10. Washington State (1-8, 0-6 Pac-10)
The Cougars were making progress, becoming more and more competitive each week, until their trip to Tempe.
WSU was not competitive at all against ASU. For the most part, the Cougars have played hard for coach Paul Wulff, but Saturday showed signs of quit.
9. Washington (3-5, 2-3)
Coach Steve Sarkisian said last year that the rebuilding project at UW wasn’t going to take very long.
Turns out, he was wrong.
The Huskies suffered another major setback this past weekend as they were embarrassed at home by Stanford.
Since scoring a touchdown with 7:05 left in the second quarter two weeks ago against UA, UW has been outscored 68-0 by UA and Stanford.
Now, quarterback Jake Locker has a broken rib and will miss this week’s game against No. 1 Oregon. Sarkisian says this is “rock bottom,” which is more accurate than last year’s statement.
8. UCLA (3-5, 1-4)
UCLA dropped its third straight on Saturday, leaving WSU as the Bruins' only Pac-10 win.
The Texas upset is looking less and less impressive weekly, as the Longhorns continue to falter.
UCLA was competitive against UA this past week despite being outgained 583-299.
Quarterback Richard Brehaut did give UCLA a viable passing game, something that has been missing during the season.
7. ASU (4-4, 2-3)
It is hard to take much out of ASU’s blowout win over WSU last Saturday, just because the Cougars matched bad talent with even worse effort.
What you can take out of the win is that the Sun Devils bounced back from an ugly loss to California and won’t be quitting on the season quite yet.
The Sun Devils’ defense did shut down a Cougars’ offense that had been pretty good of late.
6. California (4-4, 2-3)
Is this a team that dominated ASU two weeks ago or one that got dominated by Oregon State on Saturday? The answer probably lies in the middle.
Cal is a middle of the pack team that plays well at home, but struggles on the road.
Senior quarterback Kevin Riley may have suffered a season-ending injury, so it appears that junior Brock Mansion will be the starter the rest of the way.
5. Southern California (5-3, 2-3)
Coach Lane Kiffin faces another tremendous coaching challenge after the Trojans fell to Oregon last week.
USC put so much into the UO game; it was essentially their national championship. Kiffin’s challenge is to get USC back up to host ASU this week.
Thus far, USC has answered the bell every time its motivation could be questioned this season that will not feature postseason play.
4. Oregon State (4-3, 3-1)
Coming out of the bye week after a bad loss to UW, OSU and Ryan Katz bounced back nicely to rout Cal at home.
UCLA and WSU are next on the schedule, so the Beavers should be 5-1 in conference play and in title contention when the USC, Stanford and UO stretch hits in late November.
The Civil War may be all that stands between OSU’s biggest rival getting to the national championship game.
3. UA (7-1, 4-1)
Matt Scott has proven to be a capable fill-in for injured starting quarterback Nick Foles, leading UA to wins over UW and UCLA.
Now the schedule gets brutal for the Wildcats. UA is at Stanford this week, hosts USC in two weeks and after a bye week, heads to Eugene.
Foles is questionable for this week, which is a must win for UA if they have Rose Bowl aspirations.
2. Stanford (7-1, 4-1)
Stanford rolled through UW last week and gained a lot of momentum heading into its matchup with UA this week.
The Cardinal have two home games and two road games left. The tough games are in Palo Alto; the games Stanford should win are on the road.
It will be interesting to see where Stanford will be sent if they finish 11-1, assuming UO makes the title game.
1. Oregon (8-0, 5-0)
What more needs to be said? UO took a close game with USC and ran away with it in the fourth quarter.
ASU has been the toughest challenge to the Ducks thus far and the next two weeks shouldn’t present another one.
The Ducks should be undefeated when UA and OSU come up on the schedule. I still don’t see either team pulling the upset.
Ducks fans should book their trip to Glendale.
Reach the reporter at andrew.gruman@asu.edu
