With 2011 being an all-but-lost season for Oregon State University football, Saturday's game may be one last shot at redemption for the senior class.
"It's not easy on anybody — having a season like this," said senior safety Lance Mitchell.
The Beavers (2-8, 2-5 Pac-12) have only had one win in front of the home crowd this season. Saturday will be the last time 16 seniors will walk out onto the field as members of the Oregon State football team.
"I think that for the team there's a special motivation there," said head coach Mike Riley. "I think that everybody generally wants to prove that we can win and that we want to get a win. And then I think there's that added incentive personally probably for guys that have played their careers here, the seniors."
Standing in Oregon State's way in their last home contest of the year will be the University of Washington (6-4, 4-3).
As good as Washington quarterback Keith Price has been this year — 2,258 passing yards, 25 TDs, 67.2 percent completions — a knee sprain suffered last week against the University of Southern California may force Price to sit.
Nick Montana, son of legendary 49ers quarterback Joe Montana, would be Price's replacement. It would be Montana's first career start. The redshirt freshman has only thrown 20 passes in his career, completing 13 of them for 147 yards, a touchdown and an interception.
"[Montana] was a highly touted recruit, lot of talent," Riley said. "It's kind of more of the same [with Montana instead of Price]. They're not going to change dramatically with him doing what he does."
Huskies head coach Steve Sarkisian has still not announced a starter, but for as limited as Price has been in practice this week, it wouldn't be a shock if Joe Cool Jr. is out there for the Huskies.
The other area of focus for Oregon State on Saturday will be stopping the run game. A stat that bears repeating: The Beavers have been outrushed 821-92 over the last three games.
"It all starts with controlling that run game and trying to make teams one-dimensional," said senior linebacker Cameron Collins.
Husky tailback Chris Polk has already eclipsed the 1,000-yard mark for his third straight season. He's gone for 100-plus yards in seven of 10 games this season, and has crossed the goal line 10 times.
"Polk is a great back," Collins said. "He's got that combination of size and speed. He's a powerful runner. He runs downhill."
The rush defense for the Beavers has been terrible. There's really no other way to put it. The University of California, Berkeley ran for 296 yards against OSU last Saturday.
"Just poor execution; poor tackling," said redshirt freshman defensive end Scott Crichton. "It was all on the defense, this last game. We just need to fix our mistakes and learn from this game."
Run defense and run offense are big-time areas of improvement the Beavers need to see over these last two games if they want to have any chance at coming away with a win.
Emotions will be flying high on Senior Day this Saturday, as a major chapter of several players' lives will end at the conclusion of the game versus Washington.
"Especially for our seniors," Crichton said. "I know our seniors are disappointed because of our season. It's a disappointing season, and we just need to do it for our seniors."
Warner Strausbaugh, sports writer
sports@dailybarometer.com
is a member of the 
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