Instant reaction to Week 8 developments on the field (and in post-game news conferences) …
1. The good, the bad and the brutal
The weekend brought a slew of notable results across the region. We’ll start with a handful of victories worthy of mention, then move to the losses.
— Perhaps the best win of all came on Friday night, when Brigham Young snatched victory away from what would have been a bad loss to Oklahoma State.
After allowing the go-ahead touchdown with 73 seconds remaining, the Cougars converted a fourth-and-seven to preserve their desperation drive, then won the game on a 35-yard catch-and-run touchdown pass from quarterback Jake Retzlaff to receiver Darius Lassiter.
The victory preserved BYU’s undefeated season — a season that increasingly appears touched by destiny — and kept the Cougars tied with Iowa State atop the Big 12.
— Colorado also cleared our bar with its 34-7 demolition of Arizona in Tucson.
The margin was impressive, of course. So, too, was CU’s control of the line of scrimmage, an area that often flummoxes the Buffaloes.
The big picture counts, as well: The victory pushed the Buffs (5-2) to the brink of a postseason berth. Win one of the final five, and they’re bowling.
— We cannot ignore UCLA’s surprising victory at Rutgers, which qualified as a stupendous result for the Bruins given that they were 0-4 in Big Ten play and hadn’t won a game anywhere since the final day of August.
Add the cross-country trip and the early kickoff (9 a.m. Pacific), plus their start-to-finish control of the game, and it was a next-level performance for coach DeShaun Foster’s beleaguered program.
Before we move to the bad losses, of which there were several, a quick point of clarification: Some results don’t qualify as good wins or bad losses.
Oregon’s blowout victory at Purdue doesn’t move the Hotline’s needle because the Boilermakers are, well, terrible; the same could be said of Washington State’s dominance of Hawaii.
At the other end of our range, Arizona State’s loss to Cincinnati came on the road against a quality opponent, and the Sun Devils were without starting quarterback Sam Leavitt. That’s a loss, but not a bad loss.
There were quite a few of those, however.
2. Brutal losses, just brutal
The competition for the worst loss of the weekend came courtesy of two California schools — one imploded at home, the other on the opposite coast.
— USC found a new and creative way to blow a late lead and lost for the fourth time in five Big Ten games.
The Trojans led Maryland by 14 points early in the fourth quarter and by six with two minutes remaining. Facing fourth-and-one, coach Lincoln Riley opted for a 41-yard yard field goal that would have effectively sealed the win.
But the kick was blocked and returned by Maryland to midfield. The Terrapins needed five plays to score the go-ahead touchdown, then repelled USC’s last-gasp drive to secure an improbable 29-28 victory.
The come-from-ahead loss marked the continuation of an ugly trend: The Trojans have blown fourth quarter leads in all …read more
Source:: The Mercury News – Entertainment
