Kevin Gemmell, ESPN Staff Writer 8y

2016 Pac-12 ultimate road trip: Can Oregon make it 13 straight over Washington in Week 6?

We're taking a look at the best week-by-week trips to make in the Pac-12. My editors call it the Ultimate Road Trip. I call it dangling meat for you guys until we can start writing about actual games. Chow down, gang.

Welcome to Week 6.

Saturday. Oct. 8

  • Arizona at Utah

  • UCLA at Arizona State

  • Colorado at USC

  • Washington at Oregon

  • California at Oregon State

  • Washington State at Stanford

My choice: Washington at Oregon

Why: For the second week in a row, the Washington schools will be in the spotlight. Last week is Washington hosting Stanford and Washington State hosting the Ducks. This week we flip the teamsĀ and the locations. On any other week, Stanford and Wazzu would probably be the game of the week. And if we had a Friday-Saturday situation like last week, I would have picked both. Last year’s game was one of the most thrilling of the season. And this year’s could prove equally dramatic.

Be sure to also keep an eye on UCLA-Arizona State. For a couple of years in a row that was the Pac-12 South game to watch.

But the preseason hype right now already has us already gazing ahead toward this rivalry ... which hasn’t really been a rivalry since the George W. Bush Administration. His first term!

Yes, much has been written and written and debated and written (seriously folks, I could go on like this for a while) about Washington's resurgence. You get the idea. A lot of people are high on the Huskies this season and the thinking is that this could be the year they snap the 12-game losing streak to the Ducks.

The Huskies closed the gap -- at least the wide differential in scoring -- last season, but still lost 26-20. If you believe the national rhetoric, the Huskies are on an upward trend while the Ducks are on a downward spiral. Their intersection in Eugene will either confirm or deny such notions.

Washington’s offensive improvement and Oregon’s defensive improvement will dictate the outcome. We know the Huskies can play defense and that the Ducks can move the football. But whichever group bends on the opposite side of the ball will likely determine if the streak survives or is shattered.

This fifth of the Pac-12 blog is on record saying that 2017 is the Year of the Dawg. Maybe I’ll be proven wrong. Maybe the hype is justified. Maybe by the morning of Oct. 9 I’ll be enjoying bacon and eggs with crow-creamer in my coffee. Either way, I can’t wait to find out.

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