The maneuvering to be the #2 team in Pac-12 football has significant consequences—not like at the top, where second-ranked Oregon is leading the way in a league that appears highly likely to puts champion in the College Football Playoff—but consequential nonetheless.
The runner-up is even more certain to get a spot one of the New Year’s Six major bowl games—likely the Fiesta. And if you, for the moment, cede the championship to Oregon, the race for the runner-up spot is intriguing.
First, let’s point out that runner-up does not mean the team that loses the conference championship game, in which case we would just be asking who’s going to win the Pac-12 South. The runner-up from the North would be eligible, as would the runner-up from the South if there were extenuating circumstances (let’s say, for example, that USC beats a highly ranked Notre Dame team in November, after having lost the division).
Six teams are worth looking at right now. Stanford, USC, UCLA and Arizona State would have to be the frontrunners, with Washington and Arizona still on the radar.
I’ve seen three of these teams in action, having watched the USC-Stanford game from Palo Alto, and the UCLA-Texas game from Dallas all start to finish. The on-field results don’t leave us a whole lot closer to a resolution.
*UCLA is the highest-ranked runner-up right now, sitting at #12. But the Bruins have been unimpressive. They needed three defensive touchdowns to survive Virginia. They barely got by Memphis. Even allowing both teams are better than their public reputations, a major bowl hopeful shouldn’t struggle with both.
And while I was impressed with the Bruins’ heart on Saturday night in Dallas, their play was less than inspiring. I know they lost quarterback Brett Hundley early in the game, but Texas was also playing without its starting quarterback. UCLA needed to go to the wire to pull out a 20-17 win. I picked this team to win the entire Pac-12 and reach the College Football Playoff, but they look a long way from that right now.
*USC played tremendous red-zone defense in Stanford, they’re getting good play from quarterback Cody Kessler and they seem to be playing smart football. But the Trojans needed a slew of breaks to escape Stanford with a win, and then USC showed their lack of consistency when they lost at Boston College on Saturday.
*Stanford is my favorite team to watch out of this group because how physical they are and how fundamentally sound they are. But as I much as I like the mental toughness and discipline of David Shaw’s teams, it seems like Shaw often gets a little conservative in scoring situations. I’ve seen it the last couple years in the Rose Bowl, back in 2011 in the Fiesta Bowl, and again versus USC.
That’s my concern with Stanford—will they lose another game they shouldn’t? Although the flip side is that critiquing Shaw requires dropping “all his major bowl” appearances, it tells you the man knows what he’s doing.
*Out of respect for Chris Peterson, I’m keeping Washington on the short list as long as they stay undefeated early. But they’ve had some narrow escapes against shaky teams. The Huskies need to be able to beat Stanford at home in two weeks.
*Arizona hasn’t had a significant test, but surviving a feisty UT-San Antonio team on the road spoke well of the Wildcats. I can’t quite see U of A playing in a New Year’s Six game, but Rich Rodriguez has got them rolling in the right direction. Give them a loss on October 2, a Thursday night in Oregon. But circle the following Saturday, when the ‘Cats get a long week to prep for a home date with USC.
*Arizona State is the defending Pac-12 South champ. The Sun Devils haven’t played anybody yet, but they’ve already suffered a big loss—not on the field, but quarterback Taylor Kelly, a three-year starter and a senior, will miss at least the next couple games.
Next weekend will begin the next round of sorting out. Arizona State will host UCLA in a Thursday night game on September 25, and then there’s Stanford-Washington up in Seattle the following Saturday.
SIGN UP FOR THE FREE NEWSLETTER OF THESPORTSNOTEBOOK
ANALYSIS & HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE FROM AROUND THE SPORTS WORLD
The maneuvering to be the #2 team in Pac-12 football has significant consequences—not like at the top, where second-ranked Oregon is leading the way in a league that appears highly likely to puts champion in the College Football Playoff—but consequential nonetheless.
The runner-up is even more certain to get a spot one of the New Year’s Six major bowl games—likely the Fiesta. And if you, for the moment, cede the championship to Oregon, the race for the runner-up spot is intriguing.
First, let’s point out that runner-up does not mean the team that loses the conference championship game, in which case we would just be asking who’s going to win the Pac-12 South. The runner-up from the North would be eligible, as would the runner-up from the South if there were extenuating circumstances (let’s say, for example, that USC beats a highly ranked Notre Dame team in November, after having lost the division). Six teams are worth looking at right now. Stanford, USC, UCLA and Arizona State would have to be the frontrunners, with Washington and Arizona still on the radar.
I’ve seen three of these teams in action, having watched the USC-Stanford game from Palo Alto, and the UCLA-Texas game from Dallas all start to finish. The on-field results don’t leave us a whole lot closer to a resolution.
*UCLA is the highest-ranked runner-up right now, sitting at #12. But the Bruins have been unimpressive. They needed three defensive touchdowns to survive Virginia. They barely got by Memphis. Even allowing both teams are better than their public reputations, a major bowl hopeful shouldn’t struggle with both.
And while I was impressed with the Bruins’ heart on Saturday night in Dallas, their play was less than inspiring. I know they lost quarterback Brett Hundley early in the game, but Texas was also playing without its starting quarterback. UCLA needed to go to the wire to pull out a 20-17 win. I picked this team to win the entire Pac-12 and reach the College Football Playoff, but they look a long way from that right now.
*USC played tremendous red-zone defense in Stanford, they’re getting good play from quarterback Cody Kessler and they seem to be playing smart football. But the Trojans needed a slew of breaks to escape Stanford with a win, and then USC showed their lack of consistency when they lost at Boston College on Saturday.
