Monday Game Review: Ducks Need to Take a Vision Quest
The Oregon Ducks just lost to OSU and Cal in back to back weeks. Where do they go from here?
It’s officially Husky Hate ❌eek.
My m.o. is typically to omit the letter “double u” from my vocabulary completely. In texts, t❌eets, telegrams, etc. Everybody in my life tries their best to ignore me for seven ❌hole days because it’s probably insufferable. But lucky you, long-form articles kind of call for all 26 letters of the alphabet, so I’m giving myself a pass for the ne❌sletter.
Oregon looked for a big bounce back, but instead they experienced Death by a Thousand Cuts in a 21-17 loss to California. The Ducks could use a peyote self-discovery hike through the desert right about now, but they’ll have to settle for hosting the Huskies.
This is no fun.
Last week, I managed to avoid any real sort of “Come to Jesus” moment by saying that the Oregon State game was NOT indicative of who this Ducks team was, and that the way they responded in the Cal game would truly define them.
And I guess I wasn’t entirely wrong.
My review of the Beaver game was probably the most critical thing I’ve ever put together about Oregon football. And then in my preview of the Cal game, I opted to analyze cold hard numbers—straying far away from usual blind optimism.
In both scenarios I thought I was finally being a realist. I thought if the Oregon defense could simply stop the run (especially late) that it would be enough to win. And after allowing Cal’s offense to gain 1 total yard in the fourth quarter, it turns out even “James The Realist” was blind once again.
With all the individual or statistical analysis I was doing, I never imagined that this team would show up and fall short due to a mix of penalties, mental lapses, and a downright lack of effort.
The business-like nature of the Mario Cristobal era hadn’t yet prepared me for a dejected, undisciplined performance like the one the Ducks put on in Berkeley.
And I’m not even talking about being a boomer and screaming things like, “these guys don’t care, sit their asses!” These student-athletes do care, I know they do. It just felt like there was a cloud of disillusionment that slowly took over the team in grey on Saturday, and that lead to mistakes that surely cost five or more points when all was said and done.
The Oregon defense was admittedly facing a less-than-stout Cal offense, but they ended up being one of the bright spots of Saturday. After much scrutiny, KT, the linebackers, and Bennett friggin’ Williams all stepped up and played one of their best games of 2020.
Defensive stop after defensive stop gave Tyler Shough more than enough opportunities to take the game back, but the turnover bug bit the Ducks once again, and now the offense finds themselves on the scapegoat end of the losing stick.
When you’re losing, half the fanbase becomes an expert head coach/athletic director. Fire this guy. Bench