Here's the update that I'll have in the Monday paper as the Huskies head into bye week:

LAST WEEK
Washington (2-3, 0-2) lost its third straight game and slipped below .500 for the first time this season with a 27-24 loss to No. 1 USC at Husky Stadium. However, that score does not reflect the Trojans statistical domination. USC mistakes left the door to a major upset ajar, but UW couldn’t push through.

SOMETHING TO BUILD ON
The Huskies played at less than their best and still took the nation’s top-ranked team into the final minute. UW played the Trojans evenly in the second half and actually outscored them in the fourth quarter. The defense held USC to 19 rushing yards in the fourth quarter when the Trojans wanted to run the clock.

SOMETHING TO WORK ON
Jake Locker’s passing accuracy is becoming a problem as UW ranks last in the league in passing offense and efficiency. Louis Rankin was held under 50 rushing yards for the fourth straight game, but the coaches won’t give anyone else a shot. The defense continues to surrender big plays and big numbers.

PERSONNEL ISSUES
Safety Jason Wells suffered what is expected to be a long-term knee injury. Donald Butler is taking over at middle linebacker. Rankin is doing double-duty as kick returner. Cameron Elisara and Erick Lobos got increased snaps at Wilson Afoa’s DT spot. Freshman OL Matt Sedillo made his college debut.

THE WEEK AHEAD
The Huskies move into a bye week that several coaches and players say is well timed for them to regroup physically and mentally. They return to action Oct. 13 at No. 18 Arizona State, the first of eight games over the remaining eight weeks of the regular season. UW must win five of those to be bowl eligible

USC survived its mistake-prone game against Washington with a victory, but not with its No. 1 ranking ... at least not in the AP media poll.

The writers moved previous No. 2 LSU past the Trojans, while USC remained on top in the coaches poll.

Here is my game story, columnist John McGrath's take, Ryan Divish's report from the USC locker room and TNT photos from the game.

Bottom line: On a day of upsets all across the country, that was a game that was there to be won.

Southern California outgained Washington 460 total yards to 190. However, the Huskies stayed close because the Trojans committed 16 penalties for 161 yards, threw two interceptions, lost one fumbles, and suffered a blocked punt. The penalty yardage was the third-most ever by a UW opponent.

Not too surprisingly, USC coach Pete Carroll thought his team just made too many mistakes, while the UW coaches thought the Huskies forced the Trojans into those mistakes. Note Willingham's quote below regarding those penalties.

However, overall, the bottom line from Willingham and his players is that they're not taking much consolation in coming close, and they're not satisfied because they once again failed to get their breakthough win.

Beyond that, the lingering problem could be the loss of safety Jason Wells, which Willingham said would be long-term.

Some other notes:

Player of the game USC tailback Stafon Johnson came off the bench to be the game’s leading rusher with 122 yards on 14 carries – an 8.7 yard average – and he scored one touchdown.

Defensive player of the game Safety Mesphin Forrester led Washington and tied for a game-high with 10 tackles. He also intercepted a pass that had deflected off of USC fullback Stanley Havili and returned it 54 yards for a touchdown.

Personnel report UW safety Jason Wells suffered a knee injury. He watched the rest of the game on crutches and coach Tyrone Willingham said it appears to be a “long-term” injury and “a major loss for us.” Center Juan Garcia went out briefly with an ankle injury and was replaced by freshman Matt Sedillo, making his college debut. However, Garcia returned on the next series and finished the game. Safety Nate Williams and defensive tackle Wilson Afoa also missed time for the Huskies before returning. USC offensive lineman Kristofer O’Dowd and Chilo Rachal both went down with knee sprains on the same play and did not return. USC cornerback Shareece Wright went out with a hamstring injury.

Quote “If I’m (USC’s) coach I’m alarmed by that many penalties, but at the same time, I think our guys were playing and forcing some things. We probably could have gotten 32 (penalties) on just holding alone. … As I told one of the officials, ‘Those are commemorative jerseys, there won’t be anything left of those jerseys they way they were pulled and grabbed and held.’” – UW coach Tyrone Willingham on USC’s 16 penalties.

Extra points The Huskies wore throwback jerseys in recognition of the 1960 Helms Foundation national champions, who were honored at halftime. … In the first quarter, Wells recorded his first career interception. … Cody Ellis of Puyallup made his first reception of the season. … Anthony Russo of Lakewood caught four passes, extending his consecutive-game reception streak to 29. ... UW had a season-high five first downs by penalty. … Roy Lewis recorded the Huskies’ first blocked punt of the season. … The Huskies trailed at halftime for the first time after six straight games either ahead or even. … Ryan Perkins’ 37-yard field goal was the longest of his career. … UW game captains were Anthony Russo, Juan Garcia, Jordan Reffett and Donald Butler.

Next The Huskies are off next weekend. They will return to action Oct. 13 at Arizona State. Kickoff time and possible telecast information are yet to be announced.

A few other quotes that didn't get into my story:

TYRONE WILLINGHAM
(On UW hanging close to USC two seasons in a row) Especially this year, this will be a year that maybe some surprises happen. I think our conference is pretty strong. I don’t think that there’s a weekend that you can take off in the Pac-10 and that’s top to bottom. If you don’t bring your whole game, you’re going to be in trouble, because everybody can find ways to get it done and I wouldn’t be surprised if things shake out differently than people expect.

(On whether USC's mistakes were forced or unforced) "They made some mistakes, there’s no question about that. And I think my words at the beginning of this week was we do not have to play a perfect game to win – I was very clear on that – but when we made our mistakes, we couldn’t let our chin drops. And we had a couple of those lapse periods.

LOCKER
We lost by three points tonight. We had a lot of opportunities. We just have to find a way to get over that hump.

DEFENSIVE COORDINATOR KENT BAER
We forced them into mistakes. We gave them some defenses I think confused them a little bit. I think we forced them into mistakes. I know they put the ball on the ground a couple of times, but both sides made mistakes. I thought we could take advantage of a couple of things, and we did.

Lots of mistakes by both sides.

USC leads first downs, 11-10; passing yards 109-48; rushing yards, 159-76, and total yards, 268-124.

However, a Mesphin Forrester 54-yard interception return gave UW just the kind of quick score everyone expected they might need in a game against the nation's No. 1 team.

And ... lots of upsets across the country today ...

Lots of mistakes both ways.

Huskies had the best scoring opportunity, but Jake Locker missed a wide open Corey Williams in the end zone.

However, two SC starting offensive linement went down on the same play, and they have both been carted to the locker room.

(And now, as I type this, UW safety Jason Wells -- who got his first career interception in the first quarter -- is down on the field as his right leg is being attended to.)

2:40 p.m.: Just arrived at the stadium. Not as much traffic today as the past couple of home games, and from what I hear, maybe a slightly smaller crowd.

It's also a much drearier day: cloudy, cool, breezy and a slight drizzle that is expected to give way to rain by the second half.

From here, usual game-day drill: I'll pop in with news as it develops, try to pop in with quarterly reports, and then turn things over to you guys for postgame discussion, before I'll finally hop in again with quotes and notes.

3:50: A few players from each team are out on the field getting loose: Trojans in their bright yellow pants and Huskies in their pale gold. However, neither team has their game jerseys on ... which means I haven't gotten a look yet at the throwback jerseys. However, they're doing a nice job of honoring the 1960 team on the video board.

4:20: Huskies out in their throwback uniforms. Very dark jerseys. Very cool numbers. I'd vote for keeping those numbers.

5:05: Captains for today's game are Anthony Russo, Juan Gartcia, Jordan Reffett and Donald Butler.

No news out of UW on Friday, so we can turn our attention to this evening and the USC game.

NO. 1 SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA (3-0, 1-0)
AT WASHINGTON (2-2, 0-1)

Kickoff: 5 p.m., Husky Stadium

Television: ABC. Radio: 950-AM.

The series: USC leads 47-26-4 overall and 17-16-4 in Husky Stadium. The Trojans have won the last five meetings.

What to watch: Even if it hurts, Huskies fans have the rare opportunity to see what may be one of the best college teams, now or ever. Former O’Dea star Taylor Mays in the SC secondary offers an interesting game-within-the-game match with former Ferndale star quarterback Jake Locker for UW. Despite the apparent talent disparity, the Huskies found a way to take the Trojans down to the final whistle last season, and that has provided a rallying cry this week. Huskies opened up the deep-passing game last week at UCLA, and they might try again, although SC’s cover-two defense, pass rush and all-round speed make it difficult. The Huskies will wear replica uniforms of the 1960 Helms Foundation national championship team, which will be honored at halftime.

What’s at stake: Every game is must-win for USC’s national championship ambitions, and perhaps even for its Pacific-10 Conference title hopes. The Trojans have won 13 straight September games. Washington wants to avoid an 0-2 start in the conference, a third straight loss overall, and falling below .500 going into its bye week.

In tomorrow's paper, I'll have a story on the 1960 Huskies and my opinion on UW recognizing their claim to the national football championship after all these years.

In terms of pure news, there wasn't much out of our meeting with coach Willingham today.

He clarified that all of the starters who were available last week -- including linebacker E.J. Savannah, who had been bothered with a neck stinger -- will be available Saturday. The only player with a new injury that might keep him out is linebacker Matt Houston, who has been used mostly on special teams.

Willingham also said that with the start of the new school quarter, the freshman receivers Devin Aguilar and Anthony Boyles are still awaiting their ACT scores are now certainly out until winter at the earliers. And that despite the start of fall classes, no walk-on players have been awarded scholarships ... although that might happen later.

Lou Gellman, the familiar voice of "Hello Dawg Fans" in Husky Stadium since 1985, has announced his retirement.

He'll voice his familiar greeting one last time on Saturday before turning over the mike to his successor.

Here is the complete UW release.

I attended the University of Southern Mississippi and I cover the Univeristy of Washington, but those two paths don't cross very often.

However, they did in this story from the Idaho Statesman, in which Boise State players compare the UW team they played in the second week of the season with the USM team they'll play tonight.

If you want to check for yourself, the Boise State-Southern Miss game -- which pairs of couple of teams regularly among the nation's best mid-majors -- will kickoff at 4:30 on ESPN.

No. 1 Southern California at Washington. Huskies managed to take the Trojans to the final play last season. But USC just has the talent advantage everywhere, and it's hard to see that happening again. SC, 46-17.

No. 6 California at No. 11 Oregon. Very important game, and should be a lot of fun to watch. These offenses are averaging a combined 90 points per game. Ducks, 36-34.

No. 23 Arizona State at Stanford. Both of these teams are improved under their new coaches, but ASU wasn't as far down and remains far ahead. ASU, 33-15.

UCLA at Oregon State. Two inconsistent mystery teams, so it depends on which versions show up. Given that unknowable, I'll go with the home field advantage. OSU, 27-24.

Washington State at Arizona. Another interesting match. And one with importance to both team's shaky bowl hopes. Wildcats offense coming on, but Cougs offense already there. WSU, 42-37.

Last week: 5-0
Season: 19-3

I didn't go up to UW yesterday, while working instead on our Football Friday package. However, TNT sportswriter Ryan Divish did go up, and here is his story on would-be-Husky/former O'Dea/USC safety Taylor Mays.

Remember all that above-and-beyond praise Pete Carroll heaped on Jake Locker earlier this week? UW offensive coordinator Tim Lappano matches and raises with his praise of Mays.

Locker and Mays on the field at the same time Saturday will be a fascinating game-within-a-game subplot.

Meanwhile, I really liked the LA Daily News' UCLA coverage last week, and they're doing a nice job this week with USC. Here's the latest on a USC defensive loss, and the Trojans resulting adjustments. And once again, this relates directly to how the Trojans plan to deal with Locker.