*Stanford is my favorite team to watch out of this group because how physical they are and how fundamentally sound they are. But as I much as I like the mental toughness and discipline of David Shaw’s teams, it seems like Shaw often gets a little conservative in scoring situations. I’ve seen it the last couple years in the Rose Bowl, back in 2011 in the Fiesta Bowl, and again versus USC.
That’s my concern with Stanford—will they lose another game they shouldn’t? Although the flip side is that critiquing Shaw requires dropping “all his major bowl” appearances, it tells you the man knows what he’s doing.
*Out of respect for Chris Peterson, I’m keeping Washington on the short list as long as they stay undefeated early. But they’ve had some narrow escapes against shaky teams. The Huskies need to be able to beat Stanford at home in two weeks.
*Arizona hasn’t had a significant test, but surviving a feisty UT-San Antonio team on the road spoke well of the Wildcats. I can’t quite see U of A playing in a New Year’s Six game, but Rich Rodriguez has got them rolling in the right direction. Give them a loss on October 2, a Thursday night in Oregon. But circle the following Saturday, when the ‘Cats get a long week to prep for a home date with USC.
*Arizona State is the defending Pac-12 South champ. The Sun Devils haven’t played anybody yet, but they’ve already suffered a big loss—not on the field, but quarterback Taylor Kelly, a three-year starter and a senior, will miss at least the next couple games.
Next weekend will begin the next round of sorting out. Arizona State will host UCLA in a Thursday night game on September 25, and then there’s Stanford-Washington up in Seattle the following Saturday.
SIGN UP FOR THE FREE NEWSLETTER OF THESPORTSNOTEBOOK
ANALYSIS & HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE FROM AROUND THE SPORTS WORLD
There’s been a clear contrast in Pac-12 hype and Pac-12 results over the last two college football season. The run-up to the seasons in 2012 and 2013, and much of the hype for a couple months always surrounded the Oregon Ducks and their national title hopes. Then the Stanford Cardinal, quietly, with sound fundamentals and physical play, smacked the Ducks in the mouth in November and walked off with the conference championship.
SIGN UP FOR THE FREE NEWSLETTER OF THESPORTSNOTEBOOK
ANALYSIS & HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE FROM AROUND THE SPORTS WORLD
Email
The first part of this dichotomy continues this year, as Oregon comes in a solid betting favorite to win the Pac-12 football title and be in the mix for a national championship. Will the story end differently this time?
There’s reason for Duck fans to believe this year can be different. The most potent offense in the conference in 2013 has junior quarterback Marcus Mariota back, and the entire offensive line returns. The defensive front seven is a veteran group and there is experience at the skill positions. There’s some re-tooling to do in the secondary, but there’s nothing to suggest Oregon won’t have another big year.
In the meantime, Stanford has much more significant holes to fill—while Oregon’s entire O-Line comes back, Cardinal head coach David Shaw has to find four new starters and new running backs. Stanford isn’t going anywhere—the defense, in spite of some losses to the NFL draft, still has a lot of talent back and junior quarterback Kevin Hogan now enters his third year as a starter. But I get why oddsmakers feel this is Oregon’s year, at least in the Pac-12 North.
The one thing Stanford has going for them—aside from recent history, which says they’ll lurk under the radar at every media outlet other than TheSportsNotebook (I picked them to win the Pac-12 last August and I love David Shaw’s entire program)–is that they don’t play Oregon head-to-head until November 1, so there’s time to bring a new team together. But that still presumes that this is the only game that will matter in the Pac-12 North (a risky, if understandable proposition) and the game will be in Eugene.
WILL THE SOUTH RISE?
Maybe a better place to look for this year’s challenge to Oregon is the contenders in the South Division. Oddsmakers rate UCLA a narrow favorite over both Arizona State (who won the division last year) and USC. Here’s a look at the three leaders of the Pac-12 South…
UCLA: Jim Mora Jr. has won 19 games over two years in Los Angeles and transformed this program from a stereotypical soft SoCal team into a tough, physical unit. He’s got an experienced offensive line, a stable of running backs that is well-balanced, and a third-year starter at quarterback in Brett Hundley. The secondary brings back three starters and only modest retooling on the front seven is necessary, even after losing explosive outside linebacker Anthony Barr.
USC: Steve Sarkisian is the new head coach, after spending the last five years at Washington, where he first rebuilt the program from the ashes, then found himself unable to take the proverbial next step. The Trojans went 7-2 after Lane Kiffin was fired last year, including a close loss at Notre Dame. The secondary is the strength, the defensive line is young and no other spot really stands out.
Arizona State: Head coach Todd Graham has shown he can win and produce points. With quarterback Taylor Kelly keying an experienced offense, a lot more of the same will be ahead in 2014. But a massive rebuild of the entire defense awaits, including the need to replace nose tackle Will Sutton, the Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Year.
If it turns out that these three teams separate themselves from the rest of the Pac-12 South (and sitting here in July, there’s no reason to think they won’t, the first key game will come on September 25 when UCLA visits Arizona State for a nationally televised Friday night game.
Then on October 4 when Arizona State goes to USC. This was the matchup that got Kiffin fired last year, after the Sun Devils dropped 62 on the Trojans.
November 22 will be the traditional USC-UCLA rivalry game, a nominal home date for the Bruins in Pasadena.
DARK HORSES & BOWL HOPEFULS
Four teams have legitimate expectations of going to a bowl game, with the hope that maybe things will break right and they can either move up the bowl ladder or perhaps even pull off a magical ride to a division title.
Washington: If anyone other than the five teams already discussed plays their way into the Pac-12 Championship Game, it would be the Huskies. Chris Petersen has come over Boise State and he represents an upgrade on Sarkisian at head coach (that’s more a compliment to Petersen than a knock on Sarkisian). Petersen is loaded on both lines, but needs to find his quarterback and the secondary is manned by underclassmen.
