With the PAC12 currently 13-0 (USC 2-0), I thought it’d be interesting to guess each teams’ first loss. Some will invariably go down this week.
Looking through the schedules, it’s interesting to see which teams some teams miss (e.g. Oregon St. doesn’t play USC, CU avoids UW, we don’t play Wazzu & Stanford) and the timing of games (Ore St. ends v UW and @ Ore; Ore seems to play ranked team every other week; UW has a brutal 3 week stretch late @ USC, v Utah, @ Ore St. before hosting Wazzu for the Apple Cup).
From worst to 1st (based on current Sagarin Ratings which aren’t yet stable, but gotta pick something - doesn’t really matter this early. Massey has us at #9 and USC at #8!)
Stanford: Week 2 @ USC ASU: Week 2 v Oklahoma St. CU: I think they can pull off the win at home against Nebraska who lost 10-13 to Minn last week and should be able to beat CSU, so likely 1st loss to Oregon in Week 4 UA: Week 2 @ Miss St. Cal: Probably Week 2 v Auburn, but I’m hoping they win which would likely mean 1st loss in Week 4 to UW Wazzu: Probably Week 2 v Wisconsin UCLA: Week 4 @ Utah, duh Ore St: Week 5 v Utah is my hope. If they pull out the home win, they could possibly get to 10-0 before facing UW and Oregon. But I’m going to go with a fluke road game @ Cal in Week 6. Ore: I think they will beat CU in Week 4, but Week 7 (after a bye) @ UW is my pick for loss #1. If not, it’s Week 9 @ Utah Utah: As much as I think there are no L’s this season (15-0 baby!), it’s unrealistic. The away game in Corvallis in Week 5 is a huge test, as will be @ USC in Week 8, then Oregon at home in Week 9. Away game @ UW in Week 11 will be a challenge as well. So let’s go with L in first conference roadie. But we avenge the loss in the CCG. UW: I have UW picking up the Week 7 win at home against Ore, but are @ USC in Week 9, starting 3 straight losses to the Trojans, Utes, and Beavers going from 8-0 to 8-3 and out of contention USC: I hope they drop @ CU in Week 4 (5th game for them) so ticket prices come down for the Utah game, but I’m going to guess a Week 7 loss @ ND before we give them their 2nd loss a week later! I have them beating UW, but hope painted nails loses @ Ore the next week and whatever in the LA traitor bowl after that
Total guesses and just for fun. What do you think? I’ll guarantee I’m probably 0/5 on the last five, but probably 6/7 on the first 7.
Part of me is pulling for the whole conference to go undefeated in non-conf just to prove how stupid the breakup was. Then every team to smash SC and UCLA for ruining a good thing.
Well, losing the LA teams certainly sucked and may have started the beginning of the end, but we could have stayed PAC10 (or +1, +2) without the betrayal of whOregon and Udub (who convinced Arizona to hold off that fateful Thu night before not hopping on the Fri conference conference call). So maybe all 4 of them can beat on each other but lose to everyone else.
Going 36-0 would be impressive with 12 wins over P5 SEC: Miss St., Auburn, Florida Big12: Ok. St., TCU, Texas Tech, Baylor B1G: Nebraska, Mich St., Wisconsin Indy: ND (twice)
Huh, Utah and CU are the only ones with 2 P5 non-conference games. Oregon St. (2 MWC + 1 FCS) , UCLA (MWC + Sun Belt + MEAC) have 0. Does seem like most do ABC (P5, G5 or 2, FCS).
Hope so. I mean, this is for the 2023 season. Now, in the 2024 season, with everyone else bailing to other P4 conferences, the PAC2 is comprised of the two schools that aren’t AAU members
Might be tough for us this week playing our third string QB, third string RB, and obviously still with Kuithe out. Injury bug is brutal this early in the season
As predicted (expected?) in Week 2, 4 PAC12 teams got their 1st loss. Stanford fell (big) to USC, ASU wasn’t awful (led 15-10 at half), UA took it to overtime @ Miss St., and Cal showed up against Auburn (10-7 half, Aub would score 1 more TD).
