Kevin Gemmell, ESPN Staff Writer 10y

Pac-12 Ultimate Road Trip: Week 10

Gas up the family station wagon and hit the Holiday Road. The Ultimate Road Trip is back! Over the next couple of weeks we're going to look at each week during the 2014 season and pick the can't-miss game (and maybe for Thursday/Friday games, we'll work in two).

Start planning accordingly. The Ultimate Pac-12 Road Trip continues.

Welcome to Week 10.

Saturday, Nov. 1

  • Arizona at UCLA

  • Utah at Arizona State

  • USC at Washington State

  • Washington at Colorado

  • Stanford at Oregon

  • California at Oregon State

  • Byes: None

My choice: Stanford at Oregon

Why: Yes, Arizona at UCLA might be compelling. Yes, USC at Washington State is a rematch of last year’s shocking Coug win. No, neither are even close to the national attention Stanford’s trip to Autzen Stadium will receive.

This has blossomed into the game of the year in the Pac-12 the past three seasons and the results have justified the hype.

Then again, the curtain has already fallen on the Cardinal. Why bother showing up, Stanford? The Ducks, led by Marcus Mariota, have all but been anointed Pac-12 champs.

Ah, but isn’t this when Stanford is at its best? David Shaw works the us-versus-the-world angle better than any coach in the conference. He loves nothing more than to be told his team can’t do something. That’s what has made this rivalry so great. And I’m sure it’s what has made Stanford’s back-to-back conference titles that much more rewarding.

The 2012 showdown in Autzen is when this series took a decidedly different turn. Consider that the previous three games had been high-scoring affairs, with the winner scoring at least 50 points and the loser scoring at least 30. But 2012, and Stanford’s 17-14 win, changed all of that. And then a year later, the Cardinal nearly duplicated the defensive effort with a 26-20 victory in Palo Alto.

Stanford changed the tempo and the personality of this rivalry the past two years – in effect – changing the rules and thus the dynamic. It’s up to the Ducks to change them back if they hope to rid themselves of their Stanford problem.

Is the winner guaranteed the conference title? Of course not. We saw what happened last year when Stanford had the edge after beating Oregon, only to lose to USC, only to watch Oregon lose to Arizona. And then there is still the conference championship game to worry about.

Nothing is promised in this league.

But the winner certainly has a leg up in the quest for a conference crown and will surely receive a nice little bump in the national rankings. There is a strong possibility both teams could be ranked in the top 10 when this game rolls around, so the College Football Playoff selection committee will be very interested in this outcome.

So hunker down for this one. Because if recent history is any indication, this will/should be one of the best games in the all of college football in 2014.

You can see the rest of the road trip here.

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