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'Sickses' get well, bedevil Dawgs Malamute, 9 November 2008
Trailing 19-16 midway through the third quarter, the Arizona State Sun Devils went on a scoring spree to beat the Washington Huskies, 39-19, before an announced crowd of 57,013 at Husky Stadium in Seattle. QB Rudy Carpenter completed 22 out of 31 passes for 218 yards and two touchdowns and Keegan Herring rushed 22 times for 142 yards, as they led the Sun Devils to victory. At six-feet-four inches, 211 pounds, Michael Jones is the epitome of the tall receiver every quarterback wants. He caught 11 passes for 146 yards and 2 touchdowns. The Sun Devils, alias the "sixes", alias the "sickses," got well. Coach Dennis Erickson got well, winning his first game ever at Husky Stadium, this out of four tries. His Arizona State Sun Devils got well, snapping a six-game losing streak. The wide smile of an opposing coach, seemingly rubbing it in at the end of the game, has got to go. Can't someone wipe the smile off his face or take a bite out of the seat of his pants. Even Spirit, the Huskies' mascot, is nursing a bad shoulder. The Huskies played with enthusiasm from the game's start to midway through the third quarter and then turned into Zombies, as if they'd lost their sugar rush left over from Halloween candy. There were a couple of ghoulish, freakish plays in the second quarter. With the score tied at the start of the second quarter and a fourth and one on his own 43, Washington's Paul Homer stretched the ball out as he plunged for the one yard and had it swiped away by Troy Nolan who took it all the way to the house. And then there was the lateral from QB Ronnie Fouch to WR Cody Bruns who passed the ball back to Fouch who scampered in from 6 yards out, knotting the score at 10. Clever. The Huskies played with abandon, as if they had nothing to lose, their coach Tyrone Willingham in lame-duck status, coaching the game to the sound of horns announcing his exit, along with the sound of muted horns way off in the distance announcing his successor. That guy, of whom we know nothing about, could make us all wish we had Tyrone back next season. ;-) Playing with abandon: With the score knotted at 13 and 1:02 left in the first half, Washington's next drive featured a running play netting 3 yards, a pass play netting 10 yards and a pick-play run back19 yards to the UW 37. Thomas Weber's 29-yard field goal made it 16-13 at the pit stop. At the 8:53 mark in the third quarter, Ryan Perkins gave the Huskies a short-lived lead, 19-16, with a 20-yard field goal. And then the roof caved in, ASU scoring 23 unanswered points. Now for the bad news. QB Ronnie Fouch completed 13 of 40 passes for 192 yards, along with 2 picks and 4 sacks. That data, sans sacks, computes to a passing-efficiency rating of 62.82. The Huskies rushed for 52 yards against the Solar Dev's 182 yards. Those numbers are the story of the game. The Huskies' collapse in the second half can be attributed to their lack of a running game. A worn-out "D" was on the field way too much in the last half. A beefier running game would have given Fouch more time to throw and would have taken a lot of pressure off him. The Huskies' leading rusher, Terrance Daily, rushed 14 times for 66 yards, with 39 of them coming on the Huskies' last drive of the game, the outcome being long decided. Two turnovers gave ASU 10 points. UW is 0-9 on the season -- 0-11 dating back to last season -- and has the longest losing streak in FBS football.
Richard Linde, aka Malamute can be reached at
malamute@4malamute.com |
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