Arizona: Rich Rodriguez has re-established his coaching reputation in Tucson with consecutive eight-win seasons. Moving to the next level is going to be tough. Rich-Rod’s defense—never his strong suit—is soft up front, and a lot of new starters have to be found at the skill positions. If receiver Austin Hill makes a successful return from a knee injury that cost him the entire 2013 season it will make things a lot easier on whomever the new quarterback ends up being.
Washington State: Mike Leach quickly put WSU back in a bowl game, going 6-6 last year and throwing the ball all over the place with returning quarterback Connor Halliday. Between his returning quarterback and some veterans on the defensive line, Leach has enough to stay bowl-eligible and maybe jump to seven or eight wins but the defense needs to get a lot better before challenging Oregon and Stanford in the Pac-12 North is an option.
Oregon State: Another team that went 6-6 last season in the Pac-12 North and could do a bit better this time around. Sean Mannion is back for his senior year at quarterback, the offense is going to be good, and the defensive back seven looks pretty decent. The issue is going to be stopping the run.
And while I like Mike Riley as a head coach—the man’s been a winner for 13 years in Corvallis, which speaks for itself—some of his game management decisions have struck me as questionable when I’ve watched this team in significant games. That won’t keep the Beavers from being a nice bowl team, but it will prevent them from winning a division title.
THREE LONGSHOTS
All of these three teams have odds of 33-1 or higher just to win their division
Utah: They may be a longshot to win the Pac-12 South, but a bowl bid is within their grasp. The Utes have played mostly competitive football since joining this conference and they won five games in 2013. They’ll run the ball with Bubba Poole behind an offensive line that has three starters back, and have experience back at quarterback and linebacker. Pencil the Utes in for anywhere in the 5-7 win category.
Colorado: Mike MacIntyre made a lot of progress in his first year in Boulder, and I have every confidence the man who made San Jose State a bowl-quality program will get it done here. But after jumping from the dregs to four wins last year, further progress is going to be more difficult. Colorado was still blown out in most of their losses, so the next jump to bowl eligibility might have to wait until 2015.
Cal: Another program in its second year after a coaching change. The program had regressed in the final years of a mostly successful run by Jeff Tedford, and they really bottomed out in the first year under Sonny Dykes. The Golden Bears only beat Portland State last season. Reports from Pac-12 observers are that the program atrophied under Tedford because of a lack of facilities and the continued regression last season fit that storyline.
THESPORTSNOTEBOOK PICK
I’ll concur with the oddsmakers on the division winners, with UCLA and Oregon but I’m parting company when it comes to the conference champion. I think it’s UCLA’s time and what’s more, I’m just not sold on the Ducks as a nationally elite team. The same oddsmakers have them third nationally, behind only Florida State and Alabama.
I just don’t see that—I see a pretty good team that might win a conference title, could make the College Football Playoff, but is far from a favorite to do either one. Combine that with their recent history of getting smacked in the mouth in the season’s biggest games and I see UCLA taking the next step and becoming this year’s team to ram it down Oregon’s throat and take the Pac-12.
TheSportsNotebook’s college football coverage has had a Pac-12 flair this week. We looked at the Pac-12 South race, and we did Pac–12 bowl projections for everything from the Rose to the Las Vegas Bowls. All that was the buildup to the preview of the biggest game of the regular season, and it’s Thursday night’s Oregon-Stanford game from Palo Alto (9 PM ET, ESPN).
Oregon is ranked third in the BCS standings, though it’s generally assumed that a win at Stanford would push the Ducks past Florida State into the 2-spot and give them control of their destiny in the national championship push.
Even though Stanford has a lost a game, an upset loss at Utah on October 12, the Cardinal is still ranked 5th. They’re the best of the one-loss teams–and though that doesn’t seem like much now, we’ve been through enough Novembers as college football fans to know that it might loom very large at any point this month. What’s more, Stanford is ahead of some undefeated Baylor and only one spot behind undefeated Ohio State.
In short, the team that wins this game has a great shot at the national title, with Oregon’s chances being a little bit stronger since they’re undefeated. The winner also all but wraps up the Pac-12 North and will likely host the conference championship game (the Pac-12 uses the crazy idea called “merit” to determine where it’s title game is played).
Thus, it’s easy to see why the Oregon-Stanford battle joins earlier games of Alabama-Texas A&M and Florida State-Clemson as defining moments in the 2013 college football regular season.
If you compare each team’s resume…well, there is no comparison. Oregon’s is better, and not just because Stanford has one loss (though that’s hardly an inconsequential point). The teams have played common opponents in UCLA and Washington. Oregon handled both teams with ease, while Stanford won tough battles.
Oregon’s Marcus Mariota is putting together a Heisman-caliber scene and joins Jameis Winston at Florida State in leading the pack right now. Mariota has yet to throw an interception, he gets 10 yards per pass, and he rushes for over nine yards a carry. Oregon also has a quality conventional running game led by Byron Marshall, who is nearing the 900-yard mark with a third of the regular season still to play.
Against that, Stanford can throw Kevin Hogan. The sophomore quarterback played a gritty game last year up in Eugene, a game the Cardinal won in overtime and knocked Oregon out of the BCS National Championship Game and the country into watching Notre Dame getting abused by Alabama. Hogan’s had some shaky moments this year though, and while his numbers aren’t bad, they certainly aren’t spectacular.
What Stanford fans have to count on is that nothing about their team is spectacular, and that explains everything from the less impressive wins against common opponents to the lack of eye-popping stats from the quarterback. This is a team that simply wins by being physical, punishing people on both sides of the line of scrimmage and winning games late. It means you won’t always look pretty, you might even cough up a game you shouldn’t, but it doesn’t mean you can’t beat the nation’s best.
