florida and Ohio State. USC's woes will help all of those programs, plus Notre Dame, who not only has a better chance to reverse a horrible recent record against their longtime rivals but can possibly pluck an additional star recruit who may have been headed to the land of Troy.

Of course, these sanctions do not guarantee years of agony for USC fans. USC is still allowed to play games with all of the talent currently on the roster. If coach Lane Kiffin wants a model to follow he should look at the Miami Hurricanes of Butch Davis from the mid-to-late 1990s. After a similar hit from the NCAA Miami definitely dropped from their standing among the game's elite, which helped Florida and Florida State in the top 3 and Syracuse in the Big East. But Davis still recruited well and played the kids, who grew into the powerhouse program that would win nine games in each of the 1998 and 1999 campaigns before running off 46 wins with a national title from 2000-03. For Kiffin to do as well he needs to not only make the limited number of scholarships work, but also recruit more four-year players than normal. Play the kids and keep the kids. It worked for Miami.

Is it Finally Over?

So the Big Ten conference now has 12 programs and the Big 12 has 10. Got it? The Pac 10 can no longer brag about being the only true league with every conference member playing each other during the season as they are now too big to do so. Once the Pac 10 adds Utah, or some other fortunate soul, to be the 12th team in the conference, they will be done expanding for now. And that is good, because no one was ready for the myriad changes to the sport their expansion to 16 teams would have unleashed.

Will the Big 12 miss Colorado and Nebraska? Sure, at least competitively on the football field (well, Nebraska anyway and the basketball programs just saw their RPIs go up with the loss of two lowly programs). But considering that funeral dirges were being played moments earlier, losing two programs is a problem that can easily be solved. And as an aside, why do sports journalists love to kill off conferences before their time? They did so with the Big East too in the mid 2000s.

As far as competition goes, Boise State's move to the Mountain West may be the biggest news of all. If the conference can hold on to Utah, it will be loaded with big-time programs. Nebraska moving to the Big Ten is big too, of course, but the conference will still be under-appreciated until they can win a national title. Perhaps the Cornhuskers will help there. Penn State almost won it all in their second year of conference play. Meanwhile, Big 12 fans are warning the Huskers that they may not be able to recruit Texas as well as they did in the past, and perhaps the two or three players they lose there will find themselves on rosters of Iowa State, Missouri, Kansas and/or Kansas State, thus helping those schools too.

So the conference realignment craze is over for now. There are no super conferences and we can now, I hope, focus on the upcoming season.

War for the Roses

The Pac 10 could not have planned it any better with Oregon and Oregon State meeting in the 113th version of the Civil War on Thursday in prime time (without any other cfb competition) and the winner earning a Rose Bowl berth. For a conference without a championship game this contest will give the casual college football fan the opportunity to see a huge rivalry game with full BCS implications. Win the game and you go to the Rose Bowl. Any fan can follow that scenario.

For Oregon State the game marks a chance at redemption for last year's 65-38 loss. The Beavers also entered that game needing a win to go to the Rose Bowl. Instead they allowed 694y in getting creamed at home. Their reward for that failure? The Sun Bowl and New Year's in El Paso. Lesson learned. The Oregon State defense is saying the right things about that performance and how they will use it as motivation. Plus the OSU stop unit is ranked no. 1 in the conference in rush D, which is key in that the Ducks, with QB Jeremiah Masoli (1,865y passing, 619y rushing) and frosh RB LaMichael James (1,310y rushing) leading the way, are ranked no. 1 in rush O. Leading the Beavers on D is LB Keaton Kristick (80 tackles), one of only three returning starters from last year's unit. Another is DT Stephen Paea, who has been limited by a knee injury. His inside play is huge against the Ducks and their spread O.

On O, Oregon State is led by the three-headed monster that is the Rodgers brothers and QB Sean Canfield. RB Jacquizz Rodgers has rushed for 1,313y and 19 TDs and brother James has caught 77 passes for 865y and 8 TDs while continuing his terrific work as a returnman. Canfield really came into his own as senior, completing 70% of his passes for 2,797y and 19 TDs. He will need to stay sharp against an Oregon D that flies to the ball. The Ducks feature perhaps the best depth on D in the Pac 10 as they have had two games, versus Cal in September and Washington in October, that had 17 or more players record multiple tackles.

Oregon has not lost a conference home game in two years. That was to Oregon State, however, as the road team has won two straight in this hard-fought series. It should be a good one.

