# 2002 Washington State Cougars football team

The 2002 Washington State Cougars football team represented Washington State University as a member of Pacific-10 Conference the 2002 NCAA Division I-A football season. The team was led by Mike Price in his 14th and final season as head coach, and played its home games on campus at Martin Stadium in Pullman, Washington.
Washington State finished the regular season with an overall record of 10–2 and mark of 7–1 in the conference play, sharing the Pac-10 title with USC. They defeated the Trojans in overtime in early October, but lost to unranked Washington in triple overtime in the Apple Cup at Pullman; WSU regrouped and beat UCLA by three touchdowns two weeks later. The seventh-ranked Cougars were invited to the Rose Bowl on New Year's Day, but were soundly defeated by the Oklahoma Sooners, and dropped to tenth in the final rankings.
The Rose Bowl was the final game for Price at Washington State. He left to become the head football coach at the University of Alabama, but never coached a game for the Crimson Tide. Bill Doba, longtime defensive coordinator for the cougars, was promoted to head coach for the 2003 season, and he led the Cougar program through 2007.

## Schedule

| Date | Time | Opponent | Rank | Site | TV | Result | Attendance |
| August 31 | 12:00 pm | vs. Nevada* | No. 12 | Seahawks StadiumSeattle, WA (Cougar Gridiron Classic) | | W 31–7 | 63,588 |
| September 7 | 3:00 pm | Idaho* | No. 11 | Martin StadiumPullman, WA (Battle of the Palouse) | | W 49–14 | 30,110 |
| September 14 | 12:30 pm | at No. 6 Ohio State* | No. 10 | Ohio StadiumColumbus, OH (College GameDay) | ABC | L 7–25 | 104,553 |
| September 21 | 2:00 pm | Montana State* | No. 16 | Martin StadiumPullman, WA | | W 45–28 | 23,713 |
| September 28 | 2:00 pm | at California | No. 16 | California Memorial StadiumBerkeley, CA | | W 48–38 | 29,297 |
| October 5 | 4:00 pm | No. 18 USC | No. 17 | Martin StadiumPullman, WA | TBS | W 30–27 $^{OT}$ | 36,861 |
| October 12 | 2:00 pm | at Stanford | No. 12 | Stanford StadiumStanford, CA | | W 36–11 | 30,750 |
| October 26 | 7:00 pm | at Arizona | No. 9 | Arizona StadiumTucson, AZ | FSN | W 21–13 | 46,462 |
| November 2 | 12:30 pm | No. 16 Arizona State | No. 8 | Martin StadiumPullman, WA | ABC | W 44–22 | 37,444 |
| November 9 | 12:30 pm | No. 15 Oregon | No. 5 | Martin StadiumPullman, WA | ABC | W 32–21 | 37,600 |
| November 23 | 3:30 pm | Washington | No. 3 | Martin StadiumPullman, WA (Apple Cup) | FSN | L 26–29 $^{3OT}$ | 37,600 |
| December 7 | 1:30 pm | at UCLA | No. 7 | Rose BowlPasadena, CA | ABC | W 48–27 | 56,335 |
| January 1, 2003 | 2:00 pm | vs. No. 8 Oklahoma* | No. 7 | Rose BowlPasadena, CA (Rose Bowl) | ABC | L 14–34 | 86,848 |
| *Non-conference gameHomecomingRankings from AP Poll released prior to the gameAll times are in Pacific time ||||||||

## Roster

    Source:

### Coaching staff

* Head coach: Mike Price
* Assistants: Robb Akey, Chris Ball, Bob Connelly, Bill Doba, Kasey Dunn, Mike Levenseller, Robin Pflugrad, Aaron Price, Mike Walker
    Source:

## Game summaries
### USC

| | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | OT | Total |
| USC | 7 | 0 | 7 | 13 | 0 | 27 |
| • Washington St | 10 | 0 | 7 | 10 | 3 | 30 |
Washington State's first win over USC in Pullman in sixteen years.

## 2002 Cougars in professional football

* Hamza Abdullah
* Calvin Armstrong
* Erik Coleman
* Devard Darling
* Jason David
* Rien Long
* Karl Paymah
* Marcus Trufant