The biggest key to the game is going to be tempo. Stanford can’t play at a fast pace with Oregon, and the key to that is going to be Tyler Gaffney, another back who is approaching the 900-yard mark on the season. If Gaffney runs the ball, it opens things up for Hogan, it slows Oregon down and the game gets played the Stanford way.
Oregon is a solid 10.5 point favorite, and the road team has won each of the last two meetings. Is it time for three in a row? I picked Stanford to win the Pac-12 and reach the BCS National Championship Game back at the start of the year, in large part because they had this game at home. Whatever disappointment there was over the Utah loss, I still really like David Shaw’s program and am picking the Cardinal to win outright.
As part of TheSportsNotebook’s Pac-12 bowl projections, we’ll also project the conference championship game. One thing to note is that this is the one conference that does not play its title game on a neutral site. The team with the best record hosts the game, and that almost certainly means the Oregon/Stanford winner in the Pac-12 North will be at home against the survivor of a good four-team race in the Pac-12 South.
We can also realistically assume that both the Ducks and Cardinal are going to make BCS bowl games. Whether either one–namely Oregon–ends up playing for a national title on January 6 (Editor’s Note–in previous posts, I have erred in noting January 7 as the date of the BCS National Championship Game in Pasadena), is one question, but until either team loses a game outside their Thursday night head-to-head battle (9 PM ET, ESPN), we may as well just assume that this conference will snare one of the four at-large bids to the major bowls, and that the team will be the runner-up in the North.
The BCS at-large spot is a bigger deal in this league than it would be in a conference like the Big Ten or SEC, because unlike those leagues, the Pac-12 does not have a coalition of January 1 bowls lined up to take its other teams. It’s a steep drop from the BCS to the next highest-bid, which is the Alamo Bowl.
Within the Pac-12’s six contract bowls outside the BCS, there’s a another divide. The Alamo, Holiday and Sun offer the chances to play what should be pretty good teams from the Big 12 or ACC, giving a team the opportunity to end its season with a notable win.
The fourth bowl is the Las Vegas, which might offer the chance to play the Mountain West champ, although at the present, that’s Fresno State, and the Bulldogs are dreaming of busting the BCS. If they succeed (and I don’t think they will), this bowl declines in attractiveness to the Pac-12 participant. The Fight Hunger and New Mexico Bowl offer mediocre opposition.
Here’s TheSportsNotebook’s Pac-12 bowl projections as we come out of Week 10 and sit just a few days prior to the big Oregon-Stanford battle…
Alamo: UCLA (Oklahoma State) Holiday: Arizona State (Kansas State) Sun: Arizona (Duke)…the football rematch of the 2001 NCAA basketball final if it works out this way. Las Vegas: USC (Fresno State) Fight Hunger: Washington (BYU) New Mexico: Oregon State (Utah State)
Utah is currently 4-4, and needs two wins against a schedule that includes home games with Arizona State and Colorado, and road trips to Oregon and Washington State. The Utes can get the Colorado win, and their bowl hopes likely rest on whether they win at Washington State.
And speaking of Washington State, they are 4-5 and need two of three, with their other games being at Arizona and at Washington. It’s going to be tough for either the Utes or Cougars to make it, and given that they both likely need the head-to-head game, getting both in is going to be impossible.
Under the current scenario, I would not see a bowl-eligible Utah or Washington State moving ahead of any other teams in the pecking order, but there are always open spots elsewhere, as other leagues fail to get enough eligible teams to meet their minimums. Another note is that in the unlikely event that the league does not get a BCS at-large spot, everyone has to move down one rung.
The game of the regular season in the Pac-12–maybe the entire country–is coming up Thursday night when Oregon visits Stanford (9 PM ET, ESPN). But there’s a lot more going on in this conference, and it starts with a compelling race in the league’s South Division. TheSportsNotebook’s college football coverage focuses in on the Pac-12 South…
There are four teams with a legitimate shot at playing Oregon/Stanford in the conference championship game, and a lot of head-to-head matchups are still ahead. Here’s a look at the division’s contending quartet…
*Arizona State (6-2): With just one league loss, the Sun Devils are in first place and coming on strong. September was marked by a disputed win over Wisconsin and subsequently being blown out at Stanford in a game not as close as the 42-28 final might lead one to believe.
Arizona State then dropped 62 points on USC in the game that got Lane Kiffin fired, and over their past three games have scored 162 points, which include thrashings of bowl contending teams in Washington and Washington State.
*UCLA (6-2): The Bruins lost their back-to-back games with Stanford and Oregon, but they’ve won all the rest, and have got running back Jordan James–absent for both defeats–back from an injury. UCLA’s other conference wins aren’t notable, but they did pound Nebraska on the road back in non-conference play. UCLA also won this division a year ago, and gave Stanford a tough battle in the league championship game.
*Arizona (6-2): Rich Rodriguez’s team got off to a slow start, and it’s still hard to get a read on how good they might be. They’ve won three straight, but two of the wins were against Colorado and Cal, the two teams in this league that have no shot at a bowl. This is not a stereotypical Rich-Rod team that throws the ball all over the place. Running back Ka’deem Carey is one of the nation’s best.
*USC (6-3): One of these three losses is to Notre Dame, so the Trojans join UCLA and Arizona in being just one game back of Arizona State in the Pac-12 South. It seems more than a little strange to be including USC on this list, given the poor play early and the Kiffin firing. But the team has responded since, beating Arizona, Utah and Oregon State, all competitive teams since, and now they’re back in the mix.
