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ASU's Derek Glasser Gets the Dawgpack Treatment (Photo via Twitter, @UWDawgPack)
At Hec Edmundson Pavilion, with a full student section behind them, the Washington Husky basketballers are as dominant as John Wooden's UCLA teams. In Seattle, the Dawgs bombed Pac-10 leaders Cal by 15 points. They crushed Pac-10 second placers Arizona State by 23. They dropped a 56-point second half on cross-state rivals Wazzu, and a 123-point game on crosstowners Seattle U.
Washington has won 16 of 17 games at home this year. But something happens on the road. Away from Hec Ed, the Dawgs are winless in six games. That ASU team the Huskies crushed here Saturday? Lost to 'em by 17 in Tempe.
Why the difference? On the road, the Huskies start the same guys, have the same coaches, play by the same rules--and flop. The one principle difference, it would seem, is the Washington fans--specifically the rowdy student section that goes by the name "The Dawgpack." Pac-10 players generally agree that Washington has the best crowd in the league. Oregon coach Ernie Kent has called The Dawgpack the best student section in the country.
The Dawgpack stands the entire game. When the opposing team is on offense, they keep up a constant shout, unnerving players and making it hard for them to communicate. When opposing coaches attempt to shout out instructions, they yell to drown him out. They pick on opposing players, like when they chanted "Mich-ael Cera!" at Cal's Nikola Knezevic (who does sorta look like him). A sign at Saturday's game had a photoshopped image of Husky guard Venoy Overton with his arm around the mother of hated ASU guard Derek Glasser. The sign read "Mr. and Mrs. Overton." With Glasser scoreless midway through the second half, UW fans held their hands in the shape of a zero and derisively chanted "Der-ek, Der-ek."...
If your sports fan coworker came back beaming yesterday after a long lunch, he or she may have, like me, gotten twin text messages bearing tidings of great joy.
First, at about 12:24 p.m., friend David: "Locker is coming back!"
Then, at 1:20 p.m., friend Clint: "Holy crap! Cliff Lee to the Mariners?"
True and (apparently) true. Husky star quarterback Jake Locker, on the morning that ESPN projected him as the first overall pick in the NFL draft, walked into the Husky football offices with his chocolate lab Ten and told coach Steve Sarkisian "I'm staying."
Locker's decision to forego the NFL draft and return for his senior season means that the Huskies will have a very potent offense next year. Between Locker, running back Chris Polk, and receiver Jermaine Kearse, the Dawgs could have the best combination of skill players in the league. Locker's decision will also give top QB recruit Nick Montana a year of seasoning before taking over the reigns in 2011.
The supposed acquisition of 2008 Cy Young Award winner Cliff Lee, is a little murkier. ESPN's Jayson Stark, who reported the trade in the first place, now writes that the deal is "close" but "not done." Didn't stop me from dreaming last night that the Mariners won the World Series.
(I was watching with friend David and Kyle MacLachlan's character from Twin Peaks. The Mariners won in the fifth game after a series of throwing errors got Matt Stairs--who apparently has signed with the M's in my subconscious--around with the series-winning run.)...
Overton will check "traffic on the ones" next time
You know the feeling: You're driving to some important event, via the quickest and most obvious route, during a time when traffic shouldn't be an issue, when suddenly you're in a bumper-to-bumper disaster. Last time it happened to me, it was during bike dropoff the day before the Danskin Triathon. Fit ladies, I demand 30 minutes of my life back!In the case of Washington guard Venoy Overton on Sunday, it was the Seattle Marathon that made him 30 minutes late for shootaround before Washington's basketball game against Montana. As a result, Overton was on the bench at tip-off for the first time this year.
"I knew I probably wasn't going to start," Overton told the Seattle Times' Percy Allen after the game. "If I was like five minutes late then I thought I would be good, but I knew I wasn't going to start tonight."
Overton was one of the first subs off the bench, and deployed his typical mix of aggression and risk-taking. A steal and lay-in early in the first half was nice. An attempted alleyoop to Darnell Gant, not so much.