Wazzu beating Wisconsin (presumptive Big 10 West champion) was big for the conference. Kudos to them.
PAC12 is good this year. 8 ranked teams after Week 2 is another testament to that. We are going to beat each other up, but it’s going to be a fun last season, regardless how that translates to post-season play. Hopefully we can fill a couple bowl spots left open by other conferences.
Stanford picked up a second loss to Troy Taylor’s Sacramento St. (ouch). Edit: Troy Taylor was Sac St.'s coach, but is now Stanford’s coach, with his former DC leading the win over him.
Cal was down 17-0 to FCS Idaho then came back and won 31-17; no one saw it - attendance was sparse.
CU, well, I watched the whole game and it was nasty, dirty, and CU barely fended off the in-state rival that was more than a 3 TD dog; 27 penalties for 269 yards - more personal fouls than I think I’ve ever seen. And by captains. And some fouls not even called, like Shedeur sticking his hand in Kamara’s mask to try to poke his eyes. And don’t even bring up storming the field. Embarassing.
ASU scored 0 points - most fans were watching the Colorado game on their phones
This week, there will be at least 3 1st losses with 3 PAC12 games pitting ranked vs. ranked, 3-0 vs 3-0: 24 UCLA @ 11 Utah (-5.0), 19 CU @ 10 Oregon (-20.5), 14 Oregon St (-2.5) @ 21 Washington St. ASU isn’t beating USC this year. Cal has little chance against Washington. Arizona should beat Stanford.
Really a mediocre weekend for the conference. Stanford loses to an FCS school (remember back when one of our earlier marquis wins in the conference was over a Cardinal ranked about 5th or so)? Cal struggles with FCS Idaho but escapes, ASU gets blanked by Fresno State in Tempe.
Meanwhile Colorado, as a huge favorite, escapes against the Rams. And fans (whose win total last year was an rude hand gesture) storm the field. (I’ll give the fans a pass on this one, they have been at rock bottom for a while, it was an in-state game, and in 2OT). They will see how good they really are in Eugene this weekend.
At least Washington won decisively on the road against Michigan State.
Quick correction…but it was Sac State led by Andy Thompson that went in and once again exposed Troy Taylor’s inabilities. Stanford football deserves all the embarrassment they get stemming from that hire.
Yep, just coming back to correct that. Forgot Troy went to Stanford and Thompson was his DC and now leads Sac St.
I just read that ASU had 8 turnovers and Fresno had 9 FG attempts. So it could have been MUCH worse.
If Utah fans ever rushed the field after Utah St. win, even in 2OT, I would be embarrassed. But CU can do CU. Maybe the edibles hadn’t worn off.
It was kind of a relatively mediocre weekend for college football. The CU/CSU game turned out to be wildly entertaining, but throughout the day, I found myself generally bored with most of the games. Week 3 is often like that. Just how the schedules panned out I guess. This weekend has some great conference games as well as other games as conference season kicks off.
In fairness to ASU, apparently they are down to their fourth-string QB, some former BYU kid (three QBs got hurt against Fresno—that’s nuts). Washington looks like a legit playoff team. We’ll see. Oregon likes to blast inferior teams but has its share of trouble against pretty good to great teams. Washington St. looks good. And Colorado, I think the Prime hype train is going to hit a major wall the next two weeks at Oregon and against USC. I’ll admit that Shedeur has some talent and they have some good wideouts. But the CU defense isn’t good at all. Oregon and USC could score 50 on them.
The entire time he was an assistant at Utah, he lived across the street and up two houses from me. I met his wife and kids, and spoke with them many times. They were VERY nice people, but I literally never laid eyes on him. Not once! Not even driving up and down the street.
