All roads — paved and dirt — lead to Pullman, Wash., in the race for the Pacific-10 Conference football crown.
At least that’s the case the Cougars are making six weeks and two conference victories into their season.
“Oregon State and Washington State are both undefeated (in the conference),” Oregon head coach Mike Bellotti said on Sunday. “So I think until those schools meet … I said before the beginning of the season, I think this is as wide open (in the Pac-10) as I’ve seen since I’ve been here.”
Preseason favorite Southern California is down one game due to a Sept. 27 loss to California, leaving the Beavers and Cougars at the top of the Pac-10 with a 2-0 conference record. Both are 5-1 overall.
No. 12 Washington State is getting a lot more national attention than No. 24 Oregon State, helped by the Cougars’ 55-16 drubbing of Oregon one week after the Ducks squeaked past Michigan.
However, Washington State managed to disappoint its fans on Saturday when it played host to Arizona.
Conference teams expect a blowout when the Wildcats come to town. Washington State, ahead 13-0 at halftime, gave up a touchdown — making it a six-point game — before adding 17 points for the 30-7 win.
The same way of thinking that may have thrown Oregon off against the Cougars gave Washington State a speedbump in its defeat of the Pac-10 cellar-dwelling Wildcats.
“You could say it as much as you want — ‘Let’s get over the (Oregon) game’ — but that was a great win, and it’s tough to just get over it,” cornerback Jason David said on Saturday. “I don’t think we played a great game, but we played a good game.”
David was the star of the Cougars’ homecoming victory, grabbing his 14th career interception and returning it 34 yards for a touchdown. He is the first Cougar in Washington State history to return three interceptions for touchdowns in a career.
“I don’t think the quarterback really saw me,” David said. “I hid behind the tight end really well, and I knew he was going to throw because they didn’t need that many yards. He threw it, and it kind of hit my facemask. I was going to start crying if I dropped it again.”
The senior was pivotal in Washington State’s win against Oregon, and his teammates are counting on him to help them along the Pac-10 road.

Hankwitz debuts
At Washington State, Arizona continued its losing streak, picking up its fifth loss of the season. It is now 0-1 with interim head coach Mike Hankwitz.
Multiple Cougars said the Wildcats came out and played tough for their new leader.
“It was a tough week because of all the changes,” Hankwitz said on Saturday. “But I think our players responded and tried to do everything we asked of them. I am pleased overall that we came up here and fought into the fourth quarter.”

UCLA scores … finally
In five games, the Bruins have scored 110 points this season, but they scored 42 percent of those points in Saturday’s game against Washington, their first conference game of the season.
“We were able to do some things in the second half of the Washington game that we knew as a staff we had the potential of doing,” UCLA head coach Karl Dorrell said. “It was nice to finally get where everything started to click in all phases.”
After a slow first half against the Huskies, UCLA found itself behind 16-7. The Bruins found their rhythm from then on and dominated Washington, 39-0, in the second half en route to the 46-16 win.