Sports Editor:
Adam Jude
adam j ude@dailyemerald .com
Assistant Sports Editor:
Jeff Smith
jeffsmith@dailyemerald.com
Friday, November 9,2001
Best Bet
Washington at Oregon State,
12:30 p.m., Fox Sports Net
Oregon
must fight
forfan. 1
Minutes after being beaten by
Stanford, losing at Autzen
Stadium for the first time
in 23 home games and
hearing all about how much they had
lost, there emerged a glimmer of hope
amid the downtrodden Oregon foot
ball team.
In the corner of the media room,
flanked by three television cameras
and numerous reporters with
notepads ready, Oregon receiver
Keenan Howry somehow saw the sil
ver lining.
Yes, the national championship
dream that had driven these Ducks
through the rigors
of the summer
months and first
weeks of the sea
son had been
dealt a serious
blow.
Yes, the nation’s
longest home-win
ning streak was
halted.
And yes, the Pa
cific-10 Confer
ence would now
be tough to con
quer with one loss
and two daunting road games against
Washington State and UCLA on the
horizon.
But no way, Howry said with con
viction, was this one loss on Oct. 20
going to end the Ducks’ hopes of play
ing somewhere on Jan. 1.
“We’re just going to fight as hard
as we can to get back in the hunt and
try not to let this one loss get us
down,” Howry said. “We can’t let
this one game knock off our confi
dence. If we win out, especially at
UCLA, that’ll boost us up even
more.”
Smith
Hakuna Matata
Sure enough, the weeks since have
all seemed to go in Oregon’s favor.
The Ducks have won. Other teams
have lost. And now Oregon is back in
control of its destiny and can play the
winner of the Big 12 Conference in
the Fiesta Bowl if it beats the Bruins
and the Beavers.
But those Bruins. Oh how they can
be a pain in the Ducks’ tail. Oregon
finally beat them last year at Autzen
Stadium for its first win against
UCLA since 1995, but the Ducks
have yet to win at the Rose Bowl in
that span.
Joey Harrington, who has said be
fore that his dream was to someday
play in the Jan. 1 Rose Bowl, has
never played in Pasadena. In 1999,
Harrington was the backup when
quarterback A.J. Feeley led a dramat
ic last-minute drive that ended with
Marshaun Tucker receiving a short
pass and being stuffed less than a
yard away from the end zone as time
ran out.
Final score: UCLA-34 Oregon-29.
“That was a heartbreaker,” offen
sive lineman Ryan Schmid said. “We
were so close. Tough loss to swallow.
You never know, but that one yard
might have cost us a spot in the Rose
Bowl that year.”
Turn to Smith, page3B
Emerald
Oregon’s Keith Lewis (16), Wesly Mallard (18) and Kevin Mitchell (39) tackled UCLA’s Tab Perry in the Ducks’ 29-10 win at Autzen last year.
Ducks control own destiny
■The top offense in the Pac-10
takes on the top defense
in a battle of high stakes
By Adam Jude
Oregon Daily Emerald
Less than a month ago, the Ore
gon-UCLA matchup appeared to be
one for the history books; a game that
could have potentially decided who
would contend for the national
championship.
While the implications are still
great, a battle of unbeatens will not
take place Saturday in the Rose Bowl.
Instead, the Pacific-10 Conference
championship will be on the line
when No. 7 Oregon (8-1 overall, 5-1
Pac-10) and No. 16 UCLA (6-1,3-2) hit
the field at 12:30 p.m. Saturday for a
regionally-televised ABC broadcast.
“We’ve been getting ready for this
kind of game all year,” Oregon senior
quarterback Joey Harrington said.
“And now we're going to be on na
tional television, in the Rose Bowl,
against UCLA, and it’s time to show
people what we’ve got. ”
Much of the excitement was also
deflated with the news Wednesday
that UCLA star running back De
Shaun Foster will sit out the game
after being suspended for receiving
“extra benefits.”
But the game must go on.
The Ducks enter the game with
the No. 1 offense in the Pac-10, while
the Bruins feature
the No. 1 defense.
Harrington and
Co. have scored in
33-of-35 trips to
the red zone this
season, best in the
conference. Senior linebacker
Robert Thomas and the Bruins have
held opponents scoreless in 50 per
cent of trips to the red zone, also tops
in the conference.
