from video
Spirits were high in Seattle Saturday morning. Fresh off a narrow three-point loss on the road to Stanford, the Husky faithful were confident that this was the year, after nine failed tries in a row, that Washington would finally get the best of Oregon. An estimated 10,000 fans arrived by 3:00 AM for the first-ever appearance of ESPN’s College GameDay in Seattle, and Washington alumni Warren Moon and Hope Solo echoed the fan base’s energy by picking the Huskies under the sentiment that they were “due.”
Instead, Oregon made it ten victories in a row.
Following the game Washington quarterback Keith Price, on how it feels to have lost ten in a row to Oregon:
“It is frustrating . . . especially when you’re going toe-to-toe with a team like that, and then it just kind of got ugly. You know, halfway through the fourth quarter . . . uh, but man . . . I’m proud of our team, we just played a very good team, but we’re [Washington] definitely one of the best teams in the country, but it’s kind of hard matching score-for-score with a team like that.”
After playing well in the first quarter, Price had a questionable performance in the second quarter, “I think I was bit too cautious, at times just not wanting to lose my momentum, ’cause once I turn the ball over, that’s what Oregon does, they feed off of it.” He added, “They [Oregon] have a fast defense . . . but it came down to execution.”
Huskies head coach Steve Sarkisian remained positive about his team’s performance following a second straight loss, both to tough opponents:
Coach Sark’s plan to adopt Oregon’s ways reaches its next stage.
“That’s a good team we lost to. It’s been two back-to-back weeks of playing two really good football teams, and I think our kids have showed a great deal of competitive spirit. I think that they’ve shown that we can play with those guys, you know? We played with Stanford for 60 minutes, and we played pretty even with these guys for three-and-a-half quarters.”
“Unfortunately, we just couldn’t get over the hump against two really good teams, but that doesn’t take away from our football team. We’re a good football team and we need to get back on the horse and we need to start preparing for Arizona State, because the biggest game of our season is next Saturday and we need to get ready for it.”
On trying to get back in the game in the second half:
“We felt confident that we could re-group and go out and have a good plan in the second half on both sides of the ball, and for the most part, we did, and we kept going back and forth, toe-to-toe, toe-to-toe, and they just didn’t make a mistake to give us a chance to get even with them, they just kept making their plays.”
Meanwhile, Sarkisian was effusive in his praise of Oregon quarterback Marcus Mariota:
“I’d be hard pressed to see if we’re going to see a better quarterback this year. That guy is special. I don’t know when he is planning on going to the NFL, but when he does, I think he’ll be a top-five draft pick, he’s a hell of a player . . . the general plan was to try to keep him in the pocket, and then when he’d run the ball to make sure we had somebody always having their eyes on him and tackle him. Unfortunately when that happened, he ran away from our guys that had their eyes on him, so, he’s just a difficult match-up.”
Sarkisian said this about Oregon: “That’s a good football team right there, their ranking is deservedly so.”
That says it all, and it is why Washington is now trying to avoid number 11 against Oregon.
—————————————-
Announcements
* Are you a current or retired coach who would want to create some analyses as other guest coaches have in the past? The readers and I have learned so much from expertise offered, and we would love to talk with you about how you can help us all continue to learn at FishDuck.com. E-Mail me . . . charles@fishduck.com
Related Articles:
Nathan Roholt is a senior writer and managing editor emeritus for FishDuck. Follow him on Twitter @nathanroholt. Send questions/feedback/hatemail to nroholtfd@gmail.com.