Soaring Ducks invade Stanford

PULLMAN – Talk about lucky.

Twice this season the Stanford Cardinal have been fortuitous enough to be the “next game.”

Twice this season the seven-time defending conference champion USC Trojans have lost to a Pac-10 school.

Twice this season the Trojans’ conquerors have had to follow up their emotional wins with, yes, you guessed it, a game at Stanford.

The first time it happened, after Washington upset USC 16-13, it worked out well for the Cardinal. Stanford jumped all over the Huskies early and won going away 34-14.

“You fight it the best you can, you try to take it on up front, but you can get caught looking back at the last game,” UW coach Steve Sarkisian said. “I don’t think we did that. For us, the challenge was to try to replicate the energy, the enthusiasm, the emotion that goes into college football was difficult to match when we went to Stanford.

“When you play at home in front of your fans, there is so much energy in the air … when we went on the road, I didn’t feel that same emotion, that same energy.”

Saturday, the Cardinal will get another team on the rebound. Oregon, fresh off its 47-20 trouncing of USC on national television last week, will pack up its strangely colored uniforms and head to the Bay Area.

Will it affect the Ducks?

“We’ll find out Saturday, I guess,” said first-year head coach Chip Kelly, who, when pressed, was pretty adamant it wouldn’t.

“I know we’ve talked about it,” he said. “(We said), ‘Do you want to be defined because you had a big win over USC in the middle of your season and you finished 7-5?’ That’s the stark reality.

“I’m a big ‘you-are-what-you-are’ guy. Right now, we’re 7-1. That guarantees a chance to finish 7-5. It doesn’t guarantee us anything else.”

But the odds of the seventh-ranked Ducks losing out are pretty remote. Even a Vegas hangover isn’t that big.

“There doesn’t appear to be a way to shut them down,” Stanford coach Jim Harbaugh said. “You’re going to have to try and contain them the best you can.”

Instead of relying on luck, Harbaugh may ask for help from the man upstairs. And, no, not the replay booth.

“Hopefully, we’ll get a lot of sunshine and (the stadium grass) will grow,” Harbaugh said. “Maybe that’s what it takes to slow them down.”