“I’d be lying if I said I haven’t been
looking forward to this game all
year,” Oregon receiver Keenan
Howry said. “The hype is there, the
intensity is there, and there’s a lot at
stake for both teams.”
The Bruins, however, are coming
off consecutive losses to Stanford
and Washington State, and need a
win to stay within reach of a major
bowl bid.
“They’re a very good team,” Ore
gon head coach Mike Bellotti said of
UCLA. “I know they’ve stubbed
their toe here, but Pullman is a very
difficult place to go, and we said that
at the time we played Stanford they
were by far the best team we have
played all year. But, UCLA is still
dominating as a football team. They
don’t give up a lot of yardage—their
defense is as impressive as any that
we’ll have seen.”
The Ducks are tied with Washing
ton and Washington State in the con
ference standings, but hold tiebreak
er advantage on both teams. Thus, if
the Ducks defeat UCLA and Oregon
State in their remaining games, they
will receive an automatic bid to the
Fiesta Bowl.
Bellotti said his team is not look
ing past the Bruins, though.
Turn to Preview, page 6B
With top defense, UCLA stays positive
■ With DeShaun Foster out,
the Bruins hopes of ending a
two-game skid are even tougher
By Hank Hager
Oregon Daily Emerald
What do you get when you mix a
little DeShaun Foster, some Corey
Paus, a sprinkle of Brian Poli-Dixon
and top it off with Robert Thomas?
A 6-2 squad and enough fight to
challenge for the Pacific-10 Confer
ence title, that’s what. But take out a
suspended Foster, and you get a
squad riddled with questions.
With a 3-2 conference record,
UCLA is not the team to beat in the
Pac-10 anymore, especially after con
secutive losses to newly formed jug
gernauts Stanford and Washington
State. But that doesn’t mean the Bru
ins don’t have any fight left in them.
“The thing that I’m going to do with
this football team... is I’m going to re
main positive,” UCLA head coach
Bob Toledo said. “We’re going to
bounce back and we’re going to win
more football games. Not all is lost.”
But UCLA
loses its top
running back in
Foster, a Heis
man and Doak
Walker Trophy
candidate. The
senior rushed for 301 yards against
Washington earlier this season in a
35-13 win, but his play had suffered
in recent weeks when UCLA lost to
Stanford and Washington State. He
was suspended Wednesday for what
the school called an “extra benefits”
violation.
How it will affect UCLA’s game is
still to be seen, but Toledo is quite
unhappy with Foster’s actions.
“I’m extremely disappointed. He
knows what’s right and what’s
wrong, and he’s being disciplined
and suspended and we’ll go from
there,” Toledo told ESPN.com on
Wednesday. “He said he was very
sorry for what happened. He didn’t
realize it was going to be like this.
We’ll find out more about it later. ”
Foster’s absence will put the game
solely on junior quarterback Cory
Paus’ shoulders, with untested
sophomore Akil Harris starting in
Foster’s place.
At 171.8 yards per game in the air,
Paus is eighth in the category in the
Pac-10, ahead of only California’s
Kyle Boiler and Stanford’s Chris
Turn to UCLA, page 7B
THE BOX
Key Number:
-9
Rushing yards for UCLA
in last season’s 29-10 loss
at Oregon. Star running
back DeShaun Foster,
who will not play
Saturday, was held to
49 yards on the afternoon.
Pac-10
Rankings
Total Offense
Oregon.1
UCLA.6
Scoring Offense
Oregon......3
UCLA..6
Passing Offense
Oregon.5
UCLA....10
Rushing Offense
Oregon..1
UCLA.3 .
Total Defense
UCLA...1
Oregon.9
Scoring Defense
UCLA.1
Oregon.4
Passing Defense
UCLA... 3
Oregon....9
Rushing Defense
UCLA.2
Oregon...3
Quotable
“He ’s what you
would call a
’winner.’From
what l can tell,
he’s a really
genuine guy.”
Bob Toledo
UCLA head coach on
Oregon quarterback
Joey Harrington
Key Player:
Cory Paus,
UCLA
quarterback
With Foster out, Paus will
have the pressure of an
entire offense on him. He
suffered a jammed thumb
three weeks ago, and has
seen limited action since
then. On Saturday, Paus
will need to create all the
action himself.
Key Number,
Part II:
3-2
Pac-10 record of UCLA,
which has lost to Stanford
and Washington State in
consecutive games.