We know the Trojans can play championship-quality defense, and they have a playmaker extraordinaire in wide receiver Marquise Lee, but quarterback Max Wittek has had more than a few issues getting Lee the ball and helping support the defense.
When you evaluate the contenders they split in half–Arizona State and UCLA were the preseason favorites, they’ve played the most consistent football and the winner of their November 23 game in Pasadena remains the likely team to get a crack at Oregon or Stanford.
USC and Arizona are the teams not realistically expected to play for the conference title, but each have played their way into the race and have opportunities to play their way to the top. USC has its season-ending visit to UCLA, and needs to win out, while hoping the Bruins beat the Sun Devils. The problem with that scenario is that USC has no room for error and a home game with Stanford is also on the agenda.
Arizona controls its destiny–they host UCLA this week and visit Arizona State in the season finale, so they can simply win out. But not only is sweeping those two games going to be a challenge, but they do have a home date with Oregon in the mix.
Thus, we can likely point to November 23 and Arizona State-UCLA as when the Pac-12 South will be settled. But there are other contenders, and still a lot of different ways the dominoes can fall when it comes to deciding who can take a crack at winning a championship on the first Saturday of December.
The marquee games of the college football Week 5 cardare the quartet of LSU-Georgia, Oklahoma-Notre Dame, Ole Miss-Alabama and Wisconsin-Ohio State. But underneath the glitter are lots of games worth at least checking out, especially with more conference games now on the docket.
TheSportsNotebook’s college football coverage will be back later this week with a look at the four marquee games. For now, let’s whet our appetites with a look at the most notable games on the undercard, going conference-by-conference, focusing here on an interesting Saturday night agenda in the Pac-12…
Arizona visits Washington in a 7 PM ET kickoff on Fox, a game between 3-0 teams. Rich Rodriguez doesn’t yet have his quarterback situation settled, and the Wildcats are 117th in the country in passing yards in spite of a weak schedule. Washington has looked good each time out, and running back Bishop Sankey’s shoulder injury shouldn’t hold him up.
Then the late-night telecasts offer two more good Pac-12 games. Stanford visits Washington State (10 PM ET, ESPN). While it’s tough to see the Cardinal actually losing this game, WSU has already beaten USC on the road, and this is a “sandwich spot” for Stanford, right in between more heralded opponents in Arizona State and Washington.
And speaking of Arizona State, they try and recover from the trouncing Stanford put on them when they host USC in a 10:30 PM ET kick on ESPN2. Whatever merits the Sun Devils have shown this year—and there’s quite a few—great defense has not been one of them. If USC can’t get a passing game going and get the ball into the hands of Marqise Lee here, it’s fair to wonder if that will ever happen against a notable opponent. The loser of this game is in a hole in the Pac-12 South, a race that will also include UCLA.
TheSportsNotebook.com’s college football coverage has updated its BCS bowl projections following Week 4, with a special look at the chances of Fresno State rising out of the Mountain West. As part of a conference-by-conference wrap-up of the week, here’s a look at the Pac-12…
Pac-12: Stanford really looks good. The Cardinal pounded Arizona State on the ground, getting 240 yards in rushing, with balance between Tyler Gaffney and Anthony Wilkerson out of the backfield. Stanford will need to get more production out the passing game and Kevin Hogan if they’re going beat Oregon. But the physical manhandling they put on Arizona State in a game they led 29-0 and won 42-28 shows why the Cardinal is among the national elite.
Arizona State’s play showed why they’re nothing more than a spoiler. The offense was nothing except Taylor Kelly throwing the ball to Jaelen Strong. The combo is good enough that you can win a nice number of games like that, but you won’t beat anybody good. The Sun Devils weren’t close enough let an officiating crew steal them a win this time.
USC head coach Lane Kiffin might have been fired Saturday night if he would have lost at home to Utah State, and it was tied in the fourth quarter, before the Trojans won 17-14. USC played excellent defense, as usual, but they weren’t able to force turnovers, and unless they also create scoring with their defense, they’re going to have problems. This is an offense with college football’s best receiver in Marqise Lee and they can’t get him the ball.
Utah got a nice 20-13 win over BYU, their fourth straight over the Cougars. Considering that BYU has a good national reputation while Utah—at least since their move to the Pac-12—really doesn’t. The Utes are now 3-1 and have the look of a team that could play spoiler to someone like Arizona State in the Pac-12 South race, or USC in Lane Kiffin’s fight to remain gainfully employed.
Other post-Week 4 thoughts from the power conferences…
Sophomores are the order of the day in the Pac-12 this football season. UCLA, Stanford and Oregon all broke in freshman quarterbacks in 2012 with great results, and now Brett Hundley, Kevin Hogan and Marcus Mariota are back for more. Then we add USC to that list, where soph Max Witten started in place of Matt Barkley at the end of last year when Barkley was hurt, and is the heir apparent this year.
These four teams lead up the favorites to be in the Pac-12 Championship Game. It’s the third year for this conference championship game and the Pac-12 is moving it from Friday night, to be a part of the complete menu of championship games going on Saturday, December 7. The league does still stand apart as the one conference that rewards its best overall team, by giving homefield advantage for the title game.
Contenders aren’t limited to Stanford/Oregon in the North and USC/UCLA in the South. The latter division has solid contenders in Arizona State and Arizona. And while Stanford and Oregon look head-and-shoulders above the North, there are good teams in Washington and Oregon State that can get a quality bowl bid and might be as good as the best in the South.
TheSportsNotebook’s college football coverage has broken down each of the two divisions at the links below. I’m taking Stanford to win the North, and taking a flyer on Arizona State in the South. There’s no doubt I have the Cardinal winning the conference championship, with the only question being whether Stanford merits being chosen to reach the BCS National Championship Game. In either case, that puts them in Pasadena for the second straight year.