At game's end, with Washington up three points, Overton found himself guarding Montana's Anthony Johnson, the leading scorer in the Big Sky conference. The 6'3" Johnson elevated for a three-point attempt above the 5'11" Overton. But Overton timed his leap perfectly and blocked Johnson's attempt.
It's tremendously rare to block a jump shot, let alone the jump shot of a league-leading scorer, let alone a jump shot by a guy who's four inches taller than you. But Overton managed the feat; not only that, he secured the ball, took a foul, and hit the game-clinching free throws.
Overton's block gives him an early highlight for his Pac 10 defensive player of the year reel. And it secures a win on a night when the Huskies shooting hands were ice cold. Now at 5-0 one of only two undefeated Pac 10 teams (Wazzu is the other), UW moved up in both national basketball polls. Coaches say the Dawgs are the #10 best team in the nation, the media puts them at #12.
UW's next game is their first on the road--they'll play at Texas Tech on Thursday as part of the Pac 10/Big XII Challenge.
Could Washington morph from a football-crazy school into a basketball mecca? Certainly there's no contest performance-wise. Now, media coverage is beginning to turn basketball's way.
For the first time, the Seattle Times has a reporter dedicated solely to Washington basketball: Percy Allen, who formerly was the Sonics' beat writer. Previously Bob Condotta covered both basketball and football, meaning that hoops coverage suffered in the early months of the season, while football was a going concern.
Allen has followed the Dawgs from practice one, is filing a story most every day, and has created a must-read blog.
Husky basketball also finally has a dedicated fan blog, Montlake Madness. Founder Josh Anderson is covering every game, doing interviews with players and opposing coaches, basically owning it. Like every good fan blog, it covers the team in-depth and is recommended for diehards.
If you're looking for a smart, Hoops 201 perspective on Husky hoops, check out Todd Dybas' writing in the Seattlepi.com. Dybas brings more advanced strategic insight than the average beat writer, going in-depth about offensive sets, defensive styles, and players' specific moves. Good stuff.
Moving more toward the advanced hoops end of the spectrum, Kevin Pelton of BasketballProspectus.com will be sharing his thoughts about Husky hoops from time to time. Here's his "Five Thoughts: Washington-Portland State" from Sunday. Good stuff. (The College Basketball Prospectus came out last week, if you want a bookful of advanced college hoops talk.)
Football still seems to dominate conversation here. At the Times, Allen's assumption of hoops duties frees up Condotta to write full-time about football. And paid sites like Dawgman, UDubSports.com, and RealDawg all focus primarily on the gridiron. Mainly because most media consumers grew up in the football glory days. As football flounders, and basketball...uh...blasts off (?), the landscape is changing.
I walk into The Dutchess, for 80 years a Husky bar, and crane my head toward the screen to see the score.
"You sure you want to come in?" says the buzzed middle-aged man drunk at the door.
"Oh God, what's the score now," I ask.
He shakes his head. "Not good. It's not good."
And it wasn't. The Huskies had allowed a touchdown right before halftime, and a long kickoff return to open half 2. I'd been spared hearing this misery by my car radio's sudden decision to inexplicably conk out. The score, then, was 34-7. The Huskies didn't even compete.
Washington, now mathematically unable to reach the six wins they'd need to be eligible for a bowl game, get a week of rest before the Apple Cup on the 28th.
Someday, you will do it. You won't have a co-worker's birthday party, a seasonal gutter cleaning, or brunch with an ex. Someday, you will watch sports all weekend. If, perchance, this is the weekend, here's how it should go:
FRIDAY
5 p.m.: Leave work, drive towards Hec Ed for the Athletes in Action Classic. Stop at Bartells and buy some socks on the way.
5:30-6:30 p.m.: Watch the second half of Belmont/Portland St. Cheer on PSU's Melvin Jones, a Chief Sealth grad who got his life on track after a rough start to high school.
6:30 p.m.: Dinner at Hec Ed. Recommended--Porters Place BBQ. Not recommended--Everything else.
7-9 p.m.: Watch the Huskies avoid a letdown like in last year's opening-game loss to Portland, and lay an ass-whooping on outmanned Wright St. The Raiders may stay in this game early if their shooters are hot, but UW's depth will mean WSU will be run ragged by the second half.
