To Start, a Bevy of Bellwether Games

It might not take long to find out how watered down the Pacific 10 Conference is this year coming off a 2-5 bowl season and the departure of marquee players Carson Palmer, Jason Gesser, Kyle Boller, Shaun McDonald and Terrell Suggs.

You say the Pac-10 is still where it’s at?

This weekend, it is Washington at Ohio State, USC at Auburn and Oregon at Mississippi State.

All three games are doable, and losable too, with a distinct tone-setting quality.

The openers include cross-country travel, hotel food, bus rides, humidity, asphalt hot enough to scramble eggs and fans so rabid many may by camped outside stadium gates as we write.

These road-kill openers don’t have to be make-or-break. In 1974, USC opened with a loss at Arkansas in Little Rock and recovered to finish 10-1-1.

Terry Donahue’s UCLA Bruins got crushed at Oklahoma, 38-3, to open 1986, but won six of their next seven and finished 8-3.

Sometimes, winning a big road opener means center squat. In 2001, UCLA won at Alabama but fizzled to a 7-4 finish.

Still, early buzz-saw games can be telling of overall conference strength and provide a pin-prick to wind-bag potential.

In 1999, Arizona took a highly touted team into State College and got hammered by Penn State, 41-7. Arizona finished 7-7.

Last year, Washington opened at Michigan, rallied from 14 points down to take the lead, only to squander victory late when the Huskies were cited for having 12 men on the field, allowing Michigan a chance to kick the game-winning field goal.

That bitter defeat started the tailspin toward 7-6 and the end of Rick Neuheisel’s career as we knew it.

Of this weekend’s games, Oregon stands the best chance of coming out with more points, but it’s no cinch. Oregon crushed Mississippi State, 36-13, last year in Eugene, but Eugene is not Starkville.

Oregon is mystery meat after last year’s collapse following a 6-0 start. Also, this may be Jackie Sherrill’s last stand at Mississippi State after last year’s 3-9 finish, and the Bulldogs will no doubt be poised for revenge. Sherrill already has made a stink about Nike playing sponsor favoritism to Oregon just for the fact Nike chief Phil Knight has poured millions of dollars into Oregon, his alma mater.

At Auburn, where fans bent on winning a national title this year will be teeming in the late-evening steam of Jordan-Hare Stadium, USC gets to ... break in a new starting quarterback and tailback.

USC’s defense is good enough to keep this game close while the offense tries to get its swamp legs, but where is that home opener against McNeese State when Matt Leinart needs it?

In Washington, there’s no problem at quarterback as the Huskies return senior Cody Pickett, one of the nation’s best.

In Washington, they’re breaking in a new coach.

And while Keith Gilbertson didn’t fall off the back of a pickup, with a long career of service in college and the pros that included a head-coaching hitch at California, that doesn’t mean he won’t be jelly-legged when he trots his team on the field in Columbus, Ohio.

“Well, am I going to be excited about the game?” Gilbertson said. “Heck, yeah. Am I going to be nervous? Sure, I’m going to be nervous. It’s an unbelievable facility they have. They have great fans, they have a great passionate following, it’s one of the great places in college football.... You know, I’ve been a head coach before and been to some places I thought were tough, maybe not anywhere like Columbus, obviously.”

Washington has what it takes to settle Gilbertson’s stomach, namely the pass-catch combination of Pickett to Reggie Williams.

Pickett became the Pac-10’s first 4,000-yard passer last year and Williams caught 94 passes for 1,454 yards and 11 touchdowns.

Relax, coach, they’ve got you covered.

“It’s their first game too, you know, right out of the gate,” Pickett said of Ohio State, the defending national champions. “That’s why you come to a big school, to play in big games. We couldn’t ask for anything better.”

Pac Bits

This weekend is only the start of a tough nonconference road schedule in 2003.

UCLA plays at Colorado and Oklahoma, USC and Washington State have to travel to Notre Dame, and Arizona must go to Purdue.

It’s no secret Washington must improve its woeful rushing offense to have a chance to win Saturday and contend for the conference title. The Huskies ranked ninth last year, averaging only 74.5 yards a game. Word is senior tailback Rich Alexis, whose yards-per-carry average fell from 6.2 in 2000 to 3.4 last year, is ready for a bounce-back season after dropping to fourth on the depth chart at one point.

“Rich is in great shape right now, he’s running hard, and he’s going to be ready,” Pickett said.

California put up a credible fight in last weekend’s 42-28 loss to powerhouse Kansas State. What was incredible, however, was the Cal coaching staff’s first-half decision to run an option play on fourth-and-inches near the Kansas State goal line.

Two words: quarterback sneak. Cal needed only inches to secure a first and goal, but lost it all when Reggie Robertson was nailed for a loss running parallel to the line of scrimmage.

Instead of taking a 14-10 lead, Cal gave the ball back to Kansas State, which (naturally) drove the length of the field for a touchdown to make it 17-7.

Momentum lost, game over.

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FINAL 2002 PACIFIC 10 STANDINGS

*--* Conference Overall TEAM W L W L PF PA USC 7 1 10 2 427 223 WASHINGTON STATE 7 1 10 2 417 262 ARIZONA STATE 5 3 8 5 425 373 OREGON STATE 4 4 8 4 401 229 CALIFORNIA 4 4 7 5 427 318 UCLA 4 4 7 5 360 313 WASHINGTON 4 4 7 5 374 308 OREGON 3 5 7 5 400 324 ARIZONA 1 7 4 8 227 310 STANFORD 1 7 2 9 225 377

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Regular season