2008 PAC-10 Discussion

[MD Buckeye]

Rivals (Free)

4/13

Talks about Oregon State RB Ryan McCants

[MD Buckeye]

Rivals $

4/13

Chow talks about the UCLA scrimmage & the QB situation

[MD Buckeye]

ESPN - Washington's Garcia helped from field with leg injury - College Football

Originally Posted by ESPN.com

Washington's Garcia helped from field with leg injury

SEATTLE -- Washington center Juan Garcia was helped off the practice field Friday after suffering a left leg injury during a scrimmage, The Seattle Times reported.

The nature and severity of the injury are not yet known.

Garcia, The Times reported, was hurt on a running play up the middle. The practice stopped for 10 minutes while trainers attended to him. His leg was put in an air cast and he left the field on a golf cart.

Garcia was a second-team All-Pac-10 selection last season. On Friday, he was one of 71 players named to the preseason watch list for the Outland Trophy, awarded annually to the best interior lineman in the country.

Contd...

[MD Buckeye]

Arizona State Sun Devils, NCAA Football - CBSSports.com

Originally Posted by sportsline.com

Arizona State QB Carpenter to have surgery on thumb on throwing hand

TEMPE, Ariz. -- Arizona State quarterback Rudy Carpenter will have minor surgery Wednesday on the thumb on his throwing hand.

"I should be good to go in a couple weeks," Carpenter said on Tuesday. "It doesn't worry me. I should be throwing right around the beginning of June."

Carpenter, a senior, hurt his thumb handing off to teammate Keegan Herring in the California game last October. Carpenter, who has started 31 straight games, played with the injury the rest of the season.

"Maybe it affected my accuracy a little bit," he said. "Maybe it took away from my velocity a little. But you can make up for that by making good decisions."

[Dryden]

ESPN - Bruins' Cowan carted off with knee injury, Olson with broken bone in foot - College Football

LOS ANGELES -- UCLA coach Rick Neuheisel tried to put the best possible face on the immediate future of quarterback Patrick Cowan, who injured his left knee in practice Thursday.

It's Neuheisel's nature to be positive. But Bruins offensive coordinator Norm Chow, who's more direct than a Floyd Mayweather jab, doesn't expect to have Cowan for 2008.

Asked if he expected the worst for Cowan, Chow said: "Oh, yeah?.The way he went down. We've got to wait it out. I'm just telling you my opinion."

On back-to-back plays, wearing helmets, shoulder pads and shorts, in the next-to-last practice of an injury-free spring, Cowan and fellow senior Ben Olson suffered non-contact injuries. Cowan injured his ACL and meniscus. Olson broke the fifth metatarsal in his right foot. He will have a screw inserted into the bone and is expected to be out for six to eight weeks.

Cont'd ...

[Oh8ch]

On back-to-back plays, wearing helmets, shoulder pads and shorts, in the next-to-last practice of an injury-free spring, Cowan and fellow senior Ben Olson suffered non-contact injuries. Cowan injured his ACL and meniscus. Olson broke the fifth metatarsal in his right foot. He will have a screw inserted into the bone and is expected to be out for six to eight weeks.

I know. I know.


It's really not funny.

[methomps]

ESPN - UCLA QB Cowan out for '08 season; Olson to miss 6-8 weeks - College Football

Gonna be a rebuilding year.

[Taosman]

Pac Ten looks weakened because of the key injuries. Cal is probably in the best shape to challenge USC.
Just not as good over all as last year.
USC gets all of it's key games at home. So. The only thing keeping SC out of the BCS Championship game is........an over rated Ohio Sate team?

[Oneshot]

We are in some serious trouble -

At QB I think we're more than okay with Riley pushing Longshore. Runningback is only so so, I'm not one hundred percent sold on Jahvid Best.

WR we're restarting - we got a pretty good transfer from Florida, we'll see how he's doing.

But our defense needs to improve. I knew after game 1 that we wouldn't make it far. Our fundamentals are just terrible. There's no wrap up, there are terrible pursuit angles, and we're soft at defensive end.

Tedford is a great offensive coordinator, but I need to see some defense before I get too optimistic.

[MD Buckeye]

ESPN - Oregon State's Stroughter stronger than ever after tragic year - College Football

Originally Posted by ESPN.com

Oregon State's Stroughter stronger than ever after tragic year

CORVALLIS, Ore. -- Football has slowed down for Sammie Stroughter. And so has life.

Such a combination suggests that the Oregon State receiver will recover the form that earned him preseason All-American honors a year ago before a black fog of personal tragedy and depression descended upon him.

Stroughter ultimately missed the majority of the 2007 season -- and earned a medical redshirt season from the NCAA -- because of a lacerated kidney suffered against Arizona State in the season's fourth game. But that turned out to be a peculiar sort of blessing, not the burden that weighed heaviest upon him.

That terrible load was an offseason of emotional turbulence that left one of the Pac-10's most dynamic athletes wondering if he wanted -- or could -- continue to play.

Contd...

[MD Buckeye]

ESPN - Pac-10 Roundup: Cal's star search begins - College Football

Originally Posted by ESPN.com

Pac-10 Roundup: Golden Bears not finding much success with injuries

Standout offensive skill position players have distinguished the Jeff Tedford-era at California, from Kyle Boller to Aaron Rodgers to J.J. Arrington to Marshawn Lynch to DeSean Jackson. But that doesn't appear to be the case this spring, so feel free to crack wise about why Tedford handed off play-calling duties to new offensive coordinator Frank Cignetti, even though that had nothing to do with the decision.

It's not necessarily about a lack of talent. It's just the talent needs name tags. And good health and consistency.

The only non-no-name of the bunch -- quarterback Nate Longshore -- is engaged in a tight competition with fan favorite Kevin Riley. At least he was until a pectoral muscle injury sidelined him and made it clear the competition will continue well into the fall.

Contd...

[MD Buckeye]

ESPN - Blount makes big splash during Ducks' spring practice - College Football

Originally Posted by ESPN.com

Blount makes big splash during Ducks' spring practice

EUGENE, Ore. -- This child of the football-crazed deep South left behind the SEC and ACC, not to mention sweet tea, red velvet cake, warm sunshine and his family, to carry a football in the region of Birkenstocks, granola and rain.

Watching LeGarrette Blount run over and around flailing Oregon defenders during spring practices -- thereby easing concerns over the departure of first-round NFL draft pick Jonathan Stewart -- it's impossible not to wonder how this elusive, 6-foot-2, 230-pound running back got away from the southern regional powers that coveted him, such as Alabama and Florida State, which were far closer to his hometown of Perry, Fla.

The answer might make some traditionalists and sartorially conservative members of the media and college football fandom pucker up as though they were sucking on a lemon -- might we suggest a nuclear yellow lemon that approximates one of the myriad shades of Ducks football?

It's the uniforms.

Contd...

[mercer_buckeye]

Is it just me or has Ben Olson been enrolled at UCLA for like 40 years?

[Dryden]

Huskies | UW Spring Football | Locker's throws on target | Seattle Times Newspaper

UW Spring Football | Locker's throws on target
By Bob Condotta
Seattle Times staff reporter

For one play, Jake Locker showed the skills that also had him rated as an elite defensive back in high school, barreling through a few teammates to tackle safety Quinton Richardson after an interception.

And on a couple of occasions he put his trademark wheels to use, running easily for a first down on one third-and-short, for instance.

But most of the time Saturday, as Washington concluded spring drills with its annual Purple-Gold game at Husky Stadium, Locker was simply a quarterback.

And while there were a number of highlights in the eyes of UW coaches ? the apparent improvement of the defense, the playmaking ability of some of the young skill players on offense ? the continuing progression of Locker might have been the biggest.

Locker led his team to just one touchdown and was on the Purple team, which lost to the Gold 10-7. But his numbers spoke loudly as he was 13-of-17 passing for 159 yards and one touchdown, with a couple of passes dropped.

"I thought it was very obvious that he knows what he's doing now, and it comes to him a lot easier," said UW coach Tyrone Willingham.

Cont'd ...

[BB73]

Originally Posted by mercer_buckeye

Is it just me or has Ben Olson been enrolled at UCLA for like 40 years?

Just because his high school career ended in 2001?

He's had a near-normal timespan at UCLA (transferred there in 2005), but he started at BYU with a redshirt year in 2002, followed by his 2-year Mormon mission.

In terms of elder statesmen college QBs, he's 25 years old, or somewhere between Todd Boeckman and Chris Weinke at the end of his career at FSU.