And not beyond reach.

Considering some of us thought 3-9 was possible after the UCLA loss.....yeah.

9-4 including winning a bowl game.

calumnus said:

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MTBear said:

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9-4 including winning a bowl game.

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With the Axe, and wins over Sc and UW? I think we would be overjoyed. It would be pretty much what Tedford did in 2003.

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Both frustratingly close to a Rose Bowl/Pac-12 North title, too. If we win out, those tight losses to Wazzu and Zona cost us the north. We'd have been 7-2, with the tiebreakers over both UW and Wazzu. In 2003, the close losses to Oregon and UCLA cost us the Rose Bowl. We'd have been 7-1 with the tiebreak over USC.

GMP said:

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calumnus said:

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MTBear said:

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9-4 including winning a bowl game.

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With the Axe, and wins over Sc and UW? I think we would be overjoyed. It would be pretty much what Tedford did in 2003.

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Both frustratingly close to a Rose Bowl/Pac-12 North title, too. If we win out, those tight losses to Wazzu and Zona cost us the north. We'd have been 7-2, with the tiebreakers over both UW and Wazzu. In 2003, the close losses to Oregon and UCLA cost us the Rose Bowl. We'd have been 7-1 with the tiebreak over USC.

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True but the what if's work both ways. I'm sure Washington and USC have plenty of what ifs that would have changed those outcomes. The bottom line is that this year we are a 50-50 team that just happened to catch a string straight heads.

fat_slice said:

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GMP said:

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calumnus said:

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MTBear said:

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9-4 including winning a bowl game.

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With the Axe, and wins over Sc and UW? I think we would be overjoyed. It would be pretty much what Tedford did in 2003.

---

Both frustratingly close to a Rose Bowl/Pac-12 North title, too. If we win out, those tight losses to Wazzu and Zona cost us the north. We'd have been 7-2, with the tiebreakers over both UW and Wazzu. In 2003, the close losses to Oregon and UCLA cost us the Rose Bowl. We'd have been 7-1 with the tiebreak over USC.

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True but the what if's work both ways. I'm sure Washington and USC have plenty of what ifs that would have changed those outcomes. The bottom line is that this year we are a 50-50 team that just happened to catch a string straight heads.

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Of course, but I don't care about them.

A win over furds means they a re 15--9 past two seasons, and ruins their fall season. And a match being applied to Shaw's coaching seat.

GMP said:

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calumnus said:

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MTBear said:

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9-4 including winning a bowl game.

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With the Axe, and wins over Sc and UW? I think we would be overjoyed. It would be pretty much what Tedford did in 2003.

---

Both frustratingly close to a Rose Bowl/Pac-12 North title, too. If we win out, those tight losses to Wazzu and Zona cost us the north. We'd have been 7-2, with the tiebreakers over both UW and Wazzu. In 2003, the close losses to Oregon and UCLA cost us the Rose Bowl. We'd have been 7-1 with the tiebreak over USC.

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Yes you are correct. But remember that we are just 3 points away from being 4-6 where we would have to win BOTH of the next 2 games to become bowl eligible.
As a longtime suffering Cal fan. I take a glass is half full approach.

Ccajon2 said:

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A win over furds means they a re 15--9 past two seasons, and ruins their fall season. And a match being applied to Shaw's coaching seat.

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Yes, a win would ruin their season, but AFAIK, Shaw has that job as long as he wants it, barring major collapse or scandal.

We had, I think, 14 TOs during our 3 game losing stretch. Despite so many shortened drives, yardage-wise, we were very competitive in those losses; indicating that with better ball security, we clearly would have had a chance to win.

Yes, we had some close wins of course, but I don't think we had games where we were the benefactor of massive TOs.

I surmised, and posted multiple times before the season began and during that this team can be 6-1 to 7-0 before the UW game. I was wrong. I feel that those TOs were very contributory though. I felt that 8-9 wins was feasible. And, in a roundabout way, that still looks quite possible. Even better, this path would have us finishing strong, ending two major streaks in the process AND having a winning conference record!

IMO, the best aspect in all of this is feeling that we have the right guy leading us. By various metrics we have a top 20 D, the best in the Pac-12; and that's after having played the top 3 conference offenses. When we had the worst D in the nation, our offense was never tops in the conference. The year one and two improvements are highly noteworthy. It's not like the roster is laden with 4 and 5 star recruits. It's not. It's damn good coaching, and of course young, talent men who believe.

I believe 8-4 plus a bowl win would be the best finish this decade (best since the 2008 + bowl win over Miami FL) season.

Any way we could get Texas in a bowl game?
I'd just love to rub one more win into my sisters Texas Republican boyfriend.

First things first. Once we get the Axe back, the rest will follow.

Ccajon2 said:

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A win over furds means they a re 15--9 past two seasons, and ruins their fall season. And a match being applied to Shaw's coaching seat.

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Nothing would make me happier than Shaw getting fired and that program falling into disarray. Their "fanbase" deserves nothing less

metabear said:

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>Any way we could get Texas in a bowl game?

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It's possible, but highly unlikely. The #2 team in the Big12 plays the #2 team in the Pac12 in the Alamo Bowl. Texas could qualify for that if for example, Oklahoma were to trip up and then Texas lost to West Virginia in the championship game. Or if Oklahoma got in the playoff, UWV went to the Sugar and Texas then goes to the Alamo. But the pathway for us to get to the Alamo Bowl is pretty difficult. Would help if Wazzu made it into the playoffs. Then we'd have to jump one of UW or Utah and be more attractive to the Bowl than the other. It's rather difficult...

The #6 Big12 team plays the #7 Pac12 team at the Cheez It Bowl. We might wind up there even if we win one of our two remaining games. But it's hard to get Texas to fall that far down as they are currently the #3 team in the B12. They'd have to lose to Iowa State (possible) AND Kansas (LOL).

IF we win our next two games, we would probably finish 5th in the conference after Wazzu, UW, Utah and the winner of the Oregon/ASu game. That would put us in the Hyundai Sun Bowl on Dec 31, in El Paso. We would face the #3 ACC team, although more likely the #4 team if Clemson goes into the playoffs.