Pac 10 Groupie

Like a schoolgirl with a crush, I am smitten with Pac 10 football this year. The crazy games. The dynamic players. The gutsy coaches. The balance, apart from rebuilding Washington State, is excellent and more than half the teams in the league have looked like the Pac 10's best at one point in the season. Of course by beating each other up the conference will get only one team, the winner of next week's Oregon-Oregon State game, into a BCS game, but that's okay. They should do well in the Holiday Bowl, Sun Bowl and other aligned post-season games. And with a host of young talent, the league looks strong for next season.

My favorite Pac 10 player this season is Stanford RB Toby Gerhart, who is sitting on 1,531y rushing and 23 TDs with Notre Dame's 80th-ranked rush defense upcoming Saturday. Although Gerhart's uses his 235 lbs well, he has better moves than expected. I really do not understand why he is not getting enough Heisman attention. Wait, I do know. The prejudice against Pac 10 teams not named Southern California.

Defensive player of the year in the conference has to be UCLA junior DT Brian Price, who has 20.5 tackles for a loss and 7 sacks despite playing the interior line and getting double and triple teamed on virtually every play. He has a formidable challenge this weekend against USC's great interior blocking so tune in to see if no. 92 disrupts the Trojans offense.

The big story in the conference this year may be all of the kid QBs. With players like Matt Barkley of USC, Kevin Prince of UCLA, Nick Foles of Arizona and Andrew Luck of Stanford, the conference will be well stocked at the sport's premier position for years to come.

After Midnight

For once this college football season, there was little drama after midnight.

Boise State more than took care of business at hapless Hawaii. Southern California had plenty of challenges in its home win over Oregon State, but really was never in danger in the second half.
The most notable late game probably was Stanford’s easy victory over Arizona State, now 4-3. The Cardinal, now sporting a 5-3 mark, used a balanced attack that included TB Toby Gerhart’s 127 yards rushing against ASU’s second-in-the-nation run defense. In leading 24-0 at the halftime break, Stanford played as termed by Fox Sports Network commentator Petros Papadakis “as nearly a perfect half as possible.”

In the fourth quarter (well after midnight in the East), Sun Devils fans got what they’ve been screaming for most of the season. Starting fifth-year-senior quarterback Danny Sullivan, who had opened the third quarter with a touchdown pass to WR Chris McGaha, went out with a twisted knee. In trotted freshman QB Brock Osweiler, one of the most renowned passers ever to leave high school from Montana.

The TV cameras revealed Osweiler to be a bit of a short-arm thrower, but he got no help from a case of the “drops” by his receivers. Osweiler’s tepid aerial debut went 1-for-7 for 18 yards.
If viewers wanted to see a sparkling frosh QB, they surely enjoyed the performance of Stanford’s Andrew Luck, who pitched 17-for-28 for 236 yards. Luck, the son of former West Virginia and Houston Oilers QB Oliver Luck, fakes sharply with the ball, throws well on the run, and showed excellent accuracy last night. Is their Heisman talk coming his way in about 2011?
--Bob Boyles

Pac 10 Update

This was the season to get the season ticket package for the Washington Huskies (3-4, 2-2). They have played four home games so far this season against a loaded schedule of good football teams. The Huskies opened the season by losing a tough game to LSU, in a game that proved that this Washington squad was not a pushover. The following week they hosted a solid Idaho team, currently 3-0 in WAC play, and gave them their only loss on the season to date. Next up was the upset of Southern Cal which stamped the Huskies as officially back from the abyss. After dropping two straight on the road, Washington returned home to meet an Arizona squad that was riding high. A crazy and late TD won that one for the home team. Next up? The surging Oregon Ducks come visit beautiful Husky Stadium this Saturday. They had better come prepared. While QB Jake Locker is the featured player for Washington, the team has seen improvement across the board. They have not beaten Oregon since 2003 and have not looked good in dropping five straight series games. But this squad has a different feel to it, especially at home.

As for Oregon (5-1, 3-0), the stakes are extremely high. The Ducks sit atop the Pac 10 standings with their 3-0 record but four programs—USC, Arizona, Arizona State and Oregon State—are all sitting one game behind at 2-1 and more importantly still await the Ducks on the 2009 schedule. And the two other teams left for Oregon, Stanford and Washington, both host the Ducks in stadiums that are tough places to play (Stanford and Washington are combined 6-1 at home this year) and do so sandwiching the Oregon-USC game that the national media is focusing on as the battle for the conference. So Oregon has done a nice job getting on a roll after dropping game one to Boise. But the job is only half finished.