9-10 p.m.: Sit in the traffic lineup to get out of the Hec Ed parking lot. While you're at it, check ESPN 710 to see how Seattle U did in their opening game, at Oklahoma State.
10 p.m.: Drive home--you've got a big day tomorrow!
SATURDAY
7:30 a.m.: Drag yourself out of bed and drive to the George and Dragon for World Cup Qualifying soccer.
8 a.m.: Russia v. Slovenia begins. Here's the deal--eight European countries are getting their last shot at qualifying for the 2010 World Cup. They are paired into four groups of two, each pair plays a home-and-home with the winner going through to the Cup.
9 a.m.: England v. Brazil begins. This is just a friendly, with no World Cup qualifying implications, but c'mon. It's England/Brazil!
10 a.m.: Greece v. Ukraine! Ouzo v. Vodka! Who wins? Everyone!
Noon: Ireland v. France. Even more testy after an Irish diplomat gravely insulted French PM Sarkosky this week.
2 p.m.: Drive to The Dutchess and catch the second half of the Washington/Oregon St. football game. Will the Beavers knock Jake Locker senseless again?
2:30-3:30 p.m.: Probably some sort of silly play by the Husky special teams that costs us the game late, ending slight hopes of a Husky bowl appearance.
3:30-4:00 p.m.: Enjoy a chicken sandwich so you don't have to consume any Hec Ed food.
4 p.m.: Walk down to Hec Ed. Yeah, it's a trek, but do you really want to sit in that post-game parking lot traffic again? Not worth it. Plus, those fries you just ate have a ton of calories.
4:30-6:30 p.m.: Wright St. vs. Portland St. This will probably be the most competitive of the six games to be played this weekend.
6:30-7 p.m.: Check Facebook on your phone. Note how many "status updates" are actually just people whining about pointless shit.
7-9 p.m.: UW vs. Belmont, which I'm hoping will be very entertaining. Both the Huskies and Belmont were among the 50 fastest-tempo teams in the NCAA last year. If Belmont plays their style instead of trying to slow the game down, the Dawgs could hit 100.
9-9:30 p.m.: Healthful walk back up to The Dutchess.
9:30-Midnight: Buy repeated rounds for everyone at the bar (or just me)....
This weekend's Athletes in Action Classic at Hec Edmundson Pavilion would be worth checking out even if the #14-ranked Huskies weren't playing.
All four teams competing won 20 games last year. Washington, Portland State and Belmont all made postseason tournaments. Each team will play each other team in a round-robin format, with two games each night on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
The three non-Husky teams in Tweet-sized bits:
Wright St. Raiders (Dayton, OH): Slow-tempo WSU return four starters from team that took Horizon League winners Butler down to the wire in league championship game. 6'5" G Todd Brown shot 40% from three. Play Huskies Friday.
Belmont Bruins (Nashville, TN): Fast-tempo team missed NCAA tourney last season for first time in five years. Now they graduate four starters and look to be rebuilding. Young team with 11 frosh or sophomores. Play Huskies Saturday.
Portland St. Vikings (Portland, OR): New coach is Tyler Geving after Ken Bone left for Wazzu. Also gone:...
Bobby Galer (UW Special Collections)
What with it being Veterans' Day and all (thanks, Dad and Grandpa!) I thought I'd search about for a local sports star who was also a veteran. I'd never heard of Robert "Bobby" Galer until this morning, though I should have: He's a member of the Washington Sports Hall of Fame.
Galer, known as "Goose" in his player days, was a forward on the Washington basketball team from 1933-1935. He was the top offensive threat for a fast-paced team (by that day's standards) which sportswriters dubbed "The Greyhounds."
In Galer's junior year, the 1934 Dawgs won the Pacific Coast Conference Championship. Galer made All-America as a senior 1935, he's one of only 16 Huskies to do so.
But his more valuable distinction is this: Galer won the Congressional Medal of Honor, this nation's highest military award, for his service as a pilot in World War II.
