By John Sleeper
Herald Writer
CORVALLIS, Ore. – The rules for the week for the Washington Huskies went something like this:
(1) Do not look past Oregon State.
(2) Don’t even think about it.
(3) Any questions, refer to rules (1) and (2).
The eighth-ranked Huskies (7-1, 5-1 in the Pacific-10 Conference), have much to gain and much to lose. On one hand, a victory over the Beavers (3-5, 2-4) puts Washington in prime position for a major bowl game going into next week’s corker against Washington State.
On the other, a loss would wipe out much good the Huskies have done since the Oct. 13 debacle against UCLA, namely, three victories in three weeks that put them squarely in the hunt for the conference title.
“We’ve got to play our best football this week,” UW coach Rick Neuheisel.
Likely, because the Beavers have been aiming at this one since Oct. 7, 2000, when the Huskies handed them their only loss of the season and perhaps evacuated them from contention for the BCS title game.
“We’re going to be playing an inspired football team,” Neuheisel said. “They’re going to play with everything they’ve got.”
The problems for the Beavers, at least lately, haven’t been on defense.
The stoppers have been coming around after an inconsistent phase. A small, athletic and quick unit, OSU’s defense held USC to 204 total yards, 33 on the ground. The Trojans were held to minus-1 rushing yard in the second half, but pulled out the game, 16-13 in overtime.
“We were running around,” said OSU coach Dennis Erickson, an Everett native. “Our defensive ends (236-pound sophomore Noah Happe and 258-pound senior Kyle Roselle) are playing better. They were new and young. Our defensive front is flying around better to free our up our linebackers (202-pound junior Nick Barnett, 228-pound Richard Siegler, 230-pound James Allen), who are making a heck of a lot of tackles for us. They’re playing with more confidence.”
The Beavers also have the best defense in the Pac-10 against the pass, which has been a huge component of Washington’s offense.
Oregon State, however, has been coming up short on offense.
Erickson has had to replace his top three receivers, including T.J. Houshmandzadeh and Chad Johnson, both Cincinnati Bengals draftees. Also, the offensive line has three starters who had next to no experience up to this season.
The new faces and resulting lack of continuity have hurt the Beavers’ offense. Tailback Ken Simonton, a preseason Heisman Trophy candidate, has had little room to run. Quarterback Jonathan Smith has thrown as many interceptions (eight) as TD passes.
“Offensively, we haven’t played with any consistency in the running game, which has been a key for us over the last couple of years,” Erickson said. “We haven’t been able to get very many big plays in our passing game, which last year was really kind of the key to a lot of our success. There are times we play well, and other times, obviously, not playing like I hoped we would.”
Looking back, the program’s preseason hype in Sports Illustrated, touting OSU as the top team in the country, probably was unfair, given the holes the Beavers needed to fill.
“In reality, as I looked at where we were at, I felt we were going to be better than we’ve played this year,” Erickson said. “I thought we’d win more football games at this time. But we had some problem areas that we had to take care of. I think (the hype) may have affected us a little bit. But the bottom line is, we’re just not playing very well at this point.”
The Huskies hope that doesn’t change for at least another week.
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