Outplayed

During last night's game between the University of Washington Huskies and the Nike Ducks (who play for the University of Oregon), I kept thinking of a line from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. In reference to their enemy's ship, Kirk says "She can still outrun us and outgun us." And last night the Ducks were doing both: outrunning and outgunning the Huskies. And, unfortunately, there was no Mutara Nebula to even the odds.

Duck quarterback Vernon Adams Jr. would be on the run from the Husky defenders, looking like he's going to have to throw the ball away, and, bang, he'd hit a receiver. This happened over and over. I can only think of one time he missed while on the run.

The first half of the game was a defensive battle with multiple punts by both teams. But the young Huskies would make a mistake, get a crucial penalty, and save Oregon's bacon too many times.

The Huskies put a valiant effort in the second half, coming back from a 16-3 deficit to within one touchdown of winning the game. But then our true freshman quarterback, Jack Browning, was injured and we had to put in a second stringer. With 1:11 left we had to go 80 yards. But on the third play, the replacement quarterback threw and interception and that ended the game. The final score was 26-20.

This is the 12th straight loss by the Huskies to the Ducks. After last week's win against USC, I thought we might be able to beat them. But no such luck.

The Huskies are a young team who lost a lot of key players to the NFL last year. I think there's great things in the future for this team. But I am getting tired of every year saying "next year we'll be great." I hope one of these times, it's true.