The Pac-12 South was supposed to be a walk in the park for USC in 2012. Instead, the Trojans stumbled, lost the division to crosstown rival UCLA, nearly got head coach Lane Kiffin fired and now look at a balanced landscape for the 2013 season.
USC remains a contender to win this division, even as Matt Barkley goes into the NFL to hook up with old nemesis Chip Kelly and the Philadelphia Eagles. But UCLA isn’t going anywhere, and now Arizona State and Arizona have to be considered candidates to represent the league in the conference championship game. TheSportsNotebook’s college football coverage breaks down the four prime contenders…
FOUR ON THE FLOOR
USC: Barkley may be gone, but Max Witten got game experience at the end of last year when the incumbent was injured. Witten still has All-Everything receiver Marqise Lee back at receiver. Lee is the best Heisman candidate among players at non-traditional positions, and USC also returns running back Silas Redd.
The Trojans should be tougher in the trenches than was the case in 2012, when both UCLA and Notre Dame outhit them at the end of the regular season. The offensive front is experienced, and a lot of the defensive front seven is back. An extra year of maturity and being in the weight room should make a difference.
USC’s problems will be in its defensive backfield, where there is rebuilding to do, and ultimately regarding the coaching of Kiffin, who has still yet to actually prove he is capable of handling a gig like this one.
UCLA: The Bruins say goodbye to Jonathan Franklin, a tough runner who led their ground attack all the way to the conference championship game before losing to Stanford. But the offensive front that paved the way for Franklin is back, and so is sophomore quarterback Brett Hundley, who survived trial by fire as a freshman starter.
Jim Mora Jr. immediately turned around the entire culture of this program, which had developed an inferiority complex to USC. He’s got a good defense to work with, starting with his front seven and defensive end Cassius Marsh. Like the Trojans, UCLA’s big problem will be re-tooling its defensive secondary.
There’s no question though, that this program is on the rise. It might be a two-year process due to the lack of senior starters, but the Bruins can start to think about their first Rose Bowl since 1998.
Arizona State: Todd Graham is in his second year in Tempe, and his team has already started to become a trendy pick to win the Pac-12 South. They closed the year by beating Arizona, and then winning a bowl game over Navy, 62-48. Junior quarterback Taylor Kelly made great strides, he’s protected by an excellent left tackle in Evan Finkenburg and has a good tight end target in Chris Cole.
The defensive front seven is stacked with senior leadership, starting with All-American tackle Will Sutton on the nose. The Sun Devils won’t be outhit by anyone, and they have a playmaker at linebacker in Carl Bradford. There’s still more experience in the secondary. It’s easy to see why this team is getting some love to represent the South in the Pac-12 Championship Game.
Arizona: Rich Rodriguez made an instant impact during his first year in Tucson, putting the Wildcats back into postseason play and knocking off USC and pushing Stanford to overtime. But Arizona also lost to UCLA by a 66-10 count, and ending the year by losing to Arizona State and barely surviving mediocre Nevada in a bowl game was a disappointment. It’s tough to see Arizona making big strides in 2013.
The offensive line has three starters back, but only one senior. Ka’deem Carey may be the best back in the entire league, but there’s uncertainty at quarterback and wide receiver Austin Hill was lost to a torn ACL in spring practice.
Arizona could win with defense, with ten starters back and most of them upperclassmen. Normally I would expect such a team to do just that…but since when has Rich Rodriguez ever won with defense? If that trend breaks and Rich-Rod finds a quarterback, his team can get in the middle of this race. Otherwise, pencil them in for fourth, a low-level bowl game and better things next season.
THE ALSO-RANS
The football fans at Utah and Colorado have seen better days. While it’s unfair to Utah to put them in the same class as Colorado—the Utes are merely subpar, while the Buffs are genuinely horrific—neither is going to a bowl game in 2013.
Utah: The transition to the Pac-12 has been predictably challenging. This isn’t a terrible team, and bringing in Dennis Erickson to help the offensive staff could aid sophomore quarterback Travis Wilson in his development. But the Utes are just not tough enough in the trenches and they have problems in the secondary and even improvement on offense only means mediocrity.
Colorado: Mike MacIntyre turned San Jose State into a bowl team and now tries to turn around the Buffalo program. This is a team that won game last year, and that by a single point, 35-34 over Washington State.
The team is young—even with 15 starters back this year, they’re projected to have 16 more back in 2014. If you combine youth with a head coach that I like, you’ve got the formula for growth. But growth in 2013 doesn’t mean anymore than three wins.
THE PICK
This one’s really close, and I can think of good reasons to take any of UCLA, USC or Arizona State. But I’m going to go with the Sun Devils. I’m a little leery of whether Graham can get them this level, but at this point in his career I’m giving him the benefit of the doubt and I really like the defense he has going in Tempe.
The Pac-12 North breaks down pretty neatly into three clear segments. Stanford and Oregon have emerged as the clear powers of this division, with the race essentially boiling down to their head-to-head meeting.
Washington and Oregon State are solid bowl teams, maybe capable of throwing a scare into one of the Big Two, maybe even beating them…but not likely to actually win the division. Then there’s Cal and Washington State that have to hope better days are around the corner. TheSportsNotebook’scollege football coverage hones in on the Pac-12 North…
THE BIG TWO
I’m not sure how enduring football powers got built in Palo Alto and Eugene, but that’s exactly what happened. Mike Bellotti turned Oregon into a national contender, turned the reins over to Chip Kelly, who promptly took the program up another level.
