At the beginning of the year, tonight's game against Washington was supposed to be nothing more than an annoyance, a small bug smashing on the windshield of the Wildcats' semi-truck as it sped through another successful season.

Well, the bug got bigger.

After sweeping the Bay Area schools last weekend, the Huskies are off to their best start in 10 years and tied with Arizona for third place in the Pacific 10 Conference. With a few more wins, third-year head coach Bob Bender will make good on his pledge b efore the season to make the Huskies a serious contender.

"I didn't figure Washington in the top five (in the conference), but that was because of all the returners coming back at other places," UA head coach Lute Olson said.

A little trivia on Bender: He is the only player to ever compete in the NCAA championship game for two different schools. As a freshman in 1976, he played for Bobby Knight on Indiana's undefeated team that won the national championship. He later transferr ed to Duke, where in 1978 he helped lead the Blue Devils to the title game.

UW's success is in no small part attributed to the play of sophomore Mark Sanford, a 6-foot-8, 200-pound forward currently tied for fourth in the conference with 18.7 points a game. UA players and coaches agree that what makes Sanford so difficult is his ability to create mismatches on offense.

Because of that, a slew of Wildcats - Corey Williams, Joe McLean and Reggie Geary - will get the assignment to guard Sanford.

"The obvious matchup would be Corey with Sanford's size and weight situation," Olson said. "He does play inside and outside, which would create problems if Ben was on him. It's difficult for a big guy to deal with him on the outside and difficult for a sm aller guy to deal with him on the inside."

The most intriguing matchup would be the 6-2, 187-pound Geary on Sanford. It wouldn't be foreign territory for the senior, who matched up with Syracuse's John Wallace (6-8, 225) earlier this year and Michigan's Juwan Howard two years ago.

Olson said putting a smaller, quicker defender on a big guy can sometimes create problems, and Geary's ability to be physical on the inside would be a plus.

"He plays like a six-five guy, and I think putting me on him will take that aspect of him away," Geary said. "He's very aggressive offensively. We're going to rotate a lot of people on him, he's going to see a lot of styles."

Olson said forward Ben Davis would not see time guarding Sanford unless A.J. Bramlett was in the game to play one of the Huskies' 7-footers. While Davis might not have to guard Sanford, he has every confidence in his teammates.

"Anyone that's guarded him has been like 6-10 or 6-9, big and slow, you can score on people you can run right by," Davis said. "He's going to have to guard Corey too, and he hasn't had to guard anyone like Corey yet."

Besides, Davis said, scoring average is all relative.

"He's pretty good, but I could average nineteen too if I shot the ball twenty-five times," he said.

Another strength of the Huskies is their experience along the perimeter. Seniors Jason Hamilton and Bryant Boston and junior Jamie Booker give UW a defensive presence - the Huskies lead the league with 10.6 steals forced a game and are tops in scoring def ense allowing 66.2 points a game. They also convert the steals into points because the three guards are so efficient at filling the passing lanes, Olson said.

Lost in that shuffle is 6-6, 235-pound sophomore Jason Hartman, who comes off the bench to average 7.5 points. The Huskies are 5-0 when he scores in double figures.

Two Wildcats - sophomore Michael Dickerson and freshman Jason Terry - played their high school basketball in Seattle. Dickerson, who said he knows most of the current Husky roster, is pleased with UW's rise.

"I'm happy for them. They're proving people wrong," he said.