1 USC (1) 3-0, 1-0: QB John David Booty completing 70 percent of his passes.

2 California (2) 4-0, 1-0: QB Nate Longshore already over 4,000 career passing yards.

3 Arizona State (3) 4-0, 1-0: Leading Pac-10 in scoring defense and interceptions.

4 Oregon (4) 4-0, 1-0: Lacey's own Jonathan Stewart is Pac-10’s rushing leader, averaging 126 ypg.

5 UCLA (5) 3-1, 2-0: Bounced back admirably after Utah embarrassment.

6 Oregon State (8) 2-2, 0-1: Defense yielding average of less than 1 yard per rush.

7 Washington (6) 2-2, 0-1: Jake Locker is top rushing QB in the conference.

8 Washington State (7) 2-2, 0-1: Alex Brink leads Pac-10 with 12 TD passes.

9 Stanford (9) 1-2, 0-2: Free safety Bo McNalley leads league with 10.7 tackles per game.

10 Arizona (10) 1-3, 0-1: Offense might be coming around; but defense allowing almost 30 a game.

The Huskies become true student-athletes today, as the university finally holds the first classes of the fall quarter.

“That is always a concern of mine because now … there is a lot more on their plate,” coach Tyrone Willingham said. “They are officially back in school and we expect our guys to embrace that wholeheartedly. … Any time you add more responsibilities, it puts stress on you just a little bit more.”

Different Huskies weighed the impact differently.

“You don’t have mornings off, you can’t sleep in as much because we have to get up and go to class,” said quarterback Jake Locker, beginning his second season on a college campus. “But for the most part, you have your homework at night – write a paper here and there ­– but it’s not a huge difference.”

Senior cornerback Roy Lewis had a different perspective.

“A major schedule change,” he said. “Everyone has to get their priorities straight.”

At 2:20 this afternoon I'll be talking Huskies with the Groz on KJR, 950-AM.

The conversation also will be streamed over the Internet.

My Pac-10 roundup in the Wednesday paper will sort of unavoidably jump in on the controversy that arose after Oklahoma State football coach Mike Gundy used a weekend press conference to unleash screaming criticism at Daily Oklahoman columnist Jenni Carlson, who had written that Zac Robinson taking the starting quarterback job from Bobby Reid was "less about Robinson's play and more about Reid's attitude."

Interestingly, Pac-10 coaches were all over the map in their opinions of how much their players -- all amateurs, some teenages -- should be subject to public criticism.

Turing to the actual playing field, every Pac-10 team plays another league member this week, highlighted by No. 6 California at No. 11 Oregon. The other games match No. 23 Arizona State at Stanford, UCLA at Oregon State, Washington State at Arizona and No. 1 Southern California at Washington.

Notes from around the league:

ARIZONA: The Wildcats are allowing an average of 29.5 points per game, a figure coach Mike Stoops said could remain higher than usual because “this is probably the most talented group of offensive players in the Pac-10 ever assembled.”

USC: Coach Pete Carroll hinted that his school is about to make a major announcement regarding improved facilities. He conceded the obvious: USC’s relatively outdated facilities haven’t notably stunted his program’s success. However, he added, “It’s most important to take care of the athletes in the best way that’s possible.”

UCLA: Coach Karl Dorrell announced that Ben Olson will start at quarterback this week. Olson had sat out the Washington game due to concussion-like symptoms. However, he will return to the job this week, replacing Patrick Cowan, who suffered a knee ligament tear against the Huskies.

OREGON: Coach Mike Bellotti expressed “great pride” in former Oregon coach Rich Brooks' success at Kentucky, which is 4-0 and 14th ranked. “He did that here at Oregon,” Bellotti said. “He took a program at the bottom and brought it up.” … The Ducks lead the Pac-10 in scoring offense and total offense. Bellotti divided the success between new offensive coordinator Chip Kelly and the players, saying Kelly inherited “a tremendously talented group” and has “taken it to another level.”

CALIFORNIA: For two offensive teams, Cal and Oregon have combined for only 85 points in their last two games at Autzen Stadium. Cal coach Jeff Tedford said rainy Oregon weather is partly responsible. However, the forecast for this weekend calls for clear skies and temperatures around 70. … ESPN GameDay will originate from Eugene on Saturday, and Tedford said that is a good thing for the conference, adding that he hopes the show also visits the Cal campus soon.

OREGON STATE: Coach Mike Riley said sophomore quarterback Sean Canfield was far better in the loss this week to Arizona State than he had been in an earlier loss at Cincinnati. “We’ve just got to help him,” he said. “We’ve got to coach him, and he has to make better throws.” Riley said the offense went nowhere in Cincinnati while it moved against Arizona State until “turnovers killed us.”

ARIZONA STATE: New coach Dennis Erickson was pleased but cautious about his team’s ascension to No. 23 nationally. “We’ve only played four games, so it’s just so hard to tell,” he said. “The thing that has happened is the players are buying in to what we’re doing offensively and defensively and on special teams.”

WASHINGTON STATE: Coach Bill Doba noted that in the Cougars first four games, they “won the ones they were supposed to (San Diego State and Idaho), but didn’t compete as well as I hoped in the other two (Wisconsin and USC).” WSU’s game Saturday at Arizona is the first where neither team rates as a significant favorite.

A couple of quick pieces of news drifted out today regarding the UW basketball team.

First, freshman point guard Venoy Overton has been cleared academically and will attend classes when school opens tomorrow.

Also, sophomore guard Adrian Oliver, who suffered a broken nose in the final game of the Huskies' five-game tour of Greece, will undergo surgery tomorrow. He is expected to be available to play when the Huskies open camp on Oct. 12, although he might play with a mask.

And finally, speaking of that opener, the team has decided against recreating the Husky Hoopla tip-off event of last season, with coach Lorenzo Romar returning to his favored practice of beginning practice with a few days of off-campus camp.

Washington's game at Stanford will kick off at 3:30 p.m. on Nov. 3 and will be televised regionally on FSN.

In my story today, I briefly touched on USC coach Pete Carroll's admiration for UW quarterback Jake Locker.

Carroll just repeated it in detail in the Pac-10 coaches' weekly conference call. Some of his comments:

“I think this guys is one of the best guys to come in the conference in a long time. ... I’ve been wowed by his talent. … (He's a_ pocket passer who runs like crazy. ... And he’s a battler. I think I’m impressed with his competititveness as much as anything else. ... He’s the real deal. When he has a couple of years experience, he’ll be phenominal.”

A few of you have asked about the Huskies' slow second halves this season, and wondering what kind of adjustments the UW staff is making.

So far this season, the Huskies have outscored their opponents 55-29 in the first halves, and have been outscored 70-56 in the second halves.

We asked coach Willingham about that at today's week-opening press conference:

"Your concern – and I think naturally so – is are you making adjustments and those kinds of things, and yes we are, we’re making adjustments," he said. "But obviously ours aren’t working. The thing that we’re doing is still not completing the task that we’re trying to complete. … You just keep working at it, because it has worked it has done things, and we’ve got to get ourselves in better position, and that’s the job of the coaches, that’s my job to get us in better position, and then we’ve got to make more plays. Some of those we can make, some of those we should have made. We just have to get it done."

Willingham added that he doesn't think the second-half problems are related to lack of depth.

He added that once the coaches make the adjustments, it is naturally up to the players to go execute properly... and made clear that didn't always happen Saturday in the loss to UCLA.

"We have to get our defense in the best possible position, and once in that position our guys have to execute their responsibility," he said. "We probably had, I thought, Saturday as many missed tackles as we’ve had in a while that showed up in some of the big places – that was part of the kickoff return, that was part of the long run, where we had the opportunity to make that play we didn’t make."

Some of you also have asked about Anthony Boyles and Devin Aguilar -- the UW receivers who weren't enrolled with the rest of this incoming class due to SAT scores. We also asked about those, because I had thought Willingham had said he might have something to report about the time the fall quarter begins ... and now classes begin Wednesday. However, Willingham said he had no news and that he can't do anything to affect the timing.

A few other notes:

*Willingham said he knows of no new injuries that should keep any Huskies out of the USC game. However, he added that he would know more by mid-week.

*The Huskies will become true student-athletes this week as classes begin Wednesday.

*Players of the week selected by UW coaches are Russo for offense and special teams, and linebacker Dan Howell on defense.

*UCLA’s Matthew Slater was selected Pac-10 special teams player of the week today after returning three kicks for 127 yards against the Huskies, including an 85-yard touchdown that proved to be the winning score.

Finally, we also got some access to USC coach Pete Carroll today. He tried to recruit Jake Locker down to Southern California, and today he seemed as high on Locker as ever:

"He’s decisive, he’s got a great arm, he’s naturally accurate," Carroll said. "He has the abilities to throw different types of throws: He can stick it when he has to and he can lay it up when he has too. The variety of things that they’ve done have given a real nice spread to their offense and they count on him to be a good dropback thrower, as well as a guy he can do it on the move. He’s just as much of a threat as a guy can be right now."

Naturally, opposing coaches always say good things about the team they're about to face. But Carroll went way beyond that today. This is a guy who should know plenty about top-level quarterbacks, and he just seems in love with Locker.

By the way, my Tuesday story will be about Locker hitting on a couple of long balls Saturday night, and what they might do to back off defenses that have been pushing forward to try to limit his running threat.

After their 13-point loss to UCLA last week, the Huskies have opened 21-point underdogs to No. 1 USC this week.

Here's my weekly state-of-the-Dawgs chart:

LAST WEEK
Washington (2-2 overall, 0-1 Pacific-10 Conference) made its sixth straight losing trip to UCLA (3-1, 2-0), falling to the Bruins, 44-31. The Huskies defense was gouged for 537 total yards, and UCLA created big scoring plays including an 85-yard kickoff return, a 72-yard run and a 60-yard interception return.

SOMETHING TO BUILD ON
The Huskies responded with some big plays of their own, scoring on 63- and 20-yard passes from Jake Locker to Anthony Russo. Several times when the Bruins seemed on the verge of putting the game away, UW answered with a score that pulled them close again. Locker was effective on the ground, rushing for 92 yards.

SOMETHING TO WORK ON
The Huskies couldn’t stop the UCLA running game, and they were one again unable to mount one of their own, aside from Locker. UW gave up huge plays on first down, giving UCLA a wide range of options on following downs. The Huskies repeatedly let the Bruins out of bad field position early.

PERSONNEL ISSUES
Matt Mosley started for the first time at cornerback, ahead of Vonzell McDowell Jr. Then Mosley gave way to Byron Davenport, who seemed a significant upgrade despite missing much practice with a hamstring injury. TB Louis Rankin was ineffective again, but the coaches seem unwilling to try anyone else.

THE WEEK AHEAD
The Dawgs face what is likely their toughest test of a tough schedule as No. 1-ranked Southern California (3-0, 1-0) visits Husky Stadium. Despite the loss, the Huskies stressed they believe they are up to such a challenge. UW will wear throwback uniforms to honor the 1960 team’s claim to a share of the national championship.

The Huskies saw what we saw. An odd game in which both offenses stumbled around in the first half and then engaged in a track meet in the second.

Senior receiver Anthony Russo may have summed up the 44-31 loss to UCLA best, saying, “(The offense) didn’t come through in the first half and the defense didn’t come through in the second half. We can’t do that. It has to all come together.”

Some post-game reactions:

OFFENSE

On offense, coordinator Tim Lappano found hope in scoring 31 points even though there was disappointment with the running game – other than Jake Locker – and inconsistency with the passing game.

“I think he loosened up in the second half, made some really nice throws, some good reads,” Lappano said. “We never quit in the second half. We moved the football, scored 31 points and we executed really poorly. If we execute better then we should put up more points, 40-45 points. But I was proud that they didn’t quit. They kept going in the second half. We were in the game 10-10 at halftime. I’m still not happy with our running game. I don’t think we’re generating near enough run without Jake. We’ve got to get that fixed somehow. We’ve got to get our tailbacks going and help that out a little bit. I’m not sure how good we did against their man cover. Without looking at the film we weren’t separating the way I thought we would. We did at times, but I don’t know how consistent we were in their man coverage.”

RECEIVERS

Russo said the receivers were confident they could get past the Bruins, and told the coaches, who apparently listened.

“We kept telling the coaches to go down field because we felt we can go by these guys,” Russo said. “They started giving up the plays and we made plays.”

As always, Locker took the down parts of the offensive performance on himself.