Jim Harbaugh put Stanford on the map. He left for the NFL, David Shaw took over and led the team to the Fiesta Bowl. Lest anyone think that it was really about Andrew Luck, Shaw’s Cardinals won the Pac-12 and the Rose Bowl in 2012.
We have to see if the beat goes on at Oregon, with Kelly now in the NFL himself, and if Stanford can meet the burden of high expectations, but there’s no reason to think they won’t.
Stanford: The Cardinal is loaded for a run at the national championship. There are no weaknesses on the defense, with playmaking ends Ben Gardner and Henry Ariden, and the secondary is aggressive and smart, led by corner Alex Carter.
Kevin Hogan was given the keys to the offense midway through last year as a freshman, and had he started from the outset, Stanford might not have lost two early games, including a controversial overtime defeat at Notre Dame. Hogan led the team to all of its big-game wins—at Oregon, twice over UCLA and then over Wisconsin in the Rose Bowl.
Shaw has to replace the physical Stephan Taylor in the backfield, but whomever gets the ball is going to run behind an experienced offensive line led by All-American guard David Yankey. The Cardinal has turned into one of the most genuinely physical teams in the country and they match up with anybody in the trenches.
Oregon: The new man in charge is Mark Helfrich, who worked as Kelly’s offensive coordinator. So not only is the coordinator of the Ducks’ high-powered offense back, but so are the key pieces.
Marcus Mariota was electrifying as a freshman quarterback. He threw 32 touchdowns against six interceptions, completed 69 percent of his passes and did all this while his real strength was running the football. Mariota’s key targets are all back, and while running back Kejon Barner has to be replaced, there is a good offensive line blocking for him.
The Ducks’ defensive strength starts in the secondary, where everybody is back. This is an area that has to improve, because too often, Oregon’s offense had to bail out some questionable defense—notably in a 62-51 win over USC. Defensive end Taylor Hart is a good pass rusher, while some re-tooling has to be done at linebacker.
THE BOWL TEAMS
Oregon State: If anyone is going to challenge the big boys, it’s going to be the Beavers. Oregon State won nine games a year ago and appeared to have Texas beaten in the Alamo Bowl, before allowing the Longhorns to come back. Mike Riley is a seasoned head coach, he has two experienced quarterbacks to choose from Cody Vaz and Sean Mannion, and they can throw to arguably the North division’s best receiver in Brandin Cooks. And the offensive line is back and heavy on senior leadership.
The defense is keyed by end Scott Crichton, who had nine sacks in 2012, the linebackers are back, as are both safeties. Rashaad Reynolds is a quick and talented corner, and while this isn’t a great defense, it’s going to be a pretty good one.
Oregon State is going to be this year what Mississippi State was in 2012. The Bulldogs started the season 7-0, but no one knew what to think of them because all the tough games were backloaded. So it is with the Beavers in 2013. They should be 7-0 on October 26 when a stretch of games that has Stanford, USC, Arizona, Washington and the season-ender with Oregon begins.
For the sake of the Beavers, I hope that’s as far as the Mississippi State analogy stretches, because the Bulldogs collapsed. Oregon State should be able to at least get a couple wins out of that stretch.
Washington: No one expects head coach Steve Sarkisian to win this division, given the quality of the competition, but the Huskies have to get off this stretch of just barely sneaking into bowls. Last year’s 7-5 and respectable loss to Boise State was typical. Washington is good enough that you remember how bad the situation was when Sarkisian took over, but you also find yourself wanting more.
Keith Price is a good quarterback and a fifth-year senior. He’s protected a pretty good offensive line, and supported by 1,400-yard rusher Bishop Sankey. The defense has returning players throughout the lineup and should be better. Washington should aspire to at least an eight-win regular season and to be the kind of team that we think of as one that could win the Pac-12 South, but is just stuck underneath Stanford and Oregon. Those are reasonable goals.
THE REBUILDING PROJECTS
Cal: Jeff Tedford’s run in Berkeley came to an end with a three-win season and Sonny Dykes has taken over. There are six underclassmen starting on offense, inexperience in the secondary, no reliable quarterback and on top of all that, Dykes is shifting to a 4-3 defensive scheme that will require his two bright spots—former outside linebackers Brennan Scarlet and Chris McCain to become ends in a down position. And McCain only goes 215 pounds. But Dykes is smart to bite the bullet hard this year.
Washington State: Mike Leach only won three games in 2012, but there’s potential for some modest improvement. Junior quarterback Connor Halliday showed some flashes last year and he can grow with an offense that six sophomores projected to start. The defensive secondary is a strength, which can help if Leach’s high-voltage attack can create some shootouts, but the Cougars are still badly outmanned in the trenches.
THE PICK
I’m taking Stanford to win this division. They look a little bit ahead of Oregon in any case, and when you factor in the coaching change in Eugene, plus the head-to-head game being in Palo Alto, and it becomes clear the Cardinal is the favorite. I like Oregon State for third and would give them a puncher’s chance at an upset of either heavyweight. The great run for sports in northern California—of which Stanford has already been a part—keeps rolling on.
Oregon might look on a roll to the Pac-12 title, and if BCS experts are to be believed, on their way to the national championship game so long as they keep winning. But Pac-12 football has still got two other storylines of significant intrigue. The first is who gets the right to challenge the Ducks in the conference championship game. The second is who—presuming Oregon wins out—would be a candidate to replace the Ducks in the Rose Bowl.
There are five teams in contention for at least one of these honors. Oregon State and Stanford will both get their chances to upend Oregon in the regular season and take the league for themselves, but the Beavers and Cards would also be in line for runner-up bowl spots. And in the Pac-12 South, it’s still completely up in the air. UCLA is in first place, with a 4-2 league record, with USC at 4-3 and Arizona State at 3-3. But the Trojans and Sun Devils play each other on Saturday, and then USC plays UCLA the following week. So Lane Kiffin’s team could get another chance at Oregon and prove they can hold the Ducks below 60.
