Ducks in the Mist

When your team loses every Saturday for a month, it is an ugly stretch. When the moons align and there are five Saturdays in the month, it is a downright frightful stretch of primordial goo. The Bruins were “0” for October with the final Halloween beat down by the Beavers on Saturday. The only bright spot was it was televised in tape delay and we chose not to watch. October was not much kinder to the Dodgers or Angels either. When all seemed to swirling down the emotional drain of futility, USC delivered in the clutch in Eugene. It was heartwarming to see the Trojans go down hard in the Oregon mist.

That morning, we were startled to see the young USC quarterback Matt Barkley being interviewed on ESPN during College Game Day. His confidence was stout and endearing to the cardinal and gold. Barkley is a likeable kid and unfortunately has a huge upside in the wrong colors for years to come. During the course of the interview, Mattie from the OC smiled and winked about the unruly crowds he had faced in Columbus, South Bend and Berkley during his freshman year. With three victories in the duffel bag, he smirked at the reporter and said he enjoyed quieting those hostile crowds in victory. There was no such disquiet on this night.

Eugene is not Columbus or South Bend and on a Halloween night it is a nightmare on Elm Street for stout youth. Autzen Stadium holds 40,000 less than the horseshoe in Columbus. It can sound like 40,000 more and a young QB can hear every derisive comment and smell every pre-game beverage. Barkley may have wanted to silence the crowd but his offensive line twitched with each yell in route to seven illegal procedure calls. It was a beat down that we anticipate in Westwood but has never happened during the reign of Prince Pete. Bruin humility is a coping strategy, Trojan humiliation is karma.

Oregon wins out, USC wins out and the Pac-10 wins out with possibly two BCS teams and the resulting pay day for the UC system. USC will recover and let us all root on the Ducks. Chip Kelly has done an outstanding job navigating a first game melt down in Boise that still has a right jab on You Tube.

The Bruins have Washington at home and WSU wherever and they will win those games. It is a difficult time but Neuheisel has always been willing to do the unsavory things that lead to success. Bob Toledo was too lazy and Karl Dorrell was too proud. The 4th stringer at USC will come to UCLA in the years ahead. The 4th stringer that chose not to go to USC beat them on Halloween.