Galer is one of eight University of Washington alums to have won the Medal of Honor; a on-campus memorial to them was dedicated this morning.
Here is the citation for the award Galer received in 1943 from President Roosevelt:
For conspicuous heroism and courage above and beyond the call of duty as leader of a marine fighter squadron in aerial combat with enemy Japanese forces in the Solomon Islands area. Leading his squadron repeatedly in daring and aggressive raids against Japanese aerial forces, vastly superior in numbers, Maj. Galer availed himself of every favorable attack opportunity, individually shooting down 11 enemy bomber and fighter aircraft over a period of 29 days. Though suffering the extreme physical strain attendant upon protracted fighter operations at an altitude above 25,000 feet, the squadron under his zealous and inspiring leadership shot down a total of 27 Japanese planes. His superb airmanship, his outstanding skill and personal valor reflect great credit upon Maj. Galer's gallant fighting spirit and upon the U.S. Naval Service.
Bobby Galer flew in both WWII and the Korean War. In World War II he was shot down three times, once having to swim for 90 minutes to reach shore. In Korea, he was shot down again and barely survived after his foot caught in a cockpit strap and he couldn't parachute out until he was 150 feet off the ground.
Galer retired from the Marines in 1959, working in real estate and engineering. He died in 2005; here's an excellent obituary in the Seattle Times.
Monster volleyball game tonight at Hec Ed, as the 19-2 Huskies take on 15-6 Stanford in what's traditionally been the best-attended and most exciting game on the UW home schedule.
Added intensity this year, as the Huskies lead the Cardinal in the Pac-10 standings by just one game.
Stanford beat the Huskies in Palo Alto on October 10, it was UW's first loss of the year.
The Cardinals top player is 6'5" outside hitter Alix Klineman. A two-time All-American raised in Manhattan Beach, CA, Klineman says one of her favorite songs is "Rainbows” by Jack Johnson and G. Love.
Tickets for tonight's game are $9 if you are fancy and want to sit all close, but you can get general admission tickets for $6. ($4 for kids and seniors).
"Rainbows"
Well i woke up this morning, rainbow filled the sky
Yes I woke up this morning, rainbow filled the sky
That was God tellin' me, Everything's gonna be alright
Well so long, good friends, When will we meet again?
I said so long good friends, When will we meet again?
Well i don't know, i don't know, But I guess I'll see you then...
Well I'm gonna pack my old guitar, Move on down the road,
I'm gonna pack my old guitar, and move on down the road (where you gonna go?)
Where I'll go, I don't know, But I guess I's gots to go
When I woke up this morning, a rainbow filled the sky
When I woke up this morning, a rainbow filled the sky,
Well that was God tellin me, Everything...Everything is gonna be alright....
The Huskies' exhibition win over Central Washington wasn't televised, so all I'd heard was rumors of some amazing Clarence Trent dunk. Turns out UW's video crew captured it. Here it is. Yowza.
Trent, a freshman who started his high school career at Gig Harbor and finished at Nevada basketball farm Findlay Prep, may not even see much playing time for the Huskies this year. Lorenzo Romar has compiled a wealth of talent.
H/T: Percy Allen's indispensable Husky Men's Basketball Blog.
Tomorrow night's your first chance to see the University of Washington basketball team play against another team. The game is an exhibition (and, thus, viewable for the bargain price of $10) against Central Washington University, a team of predominately Puget Sound area kids. If you are any kind of high school hoops fan (and if you aren't, what's stopping you?) you will recognize some of the names on the CWU roster.
But let us discuss the Huskies. When we last left them, they had suffered a close loss to Purdue in the NCAA tournament's second round. But I prefer to remember the home win vs. Washington State which clinched the school's first Pac-10 title since the Eisenhower Administration, and watching an exultant Lorenzo Romar cut down the nets. One of my favorite Seattle sports memories.
This year, the Huskies confront life without four-year starter and team captain Jon Brockman. The school's all-time leading rebounder, now playing in the NBA (here he is dunking against the Zombie Sonics!), averaged a double-...
Coach Sark's approval ratings are down this week
We knew what Husky football coach Steve Sarkisan and his staff's strengths were: Motivating players. Game planning. Firing up fans.