He said the interception returned 60 yards for a touchdown was just a bad pass, unrelated to any timing problems with little-used target D’Andre Goodwin.

On the 21-point second half, he said, “I think we just got into a rhythm. As an offense we got comfortable. I thought we executed our offense a little better in the second half and it equated to points on the board. I felt like we didn’t do what we needed to in the second half.”

THE RUNNING GAME

The other offensive concern was the running game, and especially the performance of Louis Rankin, who rushed for 42 yards – his third straight game held under 50.

However, neither coach Tyrone Willingham nor Lappano seems to think Rankin is the problem. Willingham said he considered replacing Rankin, but decided not to. Lappano said he considered going to another back only to give Rankin a rest.

“It’s never one person and that’s what we see,” Willingham said. “We’ve got to get better execution up front. We’ve got to get better execution from Louis. It’s everything. We’ve got to give him some opportunities. … It’s difficult sometimes when you’re not having success to get him in rhythm.”

“It doesn’t look like there’s a lot of room in there,” Lappano said. “I haven’t seen a lot of big seams in there and I’ve got a pretty good seat.”

Rankin wasn’t among those made available for post-game comments.

DEFENSE

On the other side of the ball – interestingly -- defensive coordinator Kent Baer didn’t see much wrong with the play of his defense.

“In the second half, it was the drive to start the second half and the long run – that’s it,” he said. “Other than that, hey, (UCLA’s player are) on scholarship too. They’re a good football team. That’s what I see. … Other than the long run, I thought we got some things stopped. Other than at the end of the game, we couldn’t get the ball back.”

As for that long run – a 72-yard touchdown by Chris Markey – Baer said somebody on defense “didn’t fit the run right. I don’t know who did. You can’t give that up.”

Linebacker E.J. Savannah said the Bruins’ one-two punch of Markey and Kahlil Bell finally wore down the Huskies.

“I think it was that duo, how they kept swapping them in like that,” Savannah said. “Our dudes were getting tired and they just stayed fresh.”

DAVENPORT

Finally, cornerback Byron Davenport said he was happy to get back into action after his long-term hamstring injuries. Especially against the school he transferred from.

“It was like a home game,” he said. “I was excited. It was fun.”

Davenport started on the nickel defense, but replaced Matt Mosley in the base defense in the second half. Vonzell McDowell, who had started the first three games at corner, played only on special teams.

“I was supposed to play like nickel and some other packages,” Davenport said. “But at halftime we made a few adjustments, they asked me if I felt good and I said yeah, and I played more after that. It was cool. I didn’t expect to play as much as I did.”

He was asked if he expects to start next week.

“We’ll see,” he said. “I’m not sure. Hopefully, things will be good. I hope I’m with the ones, depending on how I feel and how the coaches think I’ll help the defense.”

USC

Finally, Savannah said he and the rest of the Huskies expect to beat USC next week, even if no one else believes they will.

I'm just back from talking to coach Willingham and some Huskies. I'll post some of their thoughts next.

Meanwhile, these highlights stood out to me:

Player of the game
UCLA tailback Chris Markey rushed for 193 yards on 14 carries. His biggest run was a 72-yard burst early in the fourth quarter that moved the Bruins ahead, 31-17.

Key play
Trailing by seven, Washington faced a third and 12 late in the third quarter. Quarterback Jake Locker overthrew receiver D’Andre Goodwin to the sideline, and the pass was picked off by UCLA safety Dennis Keyes who sprinted untouched for 60 yards down the sideline, pumping the Bruins lead to 24-10, a two-touchdown deficit the Huskies could never overcome.

Key stats
UCLA controlled the stats sheet more than they did the scoreboard … The Bruins dominated first downs, 24-16, and total yardage, 537-340.

Trick plays
UCLA badly fooled UW on a second quarter play in which receiver Brandon Breazell took a reverse and passed to receiver Terrence Austin, who was running wide open behind UW defenders Roy Lewis and Jason Wells to the Huskies 6. UCLA went on for a touchdown, reclaiming the lead, 10-7.
Later in the quarter, the Huskies tried their own trickery, as tailback Louis Rankin took a handoff on a sweep, then turned and tried to throw back to quarterback Jake Locker. However, Locker was covered and Rankin threw the ball away.

Hustle play
Midway through the first quarter, Markey found a hole up the gut and seemed headed for the goal line. However, UW cornerback Roy Lewis made up a lot of ground and caught Markey from behind turning a would-be touchdown into a 66-yard gain. That paid off in points, as the Bruins eventually had to settle for a field goal.

Special players
After UW cut the UCLA lead to 31-24, UCLA’s Matthew Slater returned the following kickoff 85 yards to push the Bruins ahead, 38-24.

For Washington, linebacker Chris Stevens repeatedly was the first player down on punt coverage, and recovered a second-quarter turnover when a bouncing punt glanced over a fallen Bruin.

Personnel report
For UW, Matt Mosley started at the cornerback spot that had been manned by true freshman Vonzell McDowell Jr., who gave up a 68-yard touchdown pass last week against Ohio State. … Washington cornerback Byron Davenport, who played his freshman season at UCLA, visited with several of his former teammates before the game. He saw his most significant action of the season, first in the nickle, and then taking Mosley’s spot in the base defense. … However, the UW coaches’ stated intention of using a reserve tailback to rest Louis Rankin didn’t happen. Neither did their plan to try to inject more big-strike capability into the offense by using more of Goodwin.

The Huskies reported no serious injuries. Jake Locker said he was fine, and E.J. Savannah said his neck stinger returned a bit but that he'd be fine for next week.

Meanwhile, the Bruins started the game minus seven regular starters lost to injury: quarterback Ben Olson, fullback Michael Pitre, receiver Marcus Everett, guard Shannon Tevaga, defensive end Nikola Dragovic, defensive tackle Brigham Harwell, and linebacker Aaron Whittington. … In the fourth quarter, replacement quarterback Patrick Cowan was injured and was replaced by redshirt freshman McLeod Bethel-Thompson.

Extra points
After suffering two blocked field goals in the previous to games, UW kicker Ryan Perkins nailed a 35-yarder in the first half, which tied the game at 10. … There was relatively heavy rain across the Los Angeles area Friday night and through Saturday afternoon. However, a tarp covered the Rose Bowl field, and there was a relatively fast track. (By the way, the Rose Bowl press box elevator operator reports that UCLA traditionally gets its wettest days when the Northwest schools visit.) … The Washington captains were Anthony Russo, Jordan Reffett, Dan Howell and Louis Rankin.

Next
No. 1 Southern California, 7:15 p.m. Saturday, Husky Stadium.

Two UCLA touchdowns that quarter, the (potential) killer was a 60-yard interception return for a touchdown by Bruins safety Dennis Keyes of a Jake Locker pass overthrown to the sideline.

UCLA has all the stats, but the Huskies are hanging right there, led mostly by a handful of big runs by Jake Locker.

The Bruins have 12 first downs, Washington six. The Bruins have 283 total yards, Washington 132 (and 74 of those UW yards are on Jake Locker runs).

UCLA's Patrick Cowan is 9-of-18 for 86 yards. Locker is 5-of-13 for 33 yards ... and his longest completion is 9 yards.

UCLA has had awful field position, but they've made up for it with a lot of yards. They worked down close enough for two field goal attempts, hitting one 47 yarder.

UW hasn't done much offensively ... one first down in the quarter. UCLA already have more than 100 yards rushing.

A few notes: Matt Mosely started at the cornerback spot that had been manned by true freshman Vonzell McDowell Jr., who gave up a 68-yard touchdown pass last week against Ohio State. … Washington cornerback Byron Davenport, who played his freshman season at UCLA, visited with several of his former teammates before the game. He has already seen his most significant action of the season as a nickle back. … The Washington captains were Anthony Russo, Jordan Reffett, Dan Howell and Louis Rankin.

I'm in the press box at the Rose Bowl, one of the nicest press box views in a conference that is full of them. However, it's not in its full glory as the clouds are still hanging low, hiding the tops of the surrounding mountains.

In fact, I arrived to see a tarp covering the field. It's off now, although it still looks like some rain could call.

On the way up to the press box, the elevator operator mentioned that for some reason, UCLA seems to have its worst weather when the Washington and Oregon schools play here.

Still, bottom line, it's a special place. So, naturally I asked a few of the Huskies about that this week:

JAKE LOCKER: I think it’s going to be pretty cool. I’ve personally never had the chance to go down and be in that stadium, so it will be a first time for me. I’ve heard from a lot of people that it’s a pretty neat experince and to be able to play on natural turf at night again will be kind of fun. ... (My family) always watched (the Rose Bowl Game). All the bowl games were always something we had on. We always made sure we watched that one. When I was growing up, I guess I didn’t really understand about who got to play in it each year. Every year I watched they always said that this was the Granddaddy of them all’ so I always thought that this was the biggest game. We always watched that game."

JORDAN REFFETT: "It’s like sacred ground down there. I’ve watched do many Rose Bowls over the years it’s a great feeling to go down there and get a chance to play."

ROY LEWIS: "The Rose Bowl is always a great place to play. We go down there early in the season, and hopefully at the end of the season we’ll make a second trip down there. The Rose Bowl is historic, there’s no place like it. And this is the real game time now. This is when it really counts."

Gametime: The Washington captains were Anthony Russo, Jordan Reffett, Dan Howell and Louis Rankin.

The predicted rain moved in overnight. Ourside, right now there is no rain, but lingering clouds and puddles. I hear there has been some hail reported, and even some slow in the surrounding mountains. However, last I heard, the rain was expected to be finished by gametime, however, coolish temperatures drifting from the mid- to low-60s.

Here is our preview from today's paper. And here's one from the LA Daily News, which has done a really nice job this week.

I'll file today if news develops, and then again tonight from the stadium, at the quarters, and then after the game, hopefully along with your own discussion of how things unfold.

Washington State at No. 1 Southern California. Should be entertaining for a while. USC, 48-24.

Arizona at No. 6 California. Wildcats sprung the upset last season. Cal, 37-13.

No. 13 Oregon at Stanford. Last season’s 38-point win was Ducks biggest in series. Oregon, 38-17.

Oregon State at Arizona State. Beavers haven’t won in Tempe since 1969... meaning since before ASU joined the Pac-10. Devils, 31-20.

Washington at UCLA. Just a hunch that the better Bruins will show up. UCLA, 34-24.

Last week: 7-2. (Missed on Wildcats ... and Bruins.)
Season: 14-3.

The stadium news dominated things today. However, coach Tyrone Willingham had some good health news, saying linebacker Dan Howell, tailback Brandon Johnson and cornerback Byron Davenport are healthy enough to travel to the UCLA game and are likely to play Saturday.

Willingham added that he wouldn’t hesitate to play Davenport despite all the time he has missed during camp and so far this season.

Meanwhile, junior quarterback Patrick Cowan is expected to start for UCLA, replacing regular starter Ben Olson, who showed concussion-like symptoms this week. Cowan started the final eight games last season, including the Bruins upset of Southern California. Willingham said the uncertainty “does kind of dilute what you can do for game preparations.”

Finally, Willingham is a serious weather-watcher. Forecasts call for a 40 percent chance of rain in Pasadena, Calif., on Saturday. And as he pointed out, the Huskies should be more used to rain than the Bruins.

Under a best-case scenario, the University of Washington would like to begin a “several hundreds of millions of dollars” renovation of Husky Stadium in December of next year and be playing in those new digs by 2010.

However, a more realistic timetable would have construction beginning in 2009, playing a 2010 season at Qwest Field, and then moving into their renovated – and probably renamed – home in 2011.

Athletic director Todd Turner and former Gov. Dan Evans, chairman of the stadium renovation committee, briefed the UW board of regents on their stadium plans Thursday and then updated the media.

Showing the same uncertain artists conceptions first unveiled about six months ago, Turner and Evans outlined stadium renovation goals that would include solve existing safety and code concerns, improve the fan experience, and centralize the football coaches offices, weight room, locker room ticket office and fan shop in a new building created under the west end zone.

