Huskies Don’t Know What Hit Them : Washington: Chances for No. 1 go up in smoke against underdog UCLA.

Greg Lewis sat motionless, his face fixed in a blank expression, then started listing everything the Washington Huskies had just lost on a gray, windy Saturday. He could have used a calculator.

“It really hurts,” Lewis said, but he wasn’t talking about his sore left knee, the one covered with an ice bag. “We did lose, but I still feel we are one of the best teams in the country. We just didn’t play like it today.”

The Huskies, the No. 2-ranked team in the nation, saw their hopes for a national championship blown away by 21-point underdog UCLA, which pulled off an improbable 25-22 upset before 71,925 at Husky Stadium.

Lewis gained only 50 yards, ending his streak of consecutive 100-yard games at nine. He carried the ball only 12 times and played only parts of two quarters after injuring his right knee in the second quarter.

“Going into halftime, I could barely walk,” said Lewis, who felt his knee lock after an 18-yard gain on a sweep when he was hit by UCLA free safety Eric Turner.

“I couldn’t plant my foot, cut or run with a lot of confidence,” Lewis said. “I wanted to continue to play, but Coach (Don) James had the team’s best interests at heart.”

Lewis was on track to equal Marcus Allen’s 1981 Pacific 10 Conference one-season rushing record of 100 yards in every game, but he said the end of his streak was not of primary importance.

“It doesn’t really bother me as much as losing does,” Lewis said.

For the Huskies, it was a monumental flop. Not only were they overwhelming favorites, Washington would have remained in contention for a national championship if Notre Dame faltered somewhere down the line.

The bottom line?

“Basically, it means our national championship dreams are dead,” James said. “That’s what it means.”

Washington had 146 yards rushing after averaging 254.7. The Huskies committed three costly turnovers, including two interceptions by quarterback Mark Brunell.

“Everything that could go wrong, did go wrong,” cornerback Charles Mincy said. “I don’t know what to say. It’s horrible.”

James, however, knew what word to use. He picked “horrendous” to describe his team’s offensive show.

“If we couldn’t get a running game going today, we had no chance the way we were throwing the ball and catching it,” James said.

Brunell competed only 10 of 34 passes for 137 yards, and his pass intended for Mario Bailey that Eric Turner intercepted set up UCLA’s winning drive at midfield.

“What can you say?” Brunell said. “It’s disappointing. Our chances for a national championship are gone now. We’ve got just to bounce back now, I guess.”

James, who after the game instructed his players to give credit to UCLA,said there was no clue in practices during the week that the Huskies would fall flat with so much riding on the outcome of one game.

“First of all, it wasn’t a very good day to play offense, but they played better than we did,” James said. “We didn’t have much of a running game and we had a horrendous passing game. But we live up here, we practice in it, so there’s no excuse about the weather.”

The Huskies were reeling from the time Brian Brown broke loose for an 88-yard touchdown run five minutes into the game. On that play, James said his defense got caught sending its linebackers and free safety Tommie Smith on a blitz on third and short yardage.

Once Brown crossed the line of scrimmage, he was gone. Little did the Huskies know, so were their title hopes.

“I don’t know what it was,” Mincy said. “We just played flat.”

Until Saturday, Washington had been flattening people in the Pac-10. The Huskies led virtually every offensive and defensive category: rushing offense, rushing defense, total offense, total defense, scoring offense and scoring defense.

They were 8-1 overall, 6-0 in the conference and had their sights set on No. 1.

“We had the opportunity, but we let it slip away,” Lewis said. “Maybe we will take our frustrations out on Washington State. Yeah, I guess that’s all we can do now.”

James sipped a soft drink and sat by himself. In 16 years at Washington, this was his second legitimate shot at a national championship, the other in 1984 when the Huskies finished 11-1, beat Oklahoma in the Orange Bowl and still finished No. 2 behind Brigham Young.

“You know, we read a lot of nice things about us last week,” James said. “All that talk about the national championship. Maybe the more good things you hear, the softer you get and the more people get prepared to play you.”