Fans have always known that team sports have hierarchies, the haves vs. the have-nots, royals vs. serfs, titans vs. runts, Monstars vs. Michael Jordan and Bugs Bunny, MLB vs. Mariners. In a way, it's part of the industry's charm, because everyone remembers where they were and what they felt when Cougars beat the Huskies in 1997 and went to the Rose Bowl for the first time since the continents rose from the seas and cooled.

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Bob Schloredt, the quarterback who led the University of Washington to Rose Bowl victories following the 1959 and 1960 seasons, helping transform West Coast football, has died at 79, according to his family via UW athletics.

The 1959-60 Huskies under coach Jim Owens outscored 22 opponents by a combined 525-180, including the Pasadena defeats of Big 10 champions Wisconsin, 44-8, and Minnesota, 17-7.

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One of the more callous aspects of college football is playing out at Washington, where two highly regarded quarterbacks, redshirt freshmen Jacob Sirmon and Colson Yankoff, plan to leave the Huskies program to seek more playing time at other schools.

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The Seahawks weren't the only local football team that was made better over the weekend. The NFL draft also helped the Washington Huskies. Their loss of eight players to the pros -- only Alabama (10) and Ohio State (nine) contributed more -- was a net gain for the program. There's nothing more impressive to top-tier recruits than for a school to be known as a pipeline to Pete Carroll, Bill Belichick,  and . . . well, the Arizona Cardinals.

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If you thought the 2018 Apple Cup was enhanced because the teams were good and the outcome was nationally relevant -- and hugely entertaining because of snow --  you might want get on your giddy early for the 2019 chapter.

Former Eastern Washington University star QB Gage Gubrud won his NCAA appeal Saturday for an additional year of eligibility and will spend his final season as a graduate transfer at Washington State.

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College football recruiting for most schools and fans is like ordering from a menu written in Chinese. Pictures are helpful, and previous experiences of random selections generally turned out all right, even if it was never clear what was being eaten.

For many recruits, however, the analogy is the chef from Seinfeld. For reasons often not clear, they are surprised with a harsh denial: "No soup for you!" More on this later.

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The most unheralded, yet best annual event in Seattle sports went off so well Thursday it prompted a tough, square-built retired cop to get all gushy.

"An outstanding deal," said Garth Gaines. "It's been fantastic -- the Washington Athletic Club is a great place in a great location.

"And the award is very meaningful -- voted on by opposing players. That's the cherry on top. Not a popularity contest. It's how you played."

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PASADENA, CA. -- It's not fair to say the Washington Huskies came all the way across an 18-year void for naught. But it is fair to say that that the Pac-12 Conference champions came away with little from the Rose Bowl Tuesday afternoon, because they showed up with neither plan nor purpose sufficient for such a large occasion.

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PASADENA, CA. -- Truth be told, Kaleb McGary didn't want to be an offensive lineman. Nor was he wild about going to college in the ginormous city of Seattle, where there was way too much concrete for his country-boy tastes. A better fit seemed to be the University of Wisconsin in small-town Madison, where every third mammal in the state was a cow.

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Rod Jones, a member of the 1984 Orange Bowl team who held the Washington career record for catches by a tight end, and more recently was the Huskies' academic coordinator, died Saturday at 54 by suicide from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

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Traditionalists are firing up their RVs -- Big 10 Conference champion Ohio State vs. Pac-12 Conference in Pasadena at 2 p.m. New Year's Day in the Rose Bowl. Let the caravan shortly begin heading south on I-5.

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Confirming: The Rose Bowl is obligated to take the winner of Friday night's Pac-12 Championship. The news is important in case you were among the witnesses whose cringes were so severe that vision was impaired, and you walked away seeking medical attention.

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Um . . . I'm not feeling it.

You know, the big regional sports championship Friday night. In Santa Clara. Washington Huskies vs. Utah Utes. Winner of the Pac-12 title game goes to the Rose Bowl.

Are you feeling it? Didn't think so.

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After one of best seasons for a linebacker in Huskies football history, Washington senior Ben Burr-Kirven was named Wednesday as Pac-12 Conference Scholar-Athlete of the Year for the 2018 season.

He's the second Husky to win the honor in the past three seasons. Former OL Jake Eldrekamp won in 2016.

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The Cougars' home loss to Washington Friday in the Apple Cup cost more than dignity and the North Division title. In the College Football Rankings released Tuesday, the Cougars fell from eighth to 13th, or one spot beyond where the New Year's Six bowls tend to feed.

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PULLMAN -- For all of Mike Leach's coaching acumen, in four years he's never figured out what to do about RB Myles Gaskin. And for five years, he hasn't figured out what to do about coach Chris Petersen. Even after receiving simultaneous visits from the Palouse football imps -- snow, cold, dark and wind, all at once -- he still can't change the Cougars' fate against the Washington Huskies.

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PULLMAN -- Following the crash of a bus Thursday night on the way to Pullman that temporarily hospitalized 47 members, the University of Washington band didn't continue to the Apple Cup Friday.  Ambulances transported the passengers to nearly hospitals, where none of the injuries were considered serious.

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The Apple Cup, a college football game held following Thanksgiving with its decidedly Northwest theme, compels normal people to dress up in garish crimson or purple fashion ensembles, drive 300 miles through dubious mountain-pass conditions to a designated stadium and sit in cold, rain, snow and darkness to watch the spectacle play out.

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You may think that Friday's Apple Cup is a big game for both Washington and Washington State, given the traditional bragging rights, the unusual West Coast football stakes for each program, and even a national discussion surrounding the Cougars' distant shot at a berth in the College Football Playoffs.

While all of that is true, there is potentially a more lasting consequence for Wazzu.

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Reporters who helicopter, or wagon-train, into Pullman for one-off interviews invariably find Mike Leach amusing, irreverent, original and iconoclastic, especially for his industry. However, reporters who deal with the Washington State football on a regular basis often find him circumspect, contentious and surly. And, often, late.

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