This isn't your father's Oregon State football program.

Maybe it was even your grandfather watching the Beavers back in the 1970s. If he was, he was part of an often sparse crowd that stuck with the program despite losing season after losing season.

Those days are long gone.

Ten years have passed since the Beavers snapped a 28-year streak of losing seasons with a 7-5 finish and trip to the Oahu Bowl in Honolulu, Hawaii.

Since then, moments have come true that Beavers fans could only dream of in previous decades.

The Beavers have been to seven bowl games, winning six. That includes a 41-9 win over Notre Dame in the 2001 Fiesta Bowl.

There have been three home wins over USC and five wins over Oregon.

One of the wins over the Trojans came last year and put the Beavers in the front of the pack in the running for the Rose Bowl until they lost the Civil War game and settled for the Sun Bowl.

Oh, it hasn't been all rosy for the Beavers. There were 5-6 finishes in 2001 and '05 that kept OSU out of bowl games.

Nevertheless, 5-6 was the best finish during the losing streak and that came in 1998. A record that had Beavers fans buzzing with excitement then would become somewhat of a letdown in just a few seasons.

OSU athletic director Bob De Carolis said the past 10 years proves the Beavers are now a relevant force in football in a tough conference.

"The last three years shows that we can compete on the national stage," De Carolis said. "Football success helps garner financial resources that aids in the development and competitiveness of all our other sports. The success sets the tone for the emotion of the brand of OSU athletics for our fan base."

OSU fans know the background. Mike Riley arrived in 1997, led the Beavers to a 3-8 record and then narrowly missed a winning record the next year.

It was at the end of that second season that the Beavers turned the corner. They won a wild Civil War game, 44-41 in double overtime. The win was a springboard to a winning season in 1999.

"Some people call it a perfect storm. It was perfect," former OSU athletic director Mitch Barnhart said. "It was sort of that moment you began to believe you could do a little more."

Riley's accomplishments caught the eye of the NFL and he left for the San Diego Chargers. Instead of falling back, the Beavers got a big break.

Dennis Erickson gave OSU a call and the Beavers snatched him up. Erickson promptly took the base that Riley had built and put the finishing touches that led to the Fiesta Bowl.

"The hiring of coach Erickson sort of moved us in a new direction," Barnhart said.

That team had Chad Johnson (now Ochocinco) and T.J. Houshmandzadeh catching passes from Jonathan Smith, and Ken Simonton running the football.

The Fiesta Bowl was a huge step for the football program.

"The Fiesta Bowl effect helped propel the securing of additional revenue and resources to put the support services in place to keep the momentum going," De Carolis said. "This resulted in the construction of the Truax indoor center, the upgrade of the medical staff, weight training staff, academic support and the ability to retain a successful coaching staff."

OSU had fallen behind the rest of the Pac-10 schools in the facilities race, the major exception being the Valley Football Center.

Winning seasons have also led to a bigger pot from boosters, making it easier for OSU to build an indoor practice facility, a sports performance center and renovate a large portion of Reser Stadium.

Reser received a $115 million upgrade, including an expanded grandstand on the east side complete with a club level and suites. The north end of the stadium was bowled in and a new scoreboard and Jumbotron were installed.

Barnhart oversaw some of the growth as OSU's athletic director from 1997 to 2002. De Carolis stepped in when Barnhart left for University of Kentucky and has been the driving force behind some of the biggest improvements.

"With the VFC and the Truax built it was obvious the next move to keep the momentum going both from an emotional side and financial side was stadium expansion and renovation in 2005 with Raising Reser," De Carolis said. "We continued that commitment with the 2007 projects of the south end zone and the Sports Performance Center.

"We need to continue this for the future with upgrades to VFC, which is in progress, the Student Success Center for academics, which will be built in 2011, and the possibility of doing some work in the north end zone to enhance our locker room situation. Hopefully in time we will find a financial model which will allow us to complete the west side of the stadium."

The Beavers began winning and the excitement around the program started bubbling to the surface among the fan base.

Barnhart said his focus was to leave the football to the coaches and work toward making game day fun for the fans.

"From our perspective we needed to do things around the game atmosphere. We had to do some things different," Barnhart said. "At one point we were shooting off fireworks after touchdowns. We put together videos. Doing some different packages gave us a little different look."

Erickson coached two more seasons at OSU before giving the NFL another try. Riley was available and stepped back in.

Success has bred success. The Beavers are able to recruit higher level players without getting spurned right away and even land a few.

Recruits see players such as Ochocinco, Houshmandzadeh, Steven Jackson, Nick Barnett, Keith Ellison and Derek Anderson making names for themselves in the NFL and know that choosing OSU isn't going to hinder them from getting to the next level.

The bowl wins, winning seasons and increased media attention have resulted in recruits noticing and considering OSU. It's not unusual for the Beavers to be on the short list of top recruits even though most of them will still head to another school.

Recruiting remains a tough job for the Beavers, but it's not such a tough sell anymore.

"The first thing you hear out of their mouth is, 'Oh, I watched that SC game and you guys beat SC,' " assistant coach and former player Keith Heyward said. "But still, at least in my area, because they're from down there in Los Angeles they still want to go to SC or those Southern California schools just because that's home. It's still a challenge. You still have to sell yourself, you still have to sell the program.

"You've got to get them up here to take a trip and it's always based on what those kids are looking for in the long run and what they want to do. Some of them now are into facilities or how early they're going to play in the process. So it all depends in a case by case."

Riley and his staff make a point to go after good fits for the program, whether a player has one star or five. They are adept at bringing in overlooked players who bring much more talent to the table than expected by the recruiting services and other programs.

"We've got some good athletes," Heyward said. "A lot of people don't give us the credit for having the athletes because of whatever the rankings that Rivals and Scout and all those guys give out there, but as we've all seen throughout the recruiting process it's not all about stars and how many of them a guy has, we still have some good athletes."

Is the program headed for another 10 years of success?

It's hard to say. But if the Beavers can keep winning, nearly everything else falls into place.

"If you've got the right guys in your program and you've got the right fit and pretty good athletes and guys are buying into the system and doing the things that you're asking them to do, that'll keep you going in the right direction at all times," Heyward said.