Roundup: Oregon dives back into the College Football Playoff hunt

Pat Forde of Yahoo! Sports has Oregon back in his College Football Playoff bracket after that impressive 42-30 win over UCLA. By the way, did you see that play where Marcus Mariota fumbled and scored a touchdown? Dude can do no wrong. And since it was a big win for y’all in Eugene, one more link – The Oregonian columnist John Canzano’s take on Oregon’s win over UCLA.

During the loss to Oregon, UCLA head coach Jim Mora and defensive coordinator Jeff Ulbrich got into a confrontation on the sidelines. Mora described it as a “heat of the moment” kind of thing.

Big win for the Trojans, as USC knocked off then-No. 10 Arizona to make sure everybody in the conference has at least one loss. While things got iffy down the stretch, USC running back Javorius Allen had a monster game, rushing for 205 yards and three touchdowns. Young Buck leads the Pac-12 in rushing with 781 yards on the ground so far this season.

That one had to hurt if you’re a Wildcats fan, because as Yahoo! Sports’ Graham Watson says, Arizona blew a ton of chances in the loss to USC, from missed field goals to a fumble in the red zone.

Impressive win for the Huskies coming off of a bye week, dismantling Cal 31-7 in Berkeley. Contributing for The News Tribune, Thuc Nhi Nguyen writes that turnovers helped the Huskies stifle Cal’s prolific offense. Speaking of turnovers, how ‘bout that dude Shaq Thompson? He scored another defensive touchdown on Saturday, returning a fumble 100 yards to the house for the game’s opening score. He has found the end zone five times this season already, four times on defense.

Please, not the injury bug again for these guys… While it may not have completely closed the 24-point gap, Cal was without defensive starters Brennan Scarlett, Stefan McClure and Michael Lowe in the loss to Washington.

Going back to Friday night, Stanford downed Washington State 34-17, and Elliott Almond of the San Jose Mercury News notes that Stanford tight end Greg Taboada was a Red Zone threat, catching two touchdown passes to help Stanford win.

After the loss to Stanford, Washington State gets a much-needed bye week. As link author Jacob Thorpe notes, Wazzu has started out the season with seven straight night games.

Utah jumped four spots in the AP poll to No. 20 without even playing last weekend, but now Utah is out to validate its rising reputation, to more or less borrow a headline from Kyle Goon of the Salt Lake Tribune. Thursday night special in Corvallis for these guys.

Gina Mizell has a nice story on Oregon State defensive end Obum Gwacham matching his on-field production with what he has done away from football – service projects and taking leadership roles in clubs within Oregon State’s business school are the norm for this fella.

Wanna learn more about Pac-12 football players giving their time to charity? Then you’ll like this article about Colorado defensive lineman Juda Parker from Kyle Ringo.

Hey, lookadis! Arizona State golfer Jon Rahm was featured in Sports Illustrated’s “Faces in the Crowd” section last week for winning the individual title at the World Amateur Team Golf Championships in Japan by shooting a 23-under 263. That’s doing some serious work.