Specifically, the stadium renovation would:

•remove the track surrounding the field, lower the field and move the sideline seats closer to the field,
•improve and expand the concession areas,
•greatly increase the restroom facilities, especially for women,
•increase the number of elevators from
•wide the aisles and increase leg room in the seating area,
•improve views of Lake Washington by replacing the east end zone scoreboard with two sideline scoreboards.

Funding remains uncertain, however the stadium renovation committee expects to present a proposal -- including timeline and funding – to the regents and the general public in November.

And yes, naming rights are among the funding sources being considered.

A few quotes:

EVANS: “We’ve got the oldest stadium in the Pac-10: The first game was played in 1920. The lower bowl, which holds about 40,000 people, was the original stadium. It’s in extraordinarily bad shape. … If you take a look at it when it’s not filled with fans and with all the excitement focused on the field, you’ll find it badly needs help. There is no alternative.”

TURNER: “Ideally we wouldn’t move any seasons off campus. But if it speeds the construction process up and enables us to do it less expensively, then we’d like to do it. We’d really like to get out of Sound Transit’s way as quickly as we can and make the period of disruption for our fans as short a time as possible.”

TURNER: “It’s a serious endeavor and one that’s being taken very very seriously by the university’s leadership. I think the question can clearly be answered. It’s not a matter of will we do anything to Husky Stadium, it’s just a matter of when.”

Naturally, we'll have extensive coverage of this in our Friday paper.

The LA Daily News reports this morning that Patrick Cowan will start for the Bruins Saturday against Washington.

Meanwhile, here is a look at the Bruins offense, with or without Olson, by TNT reporter Ryan Divish.

The LA Daily News is reporting that UCLA quarterback Ben Olson didn't practice again today and likely won't start Saturday's game against Washington.

In his absence, the Bruins would start Patrick Cowan, who played in all 13 Bruins games last season and started eight while Olson was out. While he'll still be the most experienced quarterback the Huskies have played this season, his surprise start will be yet another wild card in a deck already loaded with them.

1 USC 2-0: Trojans backs averaged 8.2 yards per carry at Nebraska. Pac-10's worst defense up next.

2 California 3-0: The Bears' modest five-game win streak is Pac-10’s longest.

3 Arizona State 3-0: League leader in total defense and scoring defense.

4 Oregon 3-0: Win over Fresno State was Bellotti’s 100th with Ducks.

5 UCLA 2-1, 1-0: Sitting atop the Pac-10 standings ... and middle-tier in the Mountain West.

6 Washington 2-1: Huskies allowing 18.3 points per game, down more than a touchdown from last season.

7 Washington State 2-1: Cougars have scored in eight consecutive quarters, while Brink has put together back-to-back 300-yard games.

8 Oregon State 2-1: Canfield-to-Stroughter combination finally clicked vs. Idaho State. But, of course, that was Idaho State.

9 Stanford 1-1. Rout of San Jose State was Cardinal’s first win under Jim Harbaugh and first in seven tries in renovated home field.

10 Arizona 1-2. Stoops fourth season and the natives are restless in Tucson.

At 2:20 this afternoon I'll be talking Huskies' with the Groz on KJR, 950-AM. I assume what we learned from the Ohio State game and then look forward to the oh-so-hard-to-figure UCLA Bruins.

The conversation also will be streamed over the Internet.

The L.A. Daily news is reporting this morning that reserve quarterback Patrick Cowan could start for UCLA on Saturday, if battered starter Ben Olson can't go.

No one but Olson has thrown a pass for UCLA in the first three games this season. Cowan played in all 13 games last season -- and started the final eight after Olson was injured -- completing 145 of 276 passes with 11 touchdowns and nine interceptions.

However, the UCLA depth chart released this week shows walk-on redshirt freshman McLeod Bethel-Thompson behind Olson on the depth chart.

In the opener, the Huskies plays against a quarterback making his first career start, and over the next two games they faced quarterbacks making their first road starts. So, either Olson or Cowan would be the most experienced quarterback they've faced this season, while Bethel-Thompson would -- once again -- be making a first career start.

Los Angeles media reports that reserve quarterback Patrick Cowan worked with UCLA’s No. 1 offense Tuesday, while junior starter Ben Olson sat out with what coach Karl Dorrell calls headaches.

Olson’s availability for Saturday is not yet known.

Dorrell said nothing about that during a Pac-10 coaches’ conference call Tuesday morning. However, he said starting left guard Shannon Tevaga (knee sprain) will not play this week.

Meanwhile, UW offensive coordinator Tim Lappano said Tuesday that injured tailback/returner Brandon Johnson is likely to be cleared to play this week.

Lappano also said the Huskies plan to work more receivers and runners into their rotation to keep everyone fresh. He said four tailbacks will travel to Pasadena, and all are likely to see action, at least on special teams. … He also said speedy receiver D’Andre Goodwin is likely to get more work at UCLA.

Washington coach Tyrone Willingham was asked today if he "gets a kick" out of the national discussion about his firing from Notre Dame in light of the school's 0-3 start under Charlie Weis.

At first, Willingham thought the question was if he gets a kick out of Notre Dame's failure, and he quickly made it clear that he sees no point in ever enjoying another's troubles.

However, even when it was clarified that the question was merely about whether he is amused by the national debate, he strongly denied it and instead used the opportunity to speak up for his current job.

"I’m very happy, very comfortable, at the University of Washington," he said. "I think we’re moving our program in the right direction. I’m very excited about not only our quarterback, but our entire football team. I’m excited about our coaches the building process and the univeristy that we have. So no, I don’t get a kick out of any of those discussions and prefer that they don’t exist."

For the past three seasons, the UCLA-Washington game has drawn national attention because it is the very rare meeting of NCAA programs coaches by African-Americans.

This season, it is purely unique: The only such meeting on the regular season schedule.

Given the rarity of their positions, both men have accepted their roles as spokesmen for the issue, as they proved again today.

Dorrell: “That’s kind of neat for our conference. But it’s much bigger than that for a national scope and a career scope for young people that are interested in coaching. It’s really to keep the inspiration alive for them that they can achieve greatness through a lot of hard work and building their resumes and doing great jobs for people that they work for and climbing the ladder. I think all that is very important. (Willingham) has been kind of a patriarch in this movement.”

Willingham: “I think the first thing is Karl and I would both agree that it’s great to have this opportunity. That would be No. 1. No.2 – I’ve always said this – I think it would be a shame if we are somewhat limiting based on race because there are some very qualified people who can help these young people be better people and better football players and better students. Anytime you eliminate anyone from the pool for any reason along that line – gender, religiton, etc. – that is a wrong thing to do.”

The main topic of today's meeting with coach Willingham and some of the Huskies was how the team -- and also that team from LA -- will deal with their first defeat of the season.

The Huskies suffered their first loss, 33-14, to Ohio State on Saturday; while the Bruins were shocked 44-6 at Utah.

The teams will meet Saturday at the Rose Bowl.

Quarterback Jake Locker said he just lets losses go:
“I think all of us understand that the game is in the past. We obviously didn’t play as well as we needed to. But we can’t do anything about it, so we need to look forward to a really good opponent in UCLA next weekend.”

However, senior defensive tackle Jordan Reffett and some other linemen said they had it out with each other a bit -- nothing negative, just challenging themselves to do better -- before letting it go: “We watched the film and kind of got after each other a little bit,” Reffett said. “We made a lot of mistakes. They’re correctable mistakes, that’s the good thing. But the bad thing is we lost the game. We’re going to learn from our mistakes and just keep going.”

Coach Tyrone Willingham thinks either approach can work: “I hope we’re angry the whole season about losing that ball game,” he said. “But I hope we also don’t allow any of the residue of that ball game to affect us in the next ball game or the next ball game. So it’s a real fine line.”

However, you've got to figure that whatever the Huskies are thinking, the Bruins must be saying and then so after their pure embarrassment of a loss.

However, we don't really know because coach Karl Dorrell wasn’t available to the Washington media on Monday. We should get his Tuesday as part of the weekly Pac-10 coaches call.

Willingham, however, said he doesn't think there's anything wrong with the Bruins. He especially praised their run defense, their offensive backfield, their big-play receivers, and their hard-hitting safeties.

“I think they have a lot of good things in place,” he said. “I don’t have any problem identifying the UCLA team.”

Speaking of Locker, as we were a few paragrahs back,
Saturday marked the first time he had played on the losing side since 2004 – when he was a junior at Ferndale.

“I‘ve always hated losing,” he said. “Ever since I was a little kid I hated it, and I still do. So, it’s hard. Anytime you lose it’s hard, but I hadn’t experienced that in a long time, so that was definitely a tough one for me.”

There were no announced changes to the UW injury list, with the status of cornerback Byron Davenport, linebacker Dan Howell, and tailback/returner Brandon Johnson still uncertain.

Willingham said he hopes to work another tailback into the rotation in order to help tailback Louis Rankin (ankle) recover and then remain strong for the rest of the season. However, the depth chart doesn’t clearly identify a No. 2 back from among J.R. Hasty, Curtis Shaw or Brandon Johnson. And Willingham interestingly volunteered that Hasty’s sore ankle isn’t the only reason he has only one carry this season.

Finally, UW coaches selected these players of the week for their play against the Buckeyes: fullback Paul Homer on offense, end Daniel Te’o-Nesheim on defense, and Rankin on special teams. However, Te’o Nesheim wasn’t buying. “I thought I played horrible,” he said. “There is so much more we can improve on as a defense. It’s hard to look at yourself and say, ‘Oh I played good,’ because I know I didn’t play up to the standards of what the Huskies defense should be playing.”

The university as announced that eason tickets for the 2007-08 men's basketball 18-game home season go on sale at 8:30 a.m.Tuesday.

Tickets can be purchased by calling the Husky Ticket Office at 206-543-2200 or by e-mailing huskytix@u.washington.edu. For Tyee donor seating, contact the Tyee Office at 206-543-2234 or huskies@u.washington.edu.

It sounds like UCLA coach Karl Dorrell is no happier with his team's loss to Utah than you would expect.

He apparently plans to evaluate everything before the Bruins play the Huskies on Saturday night.

Meanwhile, we'll have to take the LA papers' word for it, for at least a while, because for the first time this season, the opposing coach is not scheduled to meet with the Western Washington media today.

However, we will hear from Tyrone Willingham and several Huskies players. I'll report back after that.

Here's our game story from today's paper, along with John McGrath's analysis, and Ryan Divish's examination on those 39 seconds that changed the game.

Meanwhile:

LOOKING BACK
Washington (2-1) led Top 10 Ohio State at halftime, 7-3. However, the Huskies gave up two touchdowns in a 39-second stretch of the third quarter and never recovered. As a growth chart against a national contender, UW seemed able to compete adequately in some areas, but was ultimately didn’t quite measure up.

SOMETHING TO BUILD ON
The Huskies lost due to specific failures on specific plays, but they weren’t simply pushed around the field. Linebackers Donald Butler and E.J. Savannah rose to the challenge of playing without injured leader Dan Howell. Jake Locker ran for 102 yards against what had been the nation’s top-rated defense.

SOMETHING TO WORK ON
Locker threw three interceptions, with at least one due to a mistake in reading the defense. Tailback Louis Rankin was held under 50 yards rushing for the second straight week. Washington receivers dropped several passes, and defenders dropped at least two interceptions. A UW field goal attempt was blocked for the second week.

PERSONNEL ISSUES
Howell was a game-time scratch due to a knee injury, forcing Kyle Trew into his first start. Rankin is playing through several health issues, including a sore ankle. Anthony Russo reinjured a hand. Ohio State’s 68-yard game-changing touchdown pass underscored the need for cornerback Byron Davenport (hamstring).

THE WEEK AHEAD
Pac-10 play begins Saturday at UCLA (2-1), which fell out of the rankings after a 44-6 loss to previously winless Utah. The Bruins committed five turnovers and were held without a touchdown for the first time in four years. The Utes embarrassed UCLA, 30-0, in the second half. Now, how will the Bruins respond? And how will the Huskies?

Ohio State scored 14 points in a 39-second span in the third quarter, moving from 7-3 behind to 17-7 ahead, and no one denied how important that sequence was.

