Whicker: When their playoff dreams burst, Oregon and Wisconsin built new bubbles

Unexpected conference losses kept Oregon and Wisconsin out of College Football Playoff consideration, but they seem to think the Rose Bowl is much more than a consolation prize.

PASADENA — Oregon, or at least Oregon’s fans, had College Football Playoff sugarplums dancing in its heads.

Then Arizona State happened, on Nov. 16.

Wisconsin, or at least Wisconsin’s fans, was unbeaten and ready to step across Ohio State’s doorstep to stay that way.

Then Illinois happened, on Oct. 19.

Like boxers who lose their “0,” the teams that stumble at least once and certainly twice are not allowed redemption. The media forgets them, the fan base goes into full pout, and somehow an institution like the Rose Bowl starts to feel like a box of steak knives.

Oregon and Wisconsin, or at least their coaches, are here Wednesday. They know much of the country will enviously mistake the San Gabriel Valley for paradise, will continue the habit that Grandpa started when the sidelines belonged to Woody Hayes and John McKay.

Those Rose Bowls of our youth rarely decided a national title when such a thing was awarded, not won. Why should a CFP-era Rose Bowl be any different? The Ducks can win their 12th game and the Badgers can win their 11th. Some games are worth their existential weight.

“Everybody wants to go undefeated,” Wisconsin coach Paul Chryst said on Tuesday. “You’d love to stop the opponent on any drive, and to score a touchdown every time offensively. But it doesn’t go that way. That’s life.

“If you’re a player and if all you were worried about was winning and losing, that only happens at the end of the game. But for a player, the best part is playing the game. So why would you miss the best part to get to the end?”

Players don’t live on a soundproof campus. They hear the hearts crashing when the CFP dream disappears.

Yet it is not sudden-death. Games remain. Even if you visit a conference championship game and a bowl game in all four seasons, that’s only 56 games, compared to the thousands of grunt-work hours on which they are predicated. That is why Pete Carroll was so astonished at USC when you asked if he feared a letdown. How can you be casual about a game that happens on just 27 percent of your Saturdays?

So Oregon reassembled itself after Arizona State, beat Oregon State and then thrashed an ill-prepared Utah team in the Pac-12 championship game.

Wisconsin took a licking from Ohio State after the Illinois loss, but beat Iowa and won at Minnesota, where the Badgers found roses in the snow.

Wisconsin is one of six teams to win at least 10 games in five of its past six years, and one of five to play in six New Year’s Six bowl games in the 2010s.

“Every single game seems like a playoff game, right?” said Mario Cristobal, who is 20-7 in two years coaching Oregon. “When you lose, you always think, man, these guys are going to be down. But they’re a lot smarter, more resilient and tougher than what we think.

“Our West Coast players, this has been their dream. They can tell us about all the games in the past, and the players that have shined in a big-time way.”

This is no final destination for Oregon. Cristobal, who played at Miami and was an assistant coach at Alabama, is taking a chain saw to the Pac-12’s passing tree.

The Ducks’ offensive line has started a combined 218 games, and Oregon has rushed for 200-plus yards in 10 of Cristobal’s games.

Among the few substantive criticisms of Clay Helton’s tenure at USC is the bafflement over their up-front softness.

Helton’s first two teams were nasty and tough. They were also 21-6 with a Rose Bowl win and a Pac-12 title. The next two were 13-12, with pretty passing downfield and a roster on crutches, with quarterbacks caving in like they were coached by the Allstate Mayhem guy. Either Helton changes that situation in 2020 or someone else will in 2021.

Cristobal said the Ducks put on the pads during Rose Bowl prep. “This is still a series of collisions and whatnot,” he said. “You have to stay physical.”

With 15 linemen/linebackers on NFL rosters, and with three running backs among the Big Ten’s top six all-time rushers, Wisconsin is basically the bicep of college football. That, not the very occasional loss, is its definition.

“Everyone else worries about it (the playoff) more than we do, because we know the reality of it,” Chryst said. “If you only focus on the end, you miss the best part, which is playing the game. Enjoy the journey, appreciate the journey.”

Mountains and sunshine help, at journey’s end.