Let’s start with the landscape we know will be crucial and it’s who wins the Pac-12 South. UCLA has become a different team under the leadership of Jim Mora Jr. This is a physically tough football team, with Jonathan Franklin second in the league in rush yards.
UCLA has beaten likely Big Ten champ Nebraska, Conference USA contender Houston, lost a close one to Oregon State and then sent a message loud and clear last week when they pummeled Arizona 66-10—the same Arizona team who beat USC just a week prior. The Bruins’ weakness in a big game would be that they are led by a freshman quarterback, Brett Hundley, who hasn’t really shown he can win a game where he has to throw.
USC has never looked the part of a national contender, at least once we stepped out of preseason analysis (Yes, I picked them to win it all) and onto the field. You can’t argue with Matt Barkley’s numbers—65 percent completion, 30/10 TD-INT ratio, but you can compare them to last year, when he only had seven picks all year.
The Trojans can still score in bunches—as their 51 points against Oregon last week showed—and their receiver tandem of Marqise Lee and Robert Woods is as good as any in the country. But the running game, led by Penn State transfer Silas Redd has been hit-and-miss, and the defense’s question marks have come into full view, not just last week, but in the prior week’s 39-36 loss at Arizona.
Arizona State is the longshot in this race. They’ve got a head-to-head loss amongst the contenders, losing a tough 45-43 decision to UCLA. The points put up by the Bruins make you wonder about ASU’s defense. The numbers tell us the Sun Devils are third in the Pac-12 in points allowed. But with a game against USC up next, is that ranking going to plummet further.
Todd Graham is doing a nice job with this team and with sophomore quarterback Taylor Kelly. They’re 5-4 overall after suffering significant personnel losses and making the coaching change. They’ve got a talented defensive tackle in Will Sutton, who leads the conference with 9.5 sacks. But they haven’t beaten anyone of note and have the look of a 6-6 bowl team. Still, that’s more than might have been expected in August.
I think it’s difficult to argue with the notion that UCLA has played the best of these three teams so far, but a mix of stubbornness and concern about Hundley in a big game still leads me to pick USC to win these next two games and get another chance to play Oregon.
Presuming Oregon goes 12-0, wins the league title and goes to the BCS National Championship Game, the Rose Bowl will have to pick a replacement team. It’s not required that they pick another Pac-12 team, but Pasadena officials have shown a consistent desire to maintain Big Ten-Pac-12 purity as much as possible. There’s going to be some huge temptations to break tradition—Notre Dame is likely to be available and as long as the Irish haven’t already played the Big Ten champ (i.e., if it’s Michigan)—it’s hard to see the Rose passing on ND.
But tradition matters in Pasadena, and passing on the Pac-12 leaves the bowl without a nearby team—it’s much easier to envision the Rose replacing a Big Ten team with Notre Dame, since they could at least keep a Midwest vs. West matchup. So though at this writing, I believe the Irish would replace Oregon, it’s far from a guarantee. And that brings runner-ups in the Pac-12 North into the equation.
Oregon State is the most logical candidate. The Beavers have to clear a tough hurdle on Saturday when they go to Stanford, but after that it’s just Cal and Nicholls State (a December 1 makeup game) to get 10 wins. Between those two games would be the showdown with Oregon, where the Beavers can take their shot at the conference title, but even a competitive loss would leave them 10-2 and an attractive candidate.
Mike Riley’s team has done it in spite of injury problems at quarterback. When sophomore QB Sean Mannion went down midway through, a lot of us figured the dream of a major bowl game was done. But Cody Vaz stepped in and played so well that when Mannion struggled in his first start back, Riley went right back to Vaz. He’s got two of the top receivers in the league to throw to, in Brandin Cook and Markus Wheaton. Defensively, end Scott Crichton is one of the Pac-12’s best pass rushers and corner Jordon Poyer is a ballhawk. This team’s only loss was a close one at Washington, a likely bowl team.
Then we come to Stanford, who is tied with Oregon State, at 5-1 in league play and also gets a crack at Oregon this month, meaning the Cardinal controls its own destiny. They run the ball very well, with Stephan Taylor nearing the 1,000 yard mark and they play good defense. What they haven’t gotten is consistency at the quarterback spot and Kevin Hogan has now replaced Josh Nunes behind center. And the team is entering the two key games where their quarterback will have to make at least a few plays to win.
Ultimately, Stanford’s biggest problem is math. If we talk about them as a replacement pick for the Rose Bowl, that means they lost to Oregon. Even if they beat Oregon State, the Cardinal would still be 9-3. Would that be good enough to merit a selection for a BCS game? They currently rank 14th in the BCS standings and so long as the Oregon loss was competitive (far from a sure thing), a 9-3 finish would likely nudge them up a bit, given the opportunity to beat Oregon State, currently #11. In a lot of years that might be enough. But would a three-loss Stanford team be chosen over a potentially undefeated—or even an 11-1 Notre Dame squad that beat the Cardinal? I have my doubts.
The guess here then, is that USC visits Oregon for the Pac-12 Championship Game (this league awards homefield advantage for its title game), and the league’s other contenders are edged out by Notre Dame for a Rose Bowl spot. The next bid down would be the Alamo (against the Big 12’s best non-BCS team) and unless USC can win its remaining regular season games—including Notre Dame—the winner of Saturday’s Oregon State-Stanford game ends up in San Antonio.
Six teams are worth looking at right now. Stanford, USC, UCLA and Arizona State would have to be the frontrunners, with Washington and Arizona still on the radar.
