Most Oregon State Beaver football fans are pleasantly surprised with the 2021 season. Expectations hovered around a six-win season and the team’s first bowl berth in more than half a decade. Those have been shattered. The Beavers play Cal this Saturday with a bowl berth on the line, and it’s not even November! Now, Beaver Nation is hoping the team’s winning ways can continue till November 27.
That would pit the Beavers versus the Ducks with a trip to the Pac-12 title game on the line. That’s something Mike Parker, radio play-by-play voice of the Beavers can only hope happens.
“All over in our region and elsewhere, people are pointing to that last game (against the Ducks) as a potential North Division title decider,” Parker told Dirt and Sprague, Thursday. “Just to even have that kind of conversation shows how the mood and expectations have changed with Jonathan Smith at the helm.”
Smith has endured three straight losing seasons in Corvallis. Fans have preached patience with the new hire, still scarred by the Gary Andresen years. Most people put expectations for a bowl berth as realistic. Apparently Smith has been dreaming of something bigger this entire season.
“He wasn’t satisfied with just six wins as the early season started,” Parker explains. “He told us he believed this team was capable of more and want to be in this thing. It’s a big milestone in the development of the program and it’s something that won’t be lost of any of us, I know that.”