Now, after Washington's dreadful performance against Arizona State, a game lost on the most incompetent football play I have ever seen, we are beginning to see what Sark and his staff aren't so good at: Details. Flexibility. Keeping players under control.
Let's start with that incompetent football play. Arizona State has the ball at midfield with 13 seconds left in a tie game. I'm watching the game on FSN with childhood friend Jason. We see ASU QB Danny Sullivan loft a ball deep toward the goal line. As the camera tracks the ball, we expect to see a phalanx of Washington defensive backs there to knock away the Hail Mary attempt. Instead, we see two Arizona State players alone in the end zone. One, Chris McGaha, catches the ball in stride and scores the winning touchdown. No Huskies are in sight. (Watch it yourself on YouTube.)
The funny thing is, neither Jason or I really reacted. It was too shocking. If this had happened in a sixth-grade flag football game, you'd be a little annoyed at the kids for failing to be cognizant of the situation. But in Division I college football? Not credible. When one of us did speak it was Jason, appropriating a line from Anchorman: "Heck, I'm not even mad. That's amazing! Nick Holt just pooped a whole wheel of cheese all over the field."
Other reactions I read later on Twitter:
"Pardon me while I go put a fork in my eye."--The Times' Danny O'Neil
"That might have been the worst 1:30 I've ever seen."--KJR's ESPN 710's Mike Salk
And my favorite, from Husky hoopster Isaiah Thomas: "Daaaaaaaaaaaang."
Yup. That about captures it.
Defensive coordinator Nick Holt makes $600K/year
Holt, the assistant coach in charge of the defense, who earns a higher salary than Washington State's head coach, is most at fault for the play. His players should've had clear instructions not to let anyone behind them. Instead, two Sun Devil receivers were wide-open in the end zone. This lapse has caused message board denizens to call for his firing. (Jason emailed me last night: "Why is firenickholt.com still available? Just askin'.")
The excitable Holt is surely a master motivator, but he may be in need of adult supervision during game situations--as he was at USC, where Holt did the hands-on coaching but Pete Carroll called the defensive plays. After ASU's game-winning TD, FSN cameras caught Holt lighting into Husky linebacker E.J. Savannah. Holt screamed at the camera-person to back away. Holt also may have picked up his second 15-yard sideline interference penalty of the season--the Huskies were charged with one, but the refs didn't say who caused it. ESPN's Ted Miller has called Holt out for failing to appear at a post-game press conference, though it's unclear whether reporters requested him.
Sarkisian's weaknesses showed through as well. The fateful play shouldn't even have happened, as UW probably could've run the clock out when they had the ball seconds earlier on their own ten. Or, since they had more than a minute left, they could've tried to drive for the winning score. Instead, Sarkisian tried two running plays, then a long pass that fell incomplete, giving the Sun Devils one more chance on offense. Either run out the clock or don't.
Sark's play-calling lacked flexibility. Arizona State's fast, over-pursuing defense was ripe for some misdirection plays. Dennis Erickson called three reverses, one of which, a reverse pass, went for a touchdown. Sarkisian instead tried to exploit ASU's over pursuit with screen passes, none of which were effective despite repeated attempts.
And, perhaps most egregious, the Huskies played out of control. They committed 12 penalties, totaling 124 yards. Jake Locker threw two interceptions on the same drive, deep in ASU territory. The first was called back due to an ASU penalty. The second came at the goal line on a Tebow-esque run-forward-then-pass that went directly into the hands of a Sun Devils defender.
Next up: Oregon, a team Husky rooters desperately want to beat, a program the Huskies once dominated but haven't defeated (in fact, haven't come within 20 points of) for five years. Sarkisan and co. will earn an avalanche of brownie points with a win over the Ducks. But against Oregon's potent spread option attack, discipline is critical. If the Huskies don't have it again, another Willingham-era beatdown is inevitable. And the Willingham-era discontent will begin to bubble up once again.
By per-hour sports entertainment spending, you'll have a tough time topping tonight's Hec Ed double feature.
