Have we caught our breath yet, Beaver Nation? Saturday is a day not many of us who were there (and probably those who watched on TV) will forget any time soon. That game had just about everything you could have asked for (aside from a downfield pass by the Beavs). In terms of improbability of victory, I doubt you can beat this.

Sunday night, the Oregon State men’s soccer team fell 2-0 to the University of Portland at home. When the potential for the in-state matchup was announced by the tournament selection committee, I worried about it.

Making a prediction regarding a sporting event is tough. A team can fall apart for reasons that have little to do with the sport itself, and then you end up on @OldTakesExposed or some other Twitter feed looking like a dummy. I once wrote a blog post about why the Beavs would be better after Quizz declared for the NFL. We went out that fall and lost to Sacramento State in our first game. I was wrong.

I saw a tweet Friday about the women’s soccer game vs. Oregon, and the first two words of the tweet were “The Rivalry.”

It reminded me that it’s been over two years since the universities agreed to move on from the name “Civil War.” To my knowledge, there’s been no attempt to give the matchup a new name. Instead, both schools seem content to continue calling it “The Rivalry,” in one of the lamest moves ever.

Sometimes good ideas arrive at the wrong time, or are never given a shot for one reason or another. Buckminster Fuller designed a 12-seat car in the 1930s that got 30 miles to the gallon on an alcohol based fuel, but an unfortunate crash at the Chicago World’s Fair derailed the project before it could get off the ground - literally. Fuller’s Dymaxion vehicle was being designed to eventually be able to fly as well.

The modern era of OSU football has unquestionably spoiled Beaver Nation. From Ken Simonton’s Parker Stadium scamper vs. the Ducks in 1998 to the Fiesta Bowl in 2001 to five consecutive bowl wins from 2003-2009, to Gar…..to Jonathan Smith’s current team, we’ve had more to cheer about in the past quarter-century than our fore-Beavers could have dreamed of.

Beaver Nation is awesome. How else do you explain a season high 912 people showing up for a men’s soccer non-league game that was rescheduled from Saturday to Friday just a few days prior? Also, credit to whoever made the decision to move it so it didn’t interfere with homecoming activities or the football game on Saturday.

If ties are like kissing your sister, we might have to have a serious talk with the OSU men’s soccer team, because they keep doing it. The Beavs led in both matches this weekend, but were unable to hold second half leads in either, earning a 1-1 draw with Cal on Thursday night and battling No. 5 Stanford to a 2-2 stalemate on Sunday.

Being a quarterback is a lot like being an airline these days. One bad experience, regardless of the number of positive ones you’ve had in the past, sends everyone running for Twitter to tag you, tell you how they’ve “never been treated worse” in their lives, and vow never to give them our business again. Chance Nolan Airlines got canceled this week.

Last weekend, the Beaver football team came oh-so-close to giving the Trojans the best farewell gift they could possibly give them in the last meeting between the schools on the gridiron before they head to the Big Ten. Tonight, the men’s soccer team gets their first shot at letting UCLA know what they think of their impending departure.

The ending of Oregon State’s heartbreaking 17-14 defeat against USC certainly left us feeling unfulfilled, but I think Beaver Nation will someday soon look back at what happened Saturday night at Reser Stadium as the start of something special.

Last year, the Beaver men’s soccer team became the first school outside of Stanford or Washington to raise the Pac-12 championship trophy since 2012. Picked 3rd in the conference’s preseason poll, OSU dropped only one conference game (a road loss to UCLA) en route to their first ever conference title.

There have been many memorable games at OSU over the years, but for some reason the ones that resonate with me years later happened at night games. Quizz’s breakout performance against USC, the upset of #6 ASU in 2014, the chaos of the 4th quarter of the 2007 game vs. UW, Darell Garretson’s one shining moment as a Beaver in 2016.