SEATTLE — On a day when two teams will venture out on a somewhat unfamiliar battlefield, the University of Washington and foe Washington State are walking familiar ground.
Once again, the Huskies and Cougars play an Apple Cup game that has little more than pride on the line.
UW (6-5 overall, 4-4 in the Pacific-12 Conference) already has wrapped up a bowl bid and is just jockeying for position among the conference’s four also-ran bowl-eligibles. WSU (4-7, 2-6) saw its bubble pop last week with an overtime loss to Utah. Unlike last year’s matchup, which held all-or-nothing implications for the Huskies after three consecutive years of Apple Cup obscurity, today’s game won’t carry much weight in terms of the postseason.
That leaves the state’s two biggest football programs battling for pride — and bringing out the time-tested cliches to match.
“It doesn’t matter what your record is in the Apple Cup,” UW senior linebacker Cort Dennison said. “In-state rivals, and the best comes out in both of us in this game.”
While recent history hasn’t always proven that theory, the 2010 game certainly lived up to the billing. The Huskies outlasted WSU in an offense-heavy, 35-28 win that secured a bowl bid.
This year’s game was shaping up to be a similar all-or-nothing prospect for the Cougars before the loss to Utah knocked them out of bowl contention.
“With bowl eligibility on the line, people would obviously be more excited because there’s more riding on it,” said WSU senior quarterback Marshall Lobbestael, a former Oak Harbor High School star who will be starting for the Cougars in his final collegiate game. “But there’s enough riding on this game with it being the Apple Cup. Guys are still up for it. Guys are pumped, and we want to keep that same environment all week.”
The prospect of ending a two-year losing streak to UW is enough incentive for the Cougars, who will sit out the postseason for the eighth consecutive season.
“Oh, man. (beating the Huskies) would mean everything,” said WSU cornerback Nolan Washington, a sophomore from Burien. “Me being from Seattle, whenever I go home, I hear UW this and UW that. The game would mean the world to me if we can get it done.”
Lobbestael said a win over UW could make the pain of another bowl-less season easier to take.
“It’s huge,” he said. “The Apple Cup’s always huge. Cougar fans are great. They’re always passionate about Cougar football, but they’re even more passionate about the rivalry.
“It would be huge for the football program, it would be big for the university and the entire Coug Nation as well.”
While the game features the return of two starting quarterbacks who were among the nation’s best in the month September, WSU is more likely to be thinking about a running back who torched the Cougars for 284 rushing yards last November.
Chris Polk has proven that he can run over WSU, and he has added motivation in that he’s closing in on the UW record for career rushing yards. His 3,802 yards put him 304 behind all-time leading rusher Napoleon Kaufman’s mark of 4,106, with two games remaining in Polk’s junior season.
“I think he’s the best running back in this conference,” WSU’s Washington said, “and he’s going to be playing at the next level. We have to be able to stop him. For us to be able to win Saturday, we have to stop him.”
The Cougars still haven’t forgotten the way Polk was able to run through, over and around them last season.
“It was embarrassing,” WSU’s Washington said. “This year’s team is way different from last year’s team. Last year, they really just rolled over us. He did what he wanted to last year. This year, we’re a much tougher team. We’re a lot bigger and a lot stronger. It should be fun to see how we go against him.”
The Huskies might be playing for bowl positioning, although the bowl committees typically look to things like fan support and national attraction as much as win-loss records. UW is one of seven bowl-eligible teams from the Pac-12, and at least five of them — UW, Utah, Arizona State, UCLA and Cal — are headed for non-BCS bowls. Those five teams are likely to be going to, in no particular order, the Alamo Bowl in San Antonio, the Sun Bowl in El Paso, Texas, the Holiday Bowl in San Diego, the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl in San Francisco and the Las Vegas Bowl.
UW coach Steve Sarkisian said, at this point, where the Huskies are headed is less important than changing the direction of a three-game losing streak.
“Obviously, we were disappointed in the last few weeks of the season and how they have gone,” Sarkisian said. “Our guys really want to finish well. They really love the opportunity to play Washington State in the Apple Cup. The seniors want to close this out the way that they envisioned, and that’s finishing the season strong at 7-5 and going to a really nice bowl game and walking off the field one last time with their buddies as a winner before the bowl game.”
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