At 6 p.m., the #4-ranked Husky volleyballers play the sun-kissed ladies of #12 UCLA. (Why is volleyball awesome? It is the only sport in which your opponent will have a player from Laguna Niguel named "Dicey McGraw".)
The Dawgs are coming off their first loss of the season, a five-set defeat last Sunday at then-#7 Stanford.
Tickets for the volleyball match are $9 for reserved seats and $6 for general admission, which ensures you a good seat to the main event, the nationally-televised "Midnight Madness" public Husky hoops practice.
The "Midnight Madness," which you can also watch on ESPNU, will feature a dunk contest, three-point shooting contest, and a scrimmage. (Also, and I'm less excited about this, a "team skit" (?) and "student contests.")
The hoops event is scheduled to start at 7:30 p.m., but that depends on how long the volleyball game goes tonight. At 7:15, the gates of Hec...
Owen Schmitt, the 24-year-old starting fullback for the Seattle Seahawks, opened a gushing wound on his forehead during Sunday's pre-game introductions when he decided to repeatedly whack himself with his helmet as he ran onto the field. Video!
This is pretty awesome in a tribal way, and apparently psyched up Schmitt's teammates. "That got us going," linebacker Lofa Tatupu told the P-I's Greg Johns. "A man willing to bloody his own face, you know how much he's willing to put on the line."
Then again, as childhood friend David pointed out later that night, it also shows why football players struggle to adjust to the working world once their playing careers are over. A pre-event self-bloodying may inspire football teammates, but see how well it works before your next company-wide health coverage informational.
Ex-Husky Bobby Jones: NCAA hoops "like slavery"
Halfway around the world, a 25-year-old former Husky is giving serious thought to how athletes fit into society. Bobby Jones, a defensive whiz for the...
The main reason why you never leave a college football game early: College football is played by college students.
And college students, are, for the most part, idiots. (Moments from my freshman year: drinking a 40 oz. Budweiser and then singing "I Feel Pretty" from West Side Story while pirouetting around my dorm room. This led to vomiting and enforced celibacy.)
So you'll get moments like we had Saturday night at Husky Stadium: Arizona QB Nick Foles, who should've been handing the ball off to run down the clock, winging an ill-advised pass to a covered receiver, and having it bounce off the receiver's foot into the waiting arms of UW linebacker Mason Foster -- himself in the area because he'd decided to ignore his coaches' orders and blitz on the play--who grabs the ball and runs it into the end zone for a go-ahead score. (Here's a great breakdown of the play by the P-I's Greg Johns.)
They're calling it "The Immaculate Interception." Here's incredible video from the field-level: Foster comes right at you.
...
We await this weekend's football games like we would a root canal. Anxious, terrified, and just wanting it to be over.
Boy-band 'do or no, Nick Foles scares me
Realpolitik talk: Both the Huskies and Seahawks must win this weekend if they have any hope of postseason play. I'm not going to get into the numbers, just accept this as fact and keep reading.
On Saturday night, the Huskies host the the Arizona Wildcats and their frightening passing attack. Given the Huskies' secondary issues, this would be awful enough, but it's even worse because the Dawgs won't have either of their starting safeties. Free safety Justin Glenn is out for the season after breaking his leg against Notre Dame, and strong safety Nate Williams won't play after suffering a concussion in the same game. Two backups and even a true frosh will mix in at safety.
This just as Arizona seems to have found a quarterback: Soph. Nick Foles, who was 25/34 with 3 TDs and 0 interceptions in the 'Cats win at OSU last weekend. That's a 165 quarterback rating. Yipes.
Meanwhile the Seahawks are responding to their must-win status by rushing injured QB Matt Hasselbeck into action. Hasselbeck says he can throw despite his broken rib, which would be fine if he were a baseball player. Unfortunately, football is a contact sport, and the man protecting Hass's blind side is a third-stringer who is also playing hurt.
The Jaguars, the Hawks' opponent on Sunday, will overwhelm the left side of the Seahawks line, they will hit Hasselbeck, and only then will we really see how well that rib is healed....
