In the wild, beavers are best known for their furry faces,
oddball tails and natural tendencies to build dams. However, this
season the Oregon State Beavers have made it a point to make the
woodland creature synonymous with one other thing: going to bowl
games.
After a slow start to Pac-10 play, Oregon State has come out of
nowhere to win four straight conference matches to become
bowl-eligible once again after missing out on postseason play last
year. The Beavers (6-3, 4-2 Pac-10) are coming off of a series of
big wins and will serve as a more than worthy opponent as the
Bruins (4-5, 2-4 Pac-10) try to get back on track at the Rose Bowl
this Saturday.
Just two weeks ago, the Beavers shocked the nation when they
knocked off then No. 3 ranked USC at home in Corvallis to put an
end to the Trojans’ 27-game conference winning streak. Last
week, Oregon State triumphed big over a talented but underachieving
Arizona State team with a score of 44-10.
Fifth-year Oregon State coach Mike Riley attributes his
team’s success this year, after last year’s down
season, to having more confidence and experience throughout the
lineup.
“I think that we probably needed two things,” Riley
said. “We needed to grow individually. We had quite a few new
faces as starters, a new group of receivers, new people to form
some chemistry with during the ball games. They all needed to grow
and kind of find themselves within the system. I think that we
needed some confidence-building, and the only way to get that is to
get a win.”
With a rejuvenated offense, the Beavers have become a force to
be reckoned with as they have climbed to fourth in the conference
in points per game with just over 27. Combined with the
Pac-10’s third-best defense statistically, Oregon State is
not to be taken lightly by anyone, especially not UCLA.
“Oregon State is a confident football team,” UCLA
coach Karl Dorrell said. “They are a team, like most of the
teams we have seen in this conference, that is very capable of
doing great things towards the end.”
On the offense, the Beavers are led by former Bruin quarterback
Matt Moore who transferred to Oregon State in 2004 from College of
the Canyons after leaving UCLA. Though most people in Westwood will
remember Moore as the bust quarterback prospect who lost the
starting job to Drew Olson, the senior has made a niche for himself
in the Pacific Northwest, leaving his tumultuous time as a Bruin
behind him in California
“In all honesty, over the last year people made such a big
deal because there were so many guys still (at UCLA) that I played
with,” Moore said. “I can’t name seven guys on
that team now that I played with. So it’s not anything
anymore.”
Moore has blossomed in his final season as a Beaver, finally
overcoming the struggles he endured early in his career to become
the reliable and dangerous division-one quarterback many scouts
pegged him to be coming out of high school.
“I think that Matt just kept working.” Riley said.
“That’s the one thing that happened. He’s done a
lot of great things for us, a lot of great things over a couple
years now … Matt is just continuing to grow in the
offense.”
With Moore captaining the offense, the Beavers have also put
together a formidable ground attack as junior Yvenson Bernard is
currently second in the conference in rushing, averaging a tad over
100 yards per contest. The two teams on display this Saturday are
exact opposites this year, with Oregon State on the rise and poised
to finish with the school’s most victories since 2000, while
UCLA seems to be on its way to missing out on a bowl game for the
first time since 2001.