Stanford making Pac-10 race interesting

By WILLIAM WILKERSON

Special to the Star-Telegram

This time next year Mansfield’s own Stepfan Taylor should be the featured back for Stanford.

There’s little doubt about that.

And the Cardinal freshman should flourish, just as he did in setting Mansfield High records with 4,792 yards and 67 rushing touchdowns during his three-year varsity career, meshing his skill set and level headedness with the emerging stardom of Houston Stratford graduate Andrew Luck at quarterback.

For now, however, the tailback job belongs to baby-faced senior behemoth Toby Gerhart.

The 6-foot-1, 235-pound bruiser might slightly resemble that kid from Problem Child, but he paints defenders black and blue, as Mike Alstott did.

Just ask then-No. 7 Oregon, which felt his wrath throughout Stanford’s 51-42 home victory Saturday.

Gerhart ran for a school-record 223 yards and three TDs.

These were, mind you, the same Ducks who handed Southern Cal its worst loss since 1997 in a 47-20 drubbing on Halloween night.

Saturday against Oregon, Taylor ran for 14 yards on five carries and upped his season total to 30 attempts for 187 yards and two scores. And Gerhart wouldn’t be denied.

The two-sport star, who has hit .275 and driven in 68 runs in starting 105 games for the Cardinal baseball team, served up an overwhelming reality check for Oregon coach Chip Kelly’s team.

The Ducks (7-2, 5-1) came in firmly in the driver’s seat of the Pac-10 race, and appeared headed straight for the BCS.

Now, a loss at Arizona (6-2, 4-1) in two weeks might change all that.

Meanwhile, Gerhart, Taylor and Co. are lurking dangerously behind with two conference losses.

They’ll go to USC this week.

Puzzle nearly complete

The Big Ten is like that billion-piece jigsaw puzzle your Aunt Jane bought you for Christmas that turns into a life-size portrait of David Hasselhoff’s mug (his face, not beverage container). We know what you are thinking: Lucky me. Everyone (in Germany) agrees.

The beginning and middle stages are always extremely difficult to figure out. But the more time goes by, and the more pieces that are put in place, the end result becomes easier to figure out.

Enter the Big Ten. For nine weeks, puzzle pieces (Illinois vastly underachieving; Purdue sweeping Michigan and Ohio State for the third time in 122 years; Iowa’s antics) have been jammed into slots in which they don’t belong, giving us a false hope of what the final outcome would look like.

Then the 10th week came along and sorted everything out. Iowa’s bid for an undefeated season went down in flames in a loss, at home, to Northwestern. And Ohio State rocked Penn State 24-7 in front of 110,033 at Beaver Stadium, thanks to a three-touchdown day from Pennsylvania’s own Terrelle Pryor.

Lo and behold, a Buckeyes home win over the Hawkeyes this week will give them — surprise — their fifth consecutive conference title, barring a slip-up at Michigan in two weeks. That’s right, two-loss Ohio State looks as if it’ll do no worse than the Rose Bowl.

Looking for comments?