Senior's Key Block Huge in Win

Austin Sylvester proudly emerged from the Husky locker room, unable to hide a smile as he quietly walked past the other players being interviewed...

A soft-spoken guy at an overlooked position, the senior fullback knew he had done his part, administering one of the key blocks to give Chris Polk the easy 1-yard game-winning plunge.

To him, that was good enough. No further attention necessary.

"It was everybody," Sylvester said, again deflecting attention. "Everybody got on their man and pushed through and Chris just went right through. It was just one of those things. You couldn't draw it out better than that.

"We just wanted it more. Twenty-six power quad. It was either us or them."

But the Huskies final score didn't come without plenty of drama.

Trailing 13-10 in absolutely nasty weather conditions, UW took over at its own 21 with 4:39 to go. Helped by a 46-yard bomb from Jake Locker to Jermaine Kearse, the Huskies set themselves up perfectly in the final minutes.

A 6-yard QB sneak by Jake Locker put the Huskies at the 1-yard-line with 1:29 remaining, setting up 2nd and goal. That's when things got interesting.

Washington went to Locker again on second down, but his sneak went nowhere. UW called timeout with 44 seconds remaining.

Coming out of the timeout, Locker tried to sneak it in again on third down. Again, denied.

The Huskies let the clock run all the way down to 2 seconds before calling timeout, setting up the biggest decision in Head Coach Steve Sarkisian's two years at Washington...

To kick and force overtime.

Or to go for it, and win or go home.

The Huskies raced to the line and Locker handed it to Polk, who ran right and followed the blocks of Sylvester and guard Colin Porter for the game-ender, setting off purple eruption at the south end of California's Memorial Stadium.

Asked after the game who got the key block?

"I don't remember," Polk said. "I just lowered my head and wanted to get in there any way possible."

Meanwhile, 20 feet away, there Sylvester stood, still smiling.