By doing absolutely nothing Saturday, Oregon was assured the opportunity to finish its season in 2002.
Thanks to Washington’s 26-14 victory over Washington State, the sixth-ranked Ducks clinched at least a berth in the Jan. 1 Fiesta Bowl in Tempe, Ariz., which is where this season’s Pacific-10 Conference champion will go.
Even if Oregon (6-1 Pac-10) should lose to Oregon State on Dec. 1, the Ducks would finish in a tie for first with Washington (6-2), Washington State (6-2) and Stanford (6-2), which all finished league play Saturday. Oregon would still get the Fiesta Bowl berth since it has the four-way tiebreaker advantage of not having been to the Rose Bowl the longest.
“We know we’re at least going to the Fiesta Bowl, and that’s awesome,” Oregon head coach Mike Bellotti said. “When people tell you before the season that you’re the odds-on favorite to win the conference championship, certainly there’s a sense of pride and a sense of, ‘OK, now we have to live up to that.’ And I think we have lived up to that.”
Also, there remains the possibility of Oregon sneaking into the Jan. 3 Rose Bowl, but the Ducks didn’t receive much help Saturday with Florida, Tennessee and Miami all winning. The Ducks would need to finish first or second in the final Bowl Championship Series rankings, where they currently are fourth with the latest standings to be released today.
The Ducks expressed happiness in clinching the school’s first New Year’s Day bowl berth since the 1996 Cotton Bowl and to have become the first Oregon team to share — at least — a Pac-10 title in consecutive years.
Last season, Oregon’s Civil War loss at Oregon State kept the Ducks out of the Rose Bowl and forced them to be co-champions with the Beavers and the Huskies.
“Yeah, we were tri-champions or whatever you want to call it, but we had an empty feeling inside,” tight end Justin Peelle said.
The feeling Saturday wasn’t one of jubilation. For Oregon, the time to celebrate will come after the Civil War, if the team beats the Beavers to claim sole possession of the crown.
“No, not yet,” said linebacker Kevin Mitchell in response to whether it felt like Oregon had won the Pac-10. “We’ve got one more game. And for us to come out solo champs will be an even greater thing than what we’ve accomplished so far.”
Student tickets for the Dec. 1 Ducks-Beavers game at Autzen Stadium are available at 9 a.m. today.