When I tell you that the highlight of the Seattle sports weekend was giving a standing ovation to a third-place team, you may think it wasn't much of a weekend. But it was epic, notably for our sports teams getting the worst Indiana lambasting since the Kerry campaign.
Notre Dame 37, Washington 30 (OT)
As I headed to Teddy's to watch Washington vs. Notre Dame (live from South Bend, Indiana), I wondered exactly how empty the bandwagon would be. Coming off the USC win, the bar was packed for Stanford. But after losing that game, how would it look? Let's let pictures tell the story:
Crowd at Teddy's for UW/Stanford
Crowd at Teddy's for UW/Notre Dame
So--yeah, Seattle sports fans, you are some fairweather sons of bitches. And you missed an amazing game, one that will always be remembered for the stunning inability of the Huskies to score one touchdown from twelve tries inside the one-yard-line. If you have a Husky fan at your office, I recommend putting his morning coffee three feet behind a white line and see...
I need Bo Eason to tell me it's okay to watch football.
After seeing Eason's engrossing one-man show at ACT on Thursday, I don't know if I can do so guilt-free again. Watching the former NFL player act out the injury that helped end his career actually made me physically ill. No joke: Sweat pouring out of me, I excused myself down my row, and hustled to the bathroom to splash water on my face. I thought about the real scars on Eason's actor knees, about seeing him inject himself there on stage, as he did before games during his playing days.
And I thought about Curtis Williams, who in 2000 absorbed a fatal hit playing in a football game for the University of Washington. "He fell to his back and went into convulsions," teammate Anthony Kelley relates in Derek Johnson's The Dawgs of War , which I'd read earlier that week . "He was mouthing the words 'I can't breathe .' ... Then Curtis began spitting up and shaking, and his eyes rolled up in the back of his head." Williams died of his injuries 18 months...
Last year we watched most University of Washington road games at Teddy's, a tavern near the intersection of Roosevelt and 65th. The scene during last year's games was this: A few scattered tables, each manned by a single grumpy middle-aged guy. And then the table at which the grumpy thirty-somethings, me and my friend David, sat.
Here's what Teddy's looked like for Saturday's UW/Stanford game:
People watching Husky football! On purpose! (Photo by David Swidler)
Back when I wrote for the Seattle P-I, I had a rollicking front-page-of-sports piece that established this rule: When it comes to sports fandom, women follow winners. Said guideline was in effect Saturday, as attractive female after attractive female filed in to watch the suddenly popular Huskies. I'm not complaining: Who among us doesn't like to see a pretty girl? (Certainly the new P-I does, even when they're covering Central American political crises.) The only time you'd see one at Teddy's last year is she happened to walk past.
Amazing what one big...
Jake Locker. Along with Glee, the biggest national breakout of September 2009. With three terrific performances, Locker has rocketed up NFL scouts' charts, ESPN's Todd McShay now lists Locker as the #2 QB prospect in the 2010 draft, and #7 overall.
Oddly, Locker's ascension has come without using the tool he was best known for before this year--his legs. We may see them finally against Stanford.
Stanford's Thomas Keiser: Can He Catch Jake?
Stanford Pressures
Before we get to that, though--a quiz!
Q: What do Stanford DE Thomas Keiser and the entire Husky defense have in common?
A: They each have four sacks this season.
Keiser, a 6-5, 257 lb. sophomore from the Pittsburgh suburbs, made the Freshman All-American team last year and will make a bid for the national one if he keeps up his penetrating ways. Keiser is 7th in the nation in both tackles for loss and sacks.
Overall, the Stanford defense has nine sacks on the season. They are sacking opposing QBs on one out every twelve passing attempts. That will...
Your #3-ranked Washington Huskies volleyball team gets their stiffest test of the season tonight; they play at #7 Oregon. The Ducks are one of eight unbeaten teams in the nation--they are third in hitting percentage and have the nation's most dangerous server in Heather Meyers, who's averaging nearly an ace per set.
Washington and Oregon played two thrilling matches last season, with the Dawgs prevailing each time: In five sets at Hec Ed in October, and in four in Oregon the next month.