After Midnight

With East Coast insomniacs in mind, college football produced yet another wild finish to the last game on the schedule and for the second straight week the game involved the Washington Huskies. One week after stunning Arizona with a fluky, late INT TD RETURN, Washington made the mistake of playing for OT deep in their own territory in their game against Arizona State. This is the Pac 10 and it is a late game, so coach Steve Sarkisian should have known better. For one thing he needed to either play for the extra session or go for it. By doing both—the Huskies ran twice to face a 3rd-and-1 and then had an incompletion on a long pass—he hoped to waste clock that ASU could use and maybe get lucky himself. But the net result was a punt that set up ASU at midfield with enough time for a desperation pass. Sun Devils QB Danny Sullivan (21-35/263y)—who can drop his new first name “embattled”—dropped back to throw and must have not believed his eyes ("Oh my God, he is that wide open," recollected Sullivan after the game). There was WR Chris McGaha, the active conference leader in career receptions and yards, wide open as he raced down the middle of the field to the EZ. Sullivan threw what became his longest career completion to date as McGaha (catch pictured above) cradled the ball deep in Washington territory and then trotted into the EZ with five seconds left. McGaha had missed practice all week with an illness and only made this one catch. It was memorable. So too the last game of another crazy week in college football.

Pac 10 Update

It will be a tale of injured QBs at the Rose Bowl this weekend for the marquee Pac 10 match-up. UCLA (0-1; 3-1) QB Kevin Prince returns to the starting lineup after breaking his jaw in game two of the season. Prince’s play is crucial for UCLA’s chances as he can better exploit a banged up Oregon (2-0; 4-1) D secondary which has lost DBs Walter Thurmond and Willie Glasper for the season and is hoping to get back injured S T.J. Ward for this game. CB Anthony Gildon will need to step up as he began the season third string before moving up thanks to injuries to Thurmond and Glasper. The Ducks have not faced a QB who could exploit this issue and have to pressure Prince so that he does not have a big game. For the Ducks, QB Jeremiah Masoli is also hurt and sub Nate Costa—himself returning from torn ACL suffered in August of 2008--gets the start. Oregon goes through multiple QBs on an annual basis and Costa is a good one so look for the Ducks to remain aggressive on O with Costa running less than Masoli but throwing downfield more.

Forecasting the playing future of suspended Ducks RB LeGarrette Blount became a bit easier this week as coach Chip Kelly opened the door for a Blount return. In September he and Costa formed an awesome scout team combination. By November we might be saying the same thing about Masoli and the team’s leading rusher LaMichael James.

After Midnight

Wish I could say I watched UCLA’s 23-9 victory over Kansas State live after midnight Eastern time. Actually, I watched it pretty much at the time the sun was coming up over the Atlantic Ocean.

Here’s what occurred: Arizona State’s win over Louisiana-Monroe—shown live on Fox Sports Arizona—pushed back the start of a tape delayed UCLA game. After a long day of watching Nebraska give away a win to Virginia Tech, Notre Dame try to give away a win to Michigan State, and other adventures by California, Penn State, Iowa, Army, Florida, Georgia, and Texas, I was too bushed to do anything but dub my own version of the taped action from the Rose Bowl. It was an interesting match-up of two coaches—Rick Neuheisel and Bill Snyder—who used to battle each other annually at Colorado and K-State respectively.

A police and handcuffs nightmare—was I under arrest for posting lousy game picks in Week 2?—awoke me at 3:30 a.m. MST, so I rolled tape of the second half. Kansas State back Daniel Thomas, a former JC performer, crafted some nice spurts running the ball on an eight-minute TD drive in the third quarter to pull the Wildcats within 13-9.

But from that moment on, the Bruins’s defense really sparkled and ended with six sacks as they protected their 23-9 lead built on Kai Forbath’s field goal and WR Terrance Austin’s long reception of a perfect crossing-pattern TD pass from Kevin Craft, last year’s highly-limited QB who played well last night in place of Kevin Prince, who broke his jaw last week at Tennessee.

UCLA’s defense, which has a hole or two, plays with energy and could help steal an extra win or two in the Pac-10 this year.

Bob Boyles