First, quarterback Todd Boeckman hit receiver Brian Robiskie open down the sideline for a 68-yard touchdown. It was the longest pass of Boeckman’s career and the longest reception of Robiskie’s. Then, after UW fumbled the ensuing kickoff return, tailback Chris Wells darted 14 yards for another score.

However, UW got outplayed in several other key ways. They lost four turnovers, while the Buckeyes had none. Also, they really had no answer for the OSU size and strength advantages along both lines. The Buckeyes outrushed the Huskies 263 yards to 162.

Finally, both coaches stressed that they neither intended nor took offense by Ohio State scoring on the final play, when, reserve Buckeyes tailback Brandon Saine broke outside and raced down the sidelines 37 yards for a score.

“That was an off-tackle play where I thought we’d get 2 yards and call it a day,” OSU coach Jim Tressel said. “... I wish that didn’t happen. I think (UW coach Tyrone Willingham) knows that.”
Willingham seemed to.

“They ran the football to … run time out, and we didn’t leverage it the right way,” he said. “All of a sudden, it bounced outside. That’s the issue. That’s it.”

Some other notes:

Player of the game
Ohio State linebacker James Laurinaitis, a retuning All-American and Nagurski Award-winner, tied for his team’s game-high with eight tackles and came up with two highlight-reel interceptions.

Husky of the game
Washington linebacker Donald Butler recorded a game-high 11 tackles, including one behind the line. He also broke up two passes.

Special plays
For the second consecutive week, a Ryan Perkins’ field goal attempt was blocked. While the Husky’s kick last week against Boise State seemed low, this one was attributed to a blocking error on the line.
Also for the second week, UW senior defensive lineman Jordan Reffett blocked a field goal.

Injury report
Linebacker Dan Howell was a late scratch with a knee injury and was replaced with Kyle Trew. In his first career start, Trew made three tackles.
“I was excited,” he said. “My nerves got going. I was jacked up. I can’t lie about that. I was excited. I was just ready to go, ready to see another jersey; hit somebody and have a good time.”
Willingham reported no serious injuries suffered during the game. Receiver Anthony Russo reinjured a finger, but worked through it. Similarly, tailback Louis Rankin was hobbled by various injuries, including a sore ankle, but remained on the field.

Quote
“That was growing pains, and some of the guys that we’re playing with right now – including the quarterback – that’s part of the growing pains that we’re going to be living with for a little bit.” – UW offensive coordinator Tim Lappano.

Extra points
The crowd of 74,927 was the third-largest in Husky Stadium history, training only the 76,125 that attended the Army game in 1995 and 74,986 vs. Arizona State in 1997. Saturday attendance was boosted by about 2,500 high school band members attending annual Band Day. … Washington had only one first-quarter possession, a drive that took 6:12 minutes between two OSU possessions. … Washington had scored on all eight trips into the red zone this season until Laurinaitis’ interception of a Jake Locker shovel pass from the 5-yard line in the second quarter. … Locker’s second-quarter 23-yard pass to Anthony Russo was the first touchdown Ohio State had allowed this season. … With 102 yards rushing and 153 passing, Locker became the first Husky to top 100 yards in both categories since Isaiah Stanback did it in the 2006 opener vs. San Jose State.
… OSU leads its series with UW, 8-3. … UW game captains were Juan Garcia, Roy Lewis, Chad Macklin and Caesar Rayford.

Next
Washington will play UCLA at 7:15 p.m. Saturday, at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, Calif. The Bruins were ranked No. 11 last week, but will tumble after losing to Utah, 44-6. Yes, 44-6.

Big mistakes by freshmen. First Vondell McDowell burned on long pass, then Curtis Shaw fumbles following kickoff. Fourteen points in no time. Also, while Jake Locker is having a very nice game, he's been picked a couple of times too, including one in the third quarter ... which was simply filled with more mistakes than the Huskies can afford against this team.

The Huskies took their final drive 80 yards, with Locker hitting Anthony Russo in the end zone three seconds from the end.

That was, by the way, the first touchdown scored on the Buckeyes this season.

Quick halftime stats: UW has more first downs, 11-9; UW has more passing yards, 111-64; OSU had more rushing yards, 113-93; and UW leads in total yards, 204-177.

Quick quarter. Both teams had long drives that ended only when the offenses seemed to move away from what was working.

In any case, Washington got three first downs on its only possession: that's already as many as Akron got against OSU last week.

Second quarter opens with Buckeyes on the Husky 17.

A beatutiful day for football has dawned.

Here is a link to my game preview story from today's paper.

After that, usual gameday drill: I'll post from the stadium with whatever pregame news develops, they try to pop in with quarterly updates, then toss it over to you for postgame discussion.

If you're thinking about heading out to the stadium, they are approaching sellout status, but they do not expect a full sellout or to actually have to turn anyone away.

Otherwise, the game will be on ESPN.

11:15: Lots of crimson among the early arrivers here today. But not matching the blue and orange here last week.

Meanwhile, inside the stadium, there are a few Huskies and Buckeyes warming up.

And behind the west end zone there are acres of folding chairs, a reminder that this is high school Band Day at Husky Stadium.

12:30: UW captains are Lewis, Macklin, Garcia and Rayford. UW about to kick off.

The Buckeyes arrived in town yesterday, but there are no media opportunities today, and therefore likely no breaking news.

However, there were several previews in today's paper: John McGrath's look at what has sustained the Buckeyes' dynasty; my look at 2003 game in Ohio; and my column on a lifelong Buckeyes fan living in Lakewood.

Also, here's an advance look ahead to the game: 12:30 p.m. Saturday, Husky Stadium, tickets still available for those who want to go; ESPN telecast for everyone else:

The series: Ohio State leads, 7-3, including a 3-2 advantage in Seattle. The Buckeyes also won the most recent meeting, 28-9, at Ohio Stadium in 2003.

What to watch: The Huskies already have beaten a bad team and a good team. Now they will test themselves against what could be one of the best in the nation. However, Ohio State remains largely unknown, with a lot of newcomers who have produced only two bland wins against weak opposition. What seems certain is that the Buckeyes have the advantage of size without any corresponding disadvantage in speed.

What’s at stake: The Huskies are back on a national stage, knowing this could be a breakthrough day for the program. A win today would likely push the Huskies into the Top 25, while making the remaining bowl math considerably more realistic. Meanwhile, the Buckeyes’ hopes of a return to the national championship game can’t survive a loss here.

I'm happy to be part of the Groz with Gas-A-Thon this afternoon on KJR, 950-AM.

The annual event for a variety of charities has a relatively fluid schedule, so I'm not sure to the minute of when I'll be on, but it will be around or after 6 p.m., with perhaps TNT columnist John McGrath on about that time as well.

Many good causes are being supported here, so please listen in as you can, and perhaps add a bid as well.

The event also will be streamed over the Internet.

There wasn't much news out of Tyrone Willingham's final pregame meeting with the media today. However, one bit was good news for the Huskies.

Willingham said right guard Casey Bulyca (bruised ribs) has been taking part in almost all practice drills and is expected to play Saturday against No. 10 Ohio State.

However, cornerback Byron Davenport (hamstring) has been highly limited and is unlikely.

Then, in the few minutes of Thursday practice open to the media, we noticed linebacker E.J. Savannah wearing a red jersey. That designates injury, although he seemed to be moving fine in the few drills we watched.

Finally, tailback Louis Rankin also seemed to be moving fine, but his right ankle was heavilty taped.

No. 1 USC at No. 14 Nebraska. First No. 1 team to visit Memorial Stadium since 1978. USC, 31-20.
Louisiana Tech at No. 8 California. Bears have reached 40 points in 13 of last 21 home games. Cal, 39-17.
No. 10 Ohio State at Washington. With nation watching, Huskies playing with the big boys again. OSU, 21-20.
No. 11 UCLA at Utah. Bruins have won all eight previous meetings. UCLA, 33-20.
Fresno State at No. 19 Oregon. Mike Bellotti going for 100th win with Ducks. Oregon, 45-24.
Idaho State at Oregon State. First meeting comes at right time for bruised Beavers. OSU, 37-17.
New Mexico at Arizona. Wildcats lead series with former conference rivals, 43-18-3. Arizona, 24-21.
San Diego State at Arizona State. Sun Devils have allowed 17 points this season … all in first quarter. ASU, 40-10.
San Jose State at Stanford. Cardinal still looking for first win in rebuilt stadium. Stanford, 21-17.
Idaho at Washington State. Coug domination part of reason this series will take a break. WSU, 48-17.

Last week: 7-1. (Missed Cincinnati over the Beavers.)

(Last week’s ranking in parenthesis)
1 USC (1) 1-0: Trojans still project as best in conference, but LSU might have a better claim nationally.
2 California (2) 2-0. DeSean Jackson has 77- and 73-yard touchdowns in two games. QB Longshore hasn’t been intercepted this season.
3 UCLA (3) 2-0. Bruins snapped 11-game Brigham Young winning streak. TB Kahlil Bell leads Pac-10 in rushing with 137-yard average.
4 Arizona State (4) 2-0. Win over Colorado was 150th of Dennis Erickson’s career. Sun Devils lead Pac-10 in scoring defense and total defense.
5 Oregon (7) 2-0. Oregon leads Pac-10 in scoring and total offense. QB Dennis Dixon leads Pac-10 in pass efficiency and No. 2 in rushing.
6 Washington (6) 2-0. Huskies would crack national rankings with win Saturday. Lead Pac-10 in third-down conversions.
7 Washington State (8) 2-0. Cougars have allowed just one sack this season.
8 Oregon State (5) 1-1. WR/PR Sammie Stroughter made season debut last week. But overall performance at Cincinnati was awful.
9 Arizona (9) 1-1. QB Willie Tuitama threw career-high five TDs vs. Northern Arizona.
10 Stanford (10) 0-1. Jim Harbaugh’s Cardinal threw 59 times in opener vs. UCLA.

Websites are fluid things, but as of this morning, the Washington Huskies are the lead stories on the Pac-10 football Web site and on the Yahoo sports homepage.

The Master Coaches Survey has awarded UW defensive coordinator Kent Baer "a game ball" in honor of the Huskies' defensive achievement of holding Boise State to 10 points last week.

(Meanwhile, just a note here that I'm not heading up to UW today, so the blogging items might be thin. However, TNT writer Ryan Divish is going up, and I'll ask him to pass along any real news that might come out of today's interview sessions. If so, I'll try to get there on the blog asap.)

At 2:20 this afternoon I'll be talking Huskies' with the Groz on KJR, 950-AM. I assume the main topic of conversation will be the Washington-Ohio State game ... which this season sounds a little more like Washington-Ohio State games are historically supposed to sound: a meeting of two pretty strong teams.

The conversation also will be streamed over the Internet.

I noticed that a shipment of UW merchandise celebrating Washington's 1960 "national football championship" has arrived at the team store at Hec Ed and also at the UW online team store. (And while we've got our wallets out, there's a special UW-OSU game T-shirt, too.)

Some of the 1960 stuff is pretty cool. They seem to use the deep purple I know some of you are partial too. And it has the 1960 husky logo -- which is pretty cartoonish, but also cool in a retro sort of way.

As you may recall, Washington has belatedly embraced a share of the 1960 national championship and will honor that team with a title flag raising and by wearing 1960 uniforms at the Sept. 29 game against USC.

The Pac-10 has a 13-3 record against out-of-conference opponents this season, and is getting a lot of love for it.

Meanwhile, the Big Ten is 18-4, but is catching a lot of grief mostly due to Michigan's two high-profile losses and Wisconsin's unimpressive win at UNLV.

In any case, Washington -- which has done the conference's reputation a lot of good so far with those wins over teams from the Big East and the best of the WAC -- gets another chance to strike a big blow for the conference Saturday when it hosts defending Big Ten champion Ohio State.

We look at that aspect some in the Wednesday paper.

Also, these Pac-10 notes:

OREGON (2-0). Coach Mike Bellotti said the quarterback Dennis Dixon had his best game at Michigan. “He’s more mature and more comfortable in the system,” Bellotti said. He added that he doesn’t expect his team to look past Fresno State because of a history of close games between the schools.