Overall, the Huskies have won 16 straight matches over the Ducks, with Oregon's last win in 2000 at Mac Court.
The UW athletic department points out that the Dawgs and Ducks have had three common opponents this season:
Minnesota: UW 3-0, UO 3-2.
Portland St.: UW 3-0, UO 3-1.
Seattle U: UW 3-0, UO 3-0.
The game is at 7pm. There's no TV or radio; the best way to follow the match is probably on the UW Volleyball Twitter feed.
Derek Johnson, author of Husky Football in the Don James Era, has produced another loving remembrance of Washington footballers past: The Dawgs of War. Johnson's subject: The 2000 Huskies, a team that endured the paralysis of teammate Curtis Williams--Johnson provides chilling, visceral details of the immediate aftermath of Williams' injury--to achieve UW's last Rose Bowl victory.
The team's on-field success has since been overshadowed as a result of the Seattle Times' 2008 "Victory and Ruins" series, detailing criminal behavior by some members of that team. Johnson's book puts the focus back on the field and, in some of the book's most revealing passages, on the sideline and in the locker room. We emailed Derek some questions, he emailed back.
Was there anything you learned in the course of writing the book that really surprised you?
I didn't have a deep affection for the team when I started, and I didn't foresee that changing. By the end of the project, I loved them. I loved what Marques stood for. I loved...
After the win at USC, scads of positive reinforcement is coming the Huskies' way. You know they are ranked #25 in the AP Poll.
Donald Butler was named Walter Camp Foundation's Defensive Player of the Week. Butler is one of four nominees for the ESPN All-America Player of the Week, chosen by ESPN analysts. (See a special Butler highlight reel here.) And, Butler is Pac-10 Defensive Player of the Week.
Kicker Eric Folk is Pac-10 Special Teams Player of the Week and one of three Lou Groza Stars of the Week.
And Jake Locker won the Johnny O'Brien Quarterback of the Week Award. Locker maybe got the best praise, though, from USC coach Pete Carroll: "That's the best quarterback we've played in nine years here. Jake Locker has ridiculous talent, and had he remained healthy last year, Tyrone [Willingham] would still be coaching there."
Well that's sort-of a scary thought, but we appreciate the sentiment.
With Washington football now holding a 27-49-4 all-time record against USC, it dawned on me that coaches who beat the Trojans in their debut season must be rare. I was right. There are only two: Steve Sarkisian and Don James.
YES THAT DON JAMES! (Sorry, people under 30, but we Gen Xers grew up worshiping James, who won 153 games in 18 years. Until we die out (appx. 2060) you young bloods will be hearing about him. Deal with it.)
Did Ty Willingham beat USC in his debut season? Don't be ridiculous. Gilby? Faugh. Lambo? Nuh-uh. Jim Owens may be immortalized with a statue outside Husky Stadium, but his '57 Dawgs took a 19-12 loss to the Trojans. Darrell Royal took a 35-7 beating the year before. John Cherberg's '53 Dawgs managed a tie, as did Ralph Welch's '42 squad. But Howard Odell's 1948 squad and James Phelan's 1930 Dawgs both absorbed blowout losses.
Other Husky coaches either never faced SC, or didn't face them in their first year, which is why we must mention Enoch Bagshaw, who...
For 99.99999% of the world, "Niagara Falls" conjures up the mental image of one of the natural wonders of the world. For me it will always mean one thing: "Washington 16, USC 13." You see, my childhood friend Jason picked Saturday, September 19 for his wedding in Western New York. My season tickets for the game went to some random woman on StubHub. But I'm not bitter. After a win this wonderful, how could I be? Moments like this is why I bother to watch sports in the first place.
The father of the groom celebrates
I wasn't too worried about being at a wedding during this game. As I wrote on this site, I didn't like the Huskies' chances. ("Expecting a USC Blowout"--great work, Kolloen.) Then, Dawgs fell behind 10-0 early, confirming my fears. I stopped my obsessive Blackberry checking to focus on more wedding reception appropriate activities, like business networking and flirting.
Soon, though, the infreqent Blackberry checks began to show a different story. While I was talking up my writing to a guy who owns...
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