Huskies, Bears both chasing a bowl

BERKELEY, Calif. – The Washington Huskies play today attempting to save a season.

They do so facing California, the school they handled so easily a year ago that it helped create all the as-yet-unfulfilled expectations that have hovered over UW in 2010.

Jake Locker threw for three touchdowns and ran for two more as UW beat Cal 42-10 last December in Seattle. It was a performance as dominating as the score indicated, and one that helped give a final nudge to Locker to return, which only heightened all the high hopes for this year.

Asked what the Huskies did right that day, Cal coach Jeff Tedford said, “Pretty much everything.”

And through the offseason, it was that last image of the Huskies plowing through the Bears that made UW fans think this was the season their team would break through to a bowl game for the first time since 2002.

Instead, the Huskies have largely meandered, spending the first half of the year alternating victories and defeats before losing three in a row by 30 points each to maybe the three best teams in the Pac-10 – Arizona, Stanford and Oregon.

Still, despite the fits and starts, UW’s goal remains in reach thanks to a 24-7 victory over UCLA last Thursday that pulled the Huskies to 4-6.

And now the task is simple – win at Cal today and at Washington State next Saturday and a bowl game will belong to UW.

“We are fighting for our football lives,” coach Steve Sarkisian said earlier this week.

So, however, is Cal, which has played in a school-record seven consecutive bowl games, but needs to win today to extend that streak. A defeat would end Cal’s season at 5-7, an unsettling thought for a team that usually has a bowl game already sewn up by this time of the season.

“It’s definitely a new situation for us and I guess it’s a bad situation to be in,” Cal defensive end Trevor Guyton said. “But that just adds a little more motivation and urgency to it.”

So does avenging the defeat of last season

“Yeah, I mean we definitely want to get them back for that,” Guyton said.

The Bears have been markedly less effective offensively since Brock Mansion took over as the starter at quarterback for the injured Kevin Riley. But the Huskies’ defense must contain running back Shane Vereen and make Mansion throw.

Offensively, UW will be challenged by a Cal team that ranks among the best run defenses in the Pac-10.