Huskies, Beavers each looking for a first

Published 9:41 am Tuesday, October 14, 2008

SEATTLE — Not that Washington needs any bad news as it attempts to win its first game of the season, but here’s some anyway: The Huskies are catching Oregon State at just the wrong time.

Since a road blowout to Penn State dropped them to 0-2, the Beavers have won three of four, including an upset of then top-ranked USC last month.

“I’ve characterized their football team as a team that seems to start the season kind of slow,” Washington coach Tyrone Willingham said. “Then all of a sudden, they seem to come on like gangbusters and it happens usually about the time we’re playing them. We anticipate they will be full force.”

Indeed a slow start followed by a turnaround is nothing new for the Beavers under Mike Riley. In 2004, Oregon State started 1-4 but finished the season winning six of seven. In each of the past two seasons, the Beavers were 2-3 after five games, but they finished 10-4 in 2006 and 9-4 last season.

“I think it’s just that we’ve dug ourselves such a bad hole that we have nothing else to do but fight out of it,” Oregon State coach Mike Riley said. “My rally cry for this year was to try to have a better September, and we certainly did not, but I do think it’s very important for any team, no matter how you start, to get better through the year, because everybody else should be doing the same. If you have that as your identity and you keep coaching and you keep working hard in practice then I think you have a chance for good things to happen, and our teams in the past two years have done that.”

Riley had to drive home to his team that a turnaround was no guarantee just because it happened in each of the past two seasons.

“I told this team that it’s not given,” he said. “Just because you’re wearing that uniform doesn’t mean it’s going to happen. It took a lot of work, and I think we did it out of a lot of almost fear of failure, so I think you have to have all of that motivating you to get ready to win the next game.”

One bit of good news for the Huskies is the fact that Oregon State is winless on the road so far this season having dropped games at Stanford, Penn State and Utah. And while there is still a lot of season left to be played, Riley wants to see his team succeed on the road starting this week.

“We have already made that point — if we want to be a good football team, we’ve got to win games on the road, and we haven’t done that yet,” Riley said. “We’ve got to break through that barrier with this team and we’ve got to start now. When you get to that midway point you’re really going to start forming that identity of who the team is going to be, what they’re going to be remembered for.”

And even though the Beavers have struggled on the road this season, they should come into Seattle with confidence having won four straight against Washington, including three in a row at Husky Stadium from 2004-2006. That 2006 win helped jump start that season’s turnaround. Washington came into that game 4-2, while the Beavers were 2-3 after losing back-to-back games against Cal and Washington State. Oregon State’s 10-point win — which happened to occur two years ago today — was the first in a stretch of eight wins in nine games.

“I think that we were really, really down a couple of years ago and won a big, tough game up there that could be termed as a turnaround game for that team at that time,” Riley said. “Because we had just gotten beaten badly and we were going on the road. There was a lot of anxiety in the program at the time, so to get that win on the road against the Huskies at that time for that team might have been a turnaround game for us.”

Surgery for Bulyca and Yakaboski: Senior guard Casey Bulyca is going to have knee surgery soon, and could be out for the rest of the season.

Willingham classified Bulyca’s injury as “Something that has been going on for a while. Casey has done a great job of fighting through it, but it just reached a point where it’s now better to just go ahead and do the surgery.”

With Bulyca out, Ryan Tolar will move into the starting lineup. Tolar started at guard last season along with Bulyca, but Jordan White-Frisbee won the starting job this season. With Tolar now in the starting lineup, a possible backup at guard could be center/guard Matt Sedillo, Willingham said.

Brandon Yakaboski, who suffered a knee injury in practice two weeks ago, is also expected to have surgery and will be out for the season.

Other injuries: Tailback David Freeman, who has two injured ankles, did not participate much in practice last week and may not be back for Saturday’s game. Willie Griffin and Terrance Dailey are expected to battle for the starting job this week if Freeman can’t play, and Brandon Johnson will also battle for that spot.

Safety Johri Fogerson (ankle) practiced last week and is continuing to improve, Willingham said. Fogerson, Tripper Johnson and Victor Aiyewa are all listed as possible starters at free safety.

D’Andre Goodwin (ribs) practiced last week and is expected to be able to play this week. Darin Harris, who suffered a concussion against BYU, is still out and it is unknown when he might be able to play again.

Herald Writer John Boyle: jboyle@heraldnet.com. For more on UW sports, check out the Huskies blog at heraldnet.com /huskiesblog