Blogwatch: Cougars deserve more credit

The Washington State Cougars are having their best season since 2003.

They have already won the NCAA-mandated minimum six games to play in a bowl game. They have lost three times, all of which came to teams ranked in the Associated Press’ top 10.

And they are playing their best football of the year despite suffering through more injuries than your usual episode of House.

So why are they ranked so low nationally, even by their fans?

This weekend we asked SportsLink readers how high the Cougars should be ranked, and the numbers were surprisingly low – to me anyway.

The consensus was somewhere in the 22 to 25 range, nearly the same as the Cougs’ field-goal kickers.

But, after watching WSU dismantle a UCLA team that was coming off a near-upset in South Bend, couldn’t an argument be made the Cougars belong higher than that? Maybe even much higher.

I watched a DVR of UCLA’s game with Notre Dame and was struck how well the Bruins shut down the Irish offense. They crowded the line of scrimmage and matched up with the Irish receivers – until the final offensive play.

The performance didn’t bode well for WSU. After all, Notre Dame is a one-loss team that resides at the bottom or just outside the top 10. The Cougars? Three losses and, going into last week, pretty well unrecognized or unranked.

Then came Saturday. The Cougars suffered more injuries. More kicking game problems. And they came away with another win – one that came courtesy of an impressive second half performance by the Cougar defense and an explosive showing from the WSU passing game.

OK, an argument could be made the Bruins had a South Bend hangover. After a week of controversy in Southern California, such an argument probably holds water. But still, the Cougars are a Pac-10 opponent, it was a crucial league game for UCLA and it was at home.

Yes, the Cougars opened the season by being blown out at Auburn. Yes, they lost a USC game they probably could – and maybe should – have won. And yes, they were overpowered by Cal.

But I will argue the same could be said of the teams ranked 11 (Notre Dame) through 24 (Oregon – hey, isn’t that the same team that lost in Pullman about 10 days ago?) in the AP poll. It doesn’t seem out of the realm of possibility that WSU belongs up there with the Irish and Arkansas and LSU.

With the six wins, and a possibility of nine, the Cougars have a shot at a pretty highly valued bowl game.

Another question we asked at SportsLink last week showed WSU fans seem to be leaning toward the Holiday Bowl, because that would mean the Cougars had finished second in the Pac-10. The next choice was probably easy to predict: the Las Vegas Bowl because of the old real estate saying, location, location, location.

But that’s for the league’s fourth or fifth bowl invitee, and if the Cougars win out, expect them in El Paso for a Dec. 29 Sun Bowl date. That’s where the Pac-10 third-place team is slotted.

Of course, only one Cougar fan wanted that. But that was one more than voted for the Emerald Bowl in San Francisco.