STANFORD (0-1). The Cardinal returns to action Saturday against Bay Area rival San Jose State still looking for its first win in its new stadium, which opened last fall. Coach Jim Harbaugh said the San Jose State game has particular significance this season because of the recent death of Bill Walsh, who attended SJSU and coached at Stanford.

ARIZONA (1-1). Quarterback Willie Tuitama three a career-high five touchdowns in the Wildcats win over Northern Arizona.

OREGON STATE (1-1). Coach Mike Riley said quarterback Sean Canfield will retain his starting job. Riley also said receiver Sammie Stroughter “made a decision to (rejoin the team), and I’m glad now in retrospect that he did. … I think that he’ll just get better and better now.”

USC (1-0). The Trojans were off last weekend, and coach Pete Carroll said his team has come to like early bye weeks. “It’s kind of a nice thing,” he said. “It’s such a big deal to play that first game and then you get to regroup a little bit.” Carroll said depth is returning to his tailback position where Chauncey Washington (shoulder) has returned to practice and top freshman Joe McKnight (knee) is returning to form.

UCLA (2-0). Coach Karl Dorrell said defensive end Nikola Dragovic (concussion) has been cleared to practice today. … Dorrell said he will continue his tailback rotation of Chris Markey and Kahlil Bell with continue even though “both those guys are very competitive, they both want to be the starter and they both want to carry the team on their shoulders.”

ARIZONA STATE (2-0). Coach Dennis Erickson said he is disappointed that his team was called for eight personal fouls in its victory over Colorado. “If we have penalties it’s going to be because we’re hustling and hitting hard,” he said. “But some of those are what I call stupid penalties.”

CALIFORNIA (2-0). Coach Jeff Tedford said “against Colorado State we learned … that you can’t take any team lightly.” It is a message he may need to stress again this week as the Golden Bears host Louisiana Tech, a low-profile team that took No. 24 Hawaii into overtime Saturday.

Some emailers have asked about J.R. Hasty's current role, so we asked about that today in our weekly session with offensive coordinator Tim Lappano.

He said there isn't a clear No. 2 right now, with Hasty and Brandon Johnson mostly recovered from mild injuries. However, Lappano said he wants to establish a No. 2 pretty quickly because it's a long season and Louis Rankin can't carry it alone. That could be especially true this week, when Lappano believes it is essential for the Huskies to establish a ground game.

Elsewhere in the backfield, we just got a moment with fullback Luke Kravitz who has been outfitted with a new cast on his hand, which should allow better control when running with or catching the ball. He seems possible for playing time Saturday.

Back to Lappano: He seems as impressed with the Ohio State defense as everyone else, noting that they're not the big and slow defense that sometimes shows up in the Big Ten: these guys are big and fast.

He also said UW's scoreless second half against Boise State was due more to their own errors than any adjustments by the Broncos.

Ty Willingham said he heard that Boise State tailback Ian Johnson had said Husky Stadium wasn’t especially loud on Saturday. Willingham called the comment "kind of an affront to our fans,” who he no doubt hopes will be even louder Saturday when No. 10 Ohio State visits. (By the way, BSU quarterback Taylor Tharp seemed more impressed, attributing part of his team's offensive problems to crowd noise.)

(Also by the way, the ticket situation for the Ohio State game remains similar to the Boise game. A couple of thousand remain, but tickets are almost certain to remain availaible on game day.)

Otherwise, there wasn’t much new from the one Willingham availability we had today. He said the injured players are “moving forward,” but didn’t give any indication if any will be miss the Buckeyes’ game. However, he did say of fullback Luke Kravitz, “we’re hoping he’s day to day rather than week to week,” which is probably what passes these days for an upgraded condition.

Willingham once again praised the Ohio State defense, singling out the linebackers as maybe the most physical his team will see until the USC game … two weekends ahead.

Meanwhile, UW's sports information office announced that the Marcel Reece's 58-yard touchdown reception from Saturday's game is up for the Pontiac Game Changing Moment for week two of the NCAA Season. The winning university each week earns a $5,000 contribution from Pontiac to their general scholarship fund. Additionally, the winning play will be nominated for the "Pontiac Game Changing Performance of the Year" and the chance to win a $100,000 General Scholarship from Pontiac.

We heard from OSU coach Jim Tressel and Tyrone Willingham this afternoon, and the big topic of interest for both was the Buckeyes' defense.

Though two games, they lead the nation in total defense. They have allowed an average of four points and seven first downs per game, 1.7 yards per rush and 5.6 yards per catch. They are allowing about 44 rushing yards per game and less than 80 passing yards.

The question is how real those numbers are, since they have come against Youngstown State and Arkon.

Things really got nuts against the Zips, who punted 14 times, including after 12 straight three-and-out possessions. Akron managed just three first downs, 69 total yards, and just 3 yards on 19 rushing attempts.

However, Tressell admits the challenge should be greater this week against Washington, and especially with quarterback Jake Locker, who he said might be the fastest quarterback he's ever seen.

Anyway, that's the main topic I'll write about tomorrow, along with the previous blog posts involving Roy Lewis and the UCLA telecast.

(By the way, Lewis, who used the team “Purple Hurt” to refer to the UW defense after the Boise game, said Monday that he first heard the term from linebacker Fred Wiggs before the season opener.)

Otherwise, the rest of the news was minor or incomplete:

*UW coaches also honored Lewis as the Husky defensive player of the week, receiver Anthony Russo on offense, and Chris Stevens on special teams.

*UW tailback Louis Rankin said a sprained ankle limited his effectiveness Saturday against Boise State, when he ran for just 45 yards after going for 147 in the opener at Syracuse. Additionally, Willingham listed offensive lineman Casey Bulyca, fullback Luke Kravitz, cornerback Byron Davenport and linebacker Dan Howell on this week’s injury report. However, he gave no details on their availability for Saturday.

*Finally, UW reports comparable ticket sales to this time last week: about 3,000-2,000 tickets remaining.

Huskies cornerback Roy Lewis has been honored as Pac-10 defensive player of the week after a defensive performance that included 11 tackles – 10 unassisted, one for loss – three pass breakups and one interception in UW's 24-10 win over Boise State on Saturday.

Oregon quarterback Dennis Dixon was honored as top offensive player.

That to-be-announced time for the UCLA game next week has been announced: 7:15, complete with telecast on FSN.

Meanwhile, TBA's remain for all following games except USC (5 p.m.) , Arizona (noon) and Oregon State (7:15).

No. 10 Ohio State has opened only a four-point favorite against unranked Washington. And that's not much, considering Boise State was favored by three.

And judging by this story from Ohio the Buckeyes have more issues to clean up than you might expect from a 2-0 defending BCS title game finalist. Even this more upbeat take remains warily respectful of the Huskies.

Meanwhile, we'll have a meeting with UW coach Tyrone Willingham and some players around lunchtime today, so I should be clicking in with some updates in the early afternoon.

1.) Michigan has become Exhibit A for the case against preseason polls. Voters put them in the Top 10 on the basis of their history and helmets, pure and simple.

2.) Tyrone Willingham: 2-0. Charlie Weis: 0-2.

3.) After thoughts one and two, it should be noted that Michigan plays Notre Dame this week, and someone is going to have to win.

4.) If there was any question about how bad Syracuse was after Week One, Week Two settled it. The Orange lost 35-0 at Iowa, had only 1 yard of offense in the first half, didn't get a first down until five minutes into the third quarter, and ended with five first downs and 103 yards.

5.) If there is going to be a BCS-buster among the mid-majors this season it looks like it will have to be Hawaii. Boise State, TCU, BYU, Southern Miss and Fresno State all lost Saturday. Hawaii, meanwhile, escaped in overtime, when Louisiana Tech tried for the instant win by going for two... and missed.

6.) It might be time to slide LSU ahead of USC in the national rankings. Based on two games, the Tigers might just be super.

7.) If I got mulligans on my preseason Pac-10 picks, I would move Oregon and Washington up and Arizona and Oregon State down.

8.) South Florida may have been invited into the Big East mostly for the number of television sets in the Tampa Bay market. But the Bulls may have suddenly shot up to the status of second-best team in Florida.

9.)In case you missed it, Appalachian State stayed focused enough to take care of business against Lenoir-Rhyne, 48-7.

10.) As always, our final thoughts are saved for the Huskies:

LAST WEEK
Washington jumped to a 24-7 lead midway through the second quarter and then rode its defense to a 24-10 win over 22nd-ranked Boise State. The win snapped BSU’s 14-game winning streak – the nation’s longest – and gave the Huskies their first 2-0 start since the Holiday Bowl season of 2001.

SOMETHING TO BUILD ON
The Huskies proved that they could beat a good team even when freshman quarterback Jake Locker isn’t at his best. The UW defense held the Broncos to their lowest point total since 2005. And the crowd of 70,045 gave the Huskies a significant home field advantage, which might only grow from here.

SOMETHING TO WORK ON
Once Boise State adjusted to the UW offense, the Huskies seemed unable to answer back. Locker had a fumble and threw his first career interception, and there could have been other picks. After a big game against Syracuse, tailback Louis Rankin couldn’t get untracked and was held to 45 rushing yards.

PERSONNEL ISSUES
Cornerback Byron Davenport finally played after a long-term hamstring injury, but quickly hobbled off with another hamstring issue. That keeps UW dangerously thin in the secondary. Boise picked on freshman Vonzell McDowell with some success. Roy Lewis may be as crucial to the defense as Locker is to the offense.

THE WEEK AHEAD
UW takes another step up in class as No. 10 Ohio State visits Husky Stadium at 12:30 p.m. Saturday for a game nationally televised on ESPN. The Buckeyes (2-0) moved up two places in the national rankings after their 20-2 defensive domination of Akron, which managed just three first downs and 69 total yards.

A Top 10 team will be coming into Husky Stadium on Satuday, as Ohio State moved up to 10th in the college football coaches' poll released this morning.

Washington (2-0) technically remains unranked, but the Huskies moved up sharply, in effect assuming the No. 29 position.

USC remains No. 1 after a bye week. Oregon jumped in after routing Michigan. And frankly I'm a little surprised Arizona State shows up behind UW. I guess that's a tribute to the releatively high profile that comes with ending the nation's longest winning streak. (And playing a Western game in the day, rather than at night as ASU did.)

Boise State, previously ranked 22nd, not surprisingly dropped out of the rankings after their 24-10 loss to UW on Saturday.

Looking back, here the TNT's coverage of Washington's 24-10 win over Boise State.

Here is John McGrath's take on Jake Locker's home debut.

Here is TNT reporter Ryan Divish's report from the Broncos' locker room.

Finally, here's the game coverage from the Idaho Statesman.

Looking ahead, here's a link to The Columbus Dispatch's Buckeyes coverage.

And here's a link to the official Ohio State football site.

The Huskies are 2-0, have allowed a total of 22 points this season and may have come up with a mighty cool nickname for the defense: "The Purple Hurt." Senior cornerback Roy Lewis used the term after the game, and it seems like one of those that might stick. Especially if they continue allowing just 11 points per game.

Next up, Ohio Stae, at 12:30 next Saturday, at Husky Stadium -- likely sold out Husky Stadium –- and on ESPN.

A few game notes.

Player of the game
Washington cornerback Roy Lewis had 11 tackles, including a game-high 10 solo tackles, to lead the Huskies’ defense. Lewis also had an interception, defended three passes and made one tackle behind the line.

Key stats
Boise State hurt itself by throwing three interceptions, fumbling twice (and losing one), being whistled for nine penalties, and allowing a field goal to be blocked.

Crucial play
True freshman cornerback Vonzell McDowell Jr. made a bobbling interception at the goal line in the final three minutes to turn away Boise’s last chance. It was the first interception of his career, and the Huskies’ third of the game.

Surprising play
One of the other UW interceptions came from an unlikely source, as senior defensive end Greyson Gunheim drifted to the sidelines in pass coverage and snagged the first pick of his college career.
“I played the run first and then dropped back,” he said. “I just put my arms up and the ball came right to me. It was definitely fun. I was a little upset after that I couldn’t take it for a touchdown.”
Gunheim said he had several interceptions in high school, where he played free safety until his senior season.