My only point is that it’s pretty easy given the visibility of their success and failure, to take a 10,000 foot view of who they are, but these college coaches work longer than most of the rest of us by a significant factor.
They make a lot of money, sure, but I’d probably fail if the job required that many hours commitment (regardless of how I was spending it).
Edit to say: that even during the off-season, and non-recruiting periods, I never saw him. Perhaps he was out looking for the next job, but my original point still applies, I’m never signing up for this job.
Week 4 ‘1st loss’ casualties: UCLA and CU as predicted + Oregon State - they played hard and fought back, but Wazzu is still surprising (beating Wisc and OSU) and is playing some great football. Still 5 PAC12 teams that are undefeated.
USC: still hope CU beats them (but won’t). I do think they will still fall to ND.
UW: looking really good. UO @ UW will be a must-watch game. @ USC might still be tough, but likely also a high-scoring game coming down to the wire.
Oregon: Thinking they lose to UW and Utah
Utah: Without CR and some others returning, we drop to OSU Friday. With them, and maybe we survive another week and still have USC, Ore, and UW. All formidable, especially if we can’t find a decent offense
WSU: May go into UO game 6-0, but probably ends there. They miss Utah and USC this year but won the ‘PAC2 Championship’ already this week
Dang the conference is deep. OSU is just as dangerous, CU can score but will be losing more than winning the rest of the way. UA could surprise some. UCLA will be middle of the road. Then Cal, Stanford, and ASU.
Either 7 UW or 8 UO will get a loss this weekend. 50/50, but UW is at home. Might be the conference game of the season and could be a preview of the CCG.
If UW wins, they still have tough road games @ USC and @ Ore St., and it’s awfully hard to go on the road in the PAC12 or get through conference play, but UW does have a chance to go 12-0 (9-0)
Oregon, if they win, has @ Utah as their biggest challenge. It is our home game and if (if) we find a serviceable offense, might get the edge. Otherwise, Oregon might go 12-0 (9-0) or 11-1 (8-1)
USC still looks likely to lose to a mad 5-2 ND team in South Bend. It’s not a conference loss - hoping vs. Utah is their 1st (50/50 game IMO). Probably lose to UW and @ Oregon. So 7-2 or 6-3 conference record
With WSU coming back to earth, they likely will lose at least to Oregon and UW, so even a 6-3 conference record unlikely to get to the CCG.
Oregon St. could likely win their next 4 and be 9-1 heading into UW and @ Oregon, likely losses. Probably a 6-3 conference team.
UCLA is strongly favored in all but 2 of the rest of their games, meaning a 6-3 finish
Utah: obviously, we are at an inflection point. We could somehow find an offense and beat @ USC, Oregon at home, and maybe drop @ UW to be 7-2 but wouldn’t make the CCG unless Oregon lost another one and we won a tie-break. Or we could win the ones we are heavily favored in (Cal, ASU, UA, CU) and lose to the ‘top 3’ and end up 5-4 in conference. Or somewhere in between
There is going to be a log-jam at 6-3 in conference it seems. It’s possible we end up:
UW 9-0 or 8-1
Oregon 9-0 or 8-1
USC 7-2 or 6-3
WSU, OSU, UCLA 6-3
Utah 5-4 to 7-2, probably most likely? 6-3
CU, UA, Cal, Stanford, ASU losing conference records
CU (4-2, 1-2) probably finds at least a 6th win to get to a bowl game (5 likely, need to have 1 upset). Everyone thought 6 wins was a really good turn around for Coach Prime. Early success and hype amplified the ‘what-ifs’ but better opponents, game film, and injuries have brought them down to earth.
UA (3-3, 1-2) will have to find a 6th win (5 likely, but need an upset for 6th)
Cal (3-3, 1-2) might only get to 4 wins with 1, maybe 2 wins left on schedule
. I did not want to be right. Time to re-group and get healthy as we can before Cal and USC.