Trick plays
Boise State is known for its trick plays, but the Huskies beat the Broncos at their own game.
First, Louis Rankin threw a 16-yard halfback pass to Quintin Daniels, which pushed UW ahead, 14-0.
“We knew they would bite on it,” Daniels said. “We threw a gimmick and it worked. Louis threw a great ball, and I made the catch and the line protected.”
Midway through the second quarter, the Huskies ran a flea-flicker with quarterback Jake Locker handing off to his tailback, who flipped it back to Locker, who threw accurately to Anthony Russo running deep down the middle of the field. Boise cornerback Orlando Scandrick closed enough ground to prevent a touchdown but drew an interference call.
“In games like that you’ve got to throw everything you have,” offensive coordinator Tim Lappano said. “… They were there. The flea-flicker was a touchdown – the kid did a good job to pass interfere there or that was gone. He saved them a touchdown there.”

Injury report
Cornerback Byron Davenport, who missed most of camp and the Syracuse game with a hamstring injury, played briefly before injuring his other hamstring.
Coach Tyrone Willingham said no other injuries appeared significant.
On his first play as a Husky, Davenport tackled receiver Vinny Perretta for a 2-yard loss.

Quote
“Too many turnovers. Too many penalties. Every time we got something going we had to bring it back. That’s what happens when you play great teams like Washington.” – BSU coach Chris Petersen.

Extra points
This was Washington’s first win over a ranked team since beating eighth-ranked Washington State in the 2003 Apple Cup. … The crowd of 70,045 was the largest at Husky Stadium since the 2005 Apple Cup. … UW senior Anthony Russo caught four passes, and has now caught at least one in 26 straight games. … Senior Jordan Reffett blocked a field goal in the third quarter, the first such block by UW since Larry Tripplett vs. Idaho in 2001. … Boise later blocked a UW field goal attempt, the first time that has happened to the Huskies since 2004. … Washington’s game captains were Gunheim, Russo, Marcel Reece and Daniel Te'o-Nesheim.

No scoring in this quarter, but the game seemed to turn somewhat toward the Broncos.

However, Locker just hit Reece for 39 yards down the sidelines, and the Huskies are at the Boise 22 ... perhaps with a chance to put this away.

That's bigger than any home crowd last season ... biggest since the 2005 Apple Cup.

Beautiful day, interesting game. They're getting their money's worth.

We just got word that cornerback Byron Davenport, who got his first UW playing time today after missing most of camp and the Syracuse game with a hamstring pull, had reinjured his hamstring and isn't expected to return.

It's obvious the Huskies have a very different attitude this season. The play calling just reflects an aggressive confidence that wasn't there the last few seasons.

Rankin has run for 36 yards, Locker for 31. Locker is 9 of 18 passing for 133 yards and a touchdown. Anthony Russo has four catches for 37 yards. And also, Rankin is 1-for-1 passing, hitting Quintin Daniels on a 16-yard halfback pass.

Huskies have 12-10 advantage in first downs and 223-197 in total yards.

For Boise, Ian Johnson has 44 yards on 11 carries. He's workmanlike more than flashy.

So far, the Huskies have been far more the trick play team than the Broncos, complete with Rankin's halfback pass for a touchdown and a flea-flicker that drew a pass interference call.

Locker led an amazing opening drive for a 7-0 lead. Then the Huskies went with a trick play -- halfback pass, Rankin to Daniels -- to make it 14-0.

However, Locker lost the ball on a scramble -- the first UW turnover of the season. And Boise instantly took advantage to pull within a touchdown.

So far, it's just the entertaining game most everyone envisioned.

I've arrived at Husky Stadium for what should be a fascinating game.

The traffic in was worse than I've seen for a long while. The early arrivers are the Boise State fans ... I walked past a lot of orange and blue along Montlake. But eventually, the purple is expected to come pour in, with an eventual crowd of around 70,000 expected.

For now, there are just a handful of fans in the stadium. And the one new look to the stadium is a reader board running at ground level behind the west end zone. It's just showing ads right now, but I'm hoping they'll eventually use it for scores ... a traditional weakness of the UW gameday presentation. And there are some interesting games across the country today.

Otherwise, I anticipate our normal gameday drill on the blog.

I'll pop in with pregame notes as they develop, try to give quarterly updates during the game, and then hopefully turn it over to you guys for postgame discussion.

11:35 a.m.: After those glaring orange uniforms of last week, the Huskies will being seeing something a lot more tradition in front of them today. The Broncos are wearing white shirts and white pants.

12:15 The teams have just gone off the field and the pregame festivities are about to begin. There was a huge roar for the Broncos as they headed for the tunnel. And I've got to say, there's probably as many of the opposing teams colors visible in the stands than any game here I've attended other than an Apple Cup.

12:30 UW captains for today are Daniel Te'o-Nesheim, Anthony Russo,Greyson Gunheim and Marcel Reece. Huskies won the toss and will receive, which Willingham said he would do more often now that the kickoff spot has been moved back to the 30.

Play ball.

NO. 22 BOISE STATE (1-0)
AT WASHINGTON (1-0)

Kickoff: 12:30 p.m. Saturday, Husky Stadium

Television: FSN. Radio: 950-AM.

The series: First meeting.

What to watch: Both teams rolled to one-sided victories in their openers, but both step up in class this week. That’s especially true for Washington’s freshman cornerback Vonzell McDowell Jr., who never saw anything like the BSU passing game at Syracuse, let alone Rainier Beach High. Similarly, the Washington defense that managed seven sacks in the opener will face a tougher challenge against a Broncos’ offensive line, which is led by All-America tackle Ryan Clady. Unlike Syracuse, BSU’s corners like to bump at the line, which offers pressure and possibility for the UW receivers. For all of Boise’s razzle-dazzle reputation, their true mentality is to run first, UW must control BSU tailback Ian Johnson.

What’s at stake: Washington hasn’t gotten off to a 2-0 start since the Holiday Bowl season of 2001. And with something close to a sellout crowd expected, they’d like to impress those fans who have drifted away in recent years. Meanwhile, one BSU streak must end: the Broncos have a nation-high 14-game winning streak overall, but they have lost 12 straight when visiting schools from the BCS conferences. The Broncos know their hopes of climbing in the national rankings and returning to a second BCS bowl can’t withstand a loss today.

The pick: UW, 37-35. The Washington front seven will get a real test, because the Boise offensive line is experenced and talents. The Washington secondary will too, because this passing game is so much more advanced that Syracuse. And Jake Locker will face a tougher test because the Broncos defense play more man, which will demand more precise and difficult throws. Whoever wins two of those three battles wins the game. I'm thinking Husky Stadium could make the difference.

Here is the information from today's press announcment concerning the Apple Cup football game: Washington State at Husky Stadium on Nov. 24.

Bottom line: Boeing is the title sponsor.

A few details:

•There's a kind of cool logo (shown). And the game is refered to as The Apple Cup in big type, followed in smaller type by "Proudly sponsored by Boeing." (It's kind of hard to see because I reproduced the logo so small, but the leaf is in the shape of a football.)

•The main meaning for fans will be a luncheon at the Qwest Events Center (between Seahawks Stadium and Safeco Field) with both teams, bands, cheerleaders, etc., following the downtown Thanksgiving parade.

•The main meaning for the schools is money, but no one would say how much.

Our afternoon meeting with coach Tyrone Willingham didn't produce much news, except for an injury update that was mostly status quo: Coach Tyrone Willingham said the Huskies health report has not changed this week, with only fullback Luke Kravitz (hand) unavailable. He said cornerback Byron Davenport, who was held out of the Syracuse game with a lingering hamstring injury, has “done OK.”

Here's an early look at the Pac-10 picks that will appear in our Football Friday section tomorrow ... plus tonight's game which won't appear tomorrow because that would be cheating.

Oregon State at Cincinnati: Pac-10 prestige on line against mediocre Big East team. Beavs, 35-24.
No. 10 California at Colorado State. Bears have enough to survive slight mental letdown after Tennessee. Cal, 37-17.
BYU at No. 13 UCLA. Cougars already have one Pac-10 victim. UCLA, 37-27.
Oregon at Michigan. What if Appalachian State was actually the better team? Ducks, 38-31.
Northern Arizona at Arizona. Wildcats had better find some offense. Arizona, 27-10.
Colorado at Arizona State. Erickson using non-Pac-10-like combination of defense and power. ASU, 28-17.
San Diego State vs. WSU. Cougs showed encouraging signs at Wisconsin. WSU, 31-17.
No. 22 Boise State at Washington. Which Boise streak will end: 14 straight wins or 12 straight losses on road vs. BCS opponents? UW, 37-35.

Our first Football Friday section of the season will appear in the Friday paper.

But again this season I'll go ahead and share my Pac-10 picks and power ranking here a day early.

1 USC 1-0: Extended home win streak to 34 games.
2 California 1-0: Jackson two TD punt returns from NCAA mark.
3 UCLA 1-0: Five opponents won at least 10 games in ’06.
4 Arizona State 1-0: RB Torain has 3 straight 100-yard games.
5 Oregon State 1-0: Playing in Cincinnati tonight.
6 Washington 1-0: Opened with biggest win under Willingham.
7 Oregon 1-0: QB Dixon ran for 141 yards vs. Houston.
8 Washington State 0-1: Hung with Wisconsin for a while.
9 Arizona 0-1: No turnovers, but almost no offense.
10 Stanford 0-1: Gained 150 yards more than ’06 average.

Washington and Washington State have called a press conference for Thursday to announce "special news" related to the Apple Cup.

Athletic directors Todd Turner and Jim Sterk and former quarterbacks Sonny Sixkiller and Jack Thompson will be in attendance for the announcement, which is expected to involve special celebrations marking the coming 100th football meeting of the old rivals.

Boise State is best known for -- well, probably the blue field in it's home stadium – but after that, they're best known for their wide-open offense. Part of that is due to those memorable trick plays in the Fiesta Bowl last January.

Coach Chris Petersen says those kinds of plays only account for 1 percent of the BSU offense. But UW defensive coordinator Kent Baer (pictured) says that on almost every play the Broncos present some kind of new challenge for a defense.

For comparison, he said that typical offenses might show about 10 different first-down formations. Over a three-game sampling of Boise, Baer identified 35.

We'll take a closer look at all that in the Thursday paper, but for now, here are a few comments from out afternoon briefing from Baer.

BOISE OVERVIEW
They play as well as an entire team probalby as anybody we’ve faced. It was early in the season, but they beat a really good Oregon State team. They beat a heck of a Hawaii team. They beat a good Fresno team, and then you see what they did against Oklahoma. Those are the games you look at and just say, ‘Wow.’”

ON WORRYING ABOUT THOSE TRICK PLAYS
I don’t think you worry about it. If you worry about it you play slow, and you have to be aggressive. It’s just something you have to talk about it. We’ve talked about it since last spring. Not necessarily Boise State, but being fundamentally sound.

ON A MUCH TOUGHER TEST FOR HIS YOUNG SECONDARY
There’s a little concern. I was pleased with the way those kids played last week. … But it’s going to be different coming into this. None of them have played before 72,000 people before or against this. You just don’t see that in high school. We showed them a lot of things yesterday in practice. I think they’ll be fine.

A couple of other notes from the afternoon:

Fewer than 2,000 tickets remain for Saturday.

Tyrone Willingham said there has been no change in the status of cornerback Jordan Murchison as a result of his Tuesday guilty plea to an assault change. Sentencing and at least one more court case remain, and Willingham has implied he will wait for legal resolution before making a final decision regarding Murchison, who is at least temporarily barred from all team activities.

Now that the season has begun, gold practice jerseys are given out as weeklong rewards for contributions in games, rather than daily rewards for practice. Wearing the gold jerseys this week are Jared Ballman, Greyson Gunheim, Jake Locker, Louis Rankin, Caesar Rayford, Jordan Reffett and Daniel Te’o-Nesheim.

At 2:20 this afternoon I'll be talking Huskies' with the Groz on KJR, 950-AM.

There should be no shortage of items to talk about with Syracuse behind, Boise State ahead, the hoops team heading home, and of course John McGrath's conversation starter from this morning's paper.

The conversation also will be streamed over the Internet.

My story today revolves around Boise State tailback Ian Johnson, the first of a handful of Heisman contenders the Huskies will face this season.

However, no Husky fans will want to miss John McGrath's column recommending that the Huskies move to Qwest Field rather than spend the hundreds of millions of dollars needed to renovate Husky Stadium.

I don't think it's fully out of the question that will happen - the Miami Hurricanes, after all, just decided to leave the Orange Bowl. And it's almost certain to happen for at least a season or two when any or all of several construction projects could make Husky Stadium an impractical place for 70,000 fans to gather.

But I think it is a choice of last resort for the Huskies. Even if UW can't fully renovate Husky Stadium into that glittering structure we see in the artist's conceptions, I think most fans would be willing to trade some of the comforts of Qwest for that view of the lake and the simple pleasure of getting to the game by walking across a yellow-leaved campus of autumn.

The Huskies finished their tour of Greece with a 2-3 record, but obviously that wasn't the point of this trip and, of course, losing to Peristeri shouldn't dent their RPI much.

The value that Lorenzo Romar stressed before and after was the bonding experience for his post-Hawes team.

And the best thing I heard from the tour was the performance of Tim Morris. You will hear Romar say a thousand times that the team didn't slow down last season because of Spencer Hawes, they slowed down because the guards couldn't dictate the tempo on either end of the court. Adding Morris and the now healthy Joel Smith into the remaining guard corps strikes me as the biggest cause for optimism about the coming season.

Here's the story that will show up in our Wednesday paper:

The Washington Huskies are coming home from their five-game tour of Greece with two wins, three losses and what coach Lorenzo Romar considers an invaluable bonding experience.

“We got to be together on and off the court,” Romar said though a university news release. “Whenever you play together you gain something. It’s given us coaches, going into this season, a pretty good idea of what we’ve got, obviously not counting the (true freshmen, who were not allowed to travel). A guy like Tim Morris just stepped up and played his tail off. … I think we can count on him going into the season.”

Over the five games, junior forward Jon Brockman led the Huskies with an average of 18.6 points and 10.8 rebounds. Morris, a transfer guard, was UW’s second-leading scorer with a 12.8-point average. Next was sophomore forward Quincy Pondexter who averaged 11.6 points and also was the No. 2 rebounder (5.8 rpg).

Washington opened the tour Thursday with a 93-81 win over Ment, 93-81. That was followed by an 87-82 loss at Iraklis on Friday, a 74-73 loss at Trikala on Saturday, a 103-100 win at Peristeri on Monday, and the tour-ending 93-85 loss at Daphni on Tuesday.

The Huskies are scheduled to return home Thursday night.

They will begin their 2007-08 season Nov. 5 in an exhibition against Seattle Pacific at Hec Edmundson Pavilion.

"Someone said it might be one of the big victories in college football," Appalachian State head coach Jerry Moore said after his team upset (formerly) fifth-ranked Michigan on Saturday. "It may be the biggest."

Big enough where it spread beyond the borders of its own two conferences and came up often in this morning's conference call with Pac-10 coaches.

I've already listed some UW notes in a couple of posts below, but here are some others from around the Pac-10:

OREGON, which visits Michigan Saturday: Coach Mike Bellotti said Michigan’s stunning loss to Appalachain State “doesn’t change the complexion” of the Ducks visit. He also said his QB Dennis Dixon is running more and passing more selectively this season, which are good things.

STANFORD, which has an open date: Coach Jim Harbaugh said he was pleased with quarterback T.C. Ostrander’s “courageous” performance against UCLA. He repeated the coaches’ mantra that teams improve most between their first and second games, and said the second-week bye “is a good thing for us.”

ARIZONA, which hosts Northern Arizona: Coach Mike Stoops said he was “a little frustrated” with his new spread offense in the opening loss to BYU, wishing his offense had “forced the issue” more aggressively on the road against a good defensive team. He said quarterback Willie Tuitama played well, but “got a little antsy” when rushed. He doesn’t plan major changes in the depth chart but indicated he might give more time to new young running backs.

OREGON STATE, which plays at Cincinnati on Thursdsay. Coach Mike Riley, speaking from the team bus on the way to the airport, said consecutive Thursday games are no problem because there are the normal number or preparation days between games. Revealed left guard Jeremy Perry will likely miss six weeks with lower leg injury. He said replacement Adam Speer got experience last season and started and played entire Sun Bowl game. Said receiver Sammie Stroughter, who previously walked away from the team citing grief issues, has been practicing and wants to play. Riley called that “surprising to me, but exciting also.” Stroughter will travel with the team, but won’t necessarily play, calling that “a family decision, too.” Riley said quarterbacks Sean Canfield and Lyle Moevao will share time Thursday, but not in the fixed rotation Riley used in the opener. “Both did some very good thing and they also had some plays they’d like back,” Riley said.

USC, facing an open date. With the Trojans likely to be favored every game this season, coach Pete Carroll agreed that Appalachian State win over Michigan gives coaches something to point to when they warn about taking no one for granted. However, he also points out the Appalachian State is a two-time defensing Division I-AA champion and far better than they’re getting credit for. Carroll also said he was impressed with Week One opponent Idaho under new coach Robb Akey, saying the Vandals played as tough “as you would expect Robb’s team to play … I’m fired up for him as he gets his program going.”

UCLA, will play BYU Saturday. Quarterback Ben Olson began his college career at BYU before taking a mission and transferring to UCLA. However, coach Karl Dorrell said “I don’t think (playing his old school) as big an impression on him as people think it is.”

ARIZONA STATE, which plays Colorado on Saturday. Coach Dennis Erickson said his philosophy at Tempe is to establish the run. “We feel like our offensive line has played pretty well and we’ve got a couple of pretty good running backs,” he said.

WASHINGTON STATE, which plays San Diego State on Saturday at Qwest Field. Coach Bill Doba said playing at Qwest Field “has kind of become second nature” to the Cougars. He added, “it’s become bigger than football, it’s become a university function … and they kind of cap it off with a football game on Saturday.” Doba said he “saw only last couple of minutes” of Idaho’s loss at USC, but he though the Vandals played hard and he talked to Akey, his former assistant, after the game.

CAL, which visits Colorado State. Coach Jeff Tedford was long-tired of talking about last season’s loss to Tennessee, and he didn’t seem much more interested in talking about their win over the Vols last week. “We’ve put it to bed,” he said. “We have a veteran group here and the leadership knows that’s over.”

Washington's 42-12 win over Syracuse got the attention of one voter in the ESPN/USAToday coach's poll and one in the Associated Press poll.

Coach Tyrone Willingham said he wasn't surprised.

We just got our only availability of the day with coach Tyrone Willingham.

His main news was that fullback Luke Kravitz will not need surgery on his injured hand. Otherwise, his status is unchanged: out for Saturday, week-to-week thereafter.

Willingham repeated that he is pleased with what his freshmen did in the opener at Syracuse, especially mentioning Brandon Johnson who was "maybe a block away" from breaking one on his kickoff returns.

He repeated his hopes for a full and fiery Husky Stadium when Boise State visits on Saturday. "We need to have a real presence in our stadium," he said.

Coach Tyrone Willingham confirmed today that fullback Luke Kravitz of Olympia will miss the Boise State game with a hand injury suffered at Syracuse. Beyond that, Kravitz's status will be updated week to week, although Willingham said he didn't know if surgery would be necessary.

In his absence, the position will be manned by starter Paul Homer, with Austin Sylvester or Tobias Togi in reserve. Sylvester is a freshman from Nevada who will also practice at linebacker.

Willingham also said that freshman kicker Erik Folk remains out with back problems. However, the solid debuts of punter/kickoff man Jared Ballman and place kicker Ryan Perkins eases the impact.

Otherwise, the news was better, as corner Byron Davenport and backup guard/center Matt Sedillo are expected to be available Saturday.

Winning player of the week honors were tailback Louis Rankin on offense, defensive end Daniel Te'o-Nesheim on defense, punter Jared Ballman on special teams; and scout teamers Romeo Savant and De'Shon Matthews.

Off field, UW announced that only a few thousand tickets remain for Saturday and that a sellout is expected.

1.) There are college upsets every week, but I'm not sure I can think of a bigger one -- ever -- than Appalachian State's 34-32 win over No. 5 Michigan in Ann Arbor.

2.) It will be fascinating to see what the polls do with Michigan now. By performance, obviously there is no way for them to belong among the Top 25 teams in college football.

3.) California's win over Tennessee was impressive and entertaining, but it lacked the case-closed finality of the Vols' domination of a season ago.

4.) That said, the Golden Bears might be as offensively gifted as any team in quite a while. Their battle with USC could be epic.

5.) Aside from Michigan, Arizona might have been the most disappointing team of Week One. A lot of folks -- me included -- felt like this might be the season that the Mike Stoops rebuilding elevated the program into the upper half of the Pac-10. Instead, the dreary and dreadful 20-3 loss to BYU indicates that the Arizona Wildcasts are as much of an annual tease/fraud as the Arizona Cardinals.

6.) A 38-10 loss at Southern California was probably about the best Idaho could have hoped for. It will take another week or two to figure is Robb Akey's Vandals are better than expected, or if the Trojans aren't as dominating as expected, or if the Trojans were just sleepwalking past the lone school on their schedule that didn't merit their full attention.

7.)It's nice that Virginia Tech got it's win for Blacksburg. But the Hokies had better bring something closer to their A game next weekend at LSU.

8.) If there is a mid-major school that makes a big Boise-like jump into BCS-bowl contention this season it is likely to be Hawaii, TCU, Southern Miss or Boise itself.

9.) Syracuse could be an absolutely dreadful football team, but Boise State's opening opponent -- Weber State -- is likely even worse. The coming week will tell far more about both the Broncos and the Huskies.

10) And speaking of those Huskies:

LAST WEEK
Washington (1-0) opened its season by routing Syracuse, 42-12, the most one-sided win of the Tyrone Willingham era. The Orange may be among the weakest teams in Division I-A, but the Huskies dominated so thoroughly that coaches were able to turn most of the final quarter over to reserves, getting valuable experience for young players.

SOMETHING TO BUILD ON
Jake Locker lived up to every expectation: running, passing, leading and making those around him better. Tailback Louis Rankin produced a career-high 147 rushing yards. Both lines outclassed Syracuse, with the O-line allowing no sacks and the D-line notching seven. The reworked secondary and new kickers got the job done.

SOMETHING TO WORK ON
Not much, other than seeing if UW can get Syracuse on the schedule a few more times. SU dominated in kickoff return average, but little else. The top concern for the Huskies might be avoiding overconfidence, while remembering how bad Syracuse might be. Willingham seemed to have that in mind Friday when he offered his team only notably muted praise.

PERSONNEL ISSUES
Fullback Luke Kravitz suffered the only announced injury, and it wasn’t much of an announcement: no description or the injury nor prognosis, although the tone indicated some significance. Otherwise, the one-sidedness of the victory allowed Washington to develop its bench and get an initial college experience for about a dozen and a half players.

THE WEEK AHEAD
The Huskies face a much more significant test, Boise State (1-0) brings its 14-game winning streak -- the longest in the nation -- into Husky Stadium. Despite significant personnel losses, the Broncos looked pretty good in their opener last week: a 56-7 thrashing of a Weber State.

We won't get any more UW coach or player information until Monday. So this might be a good day to check in on the upcoming home-opening opponent, Boise State, who is 1-0 just like UW, with a 56-7 win over Weber. That means the Broncos will take a 14-game winning streak into Husky stadium.

Here is a link to the Boise coverage from the local newspaper, The Idaho Statesman.

Here is the link to the official BSU football site.

Also, I went down to Western Athletic Conference media day this season, so we should have some pretty good BSU information in the pages of the TNT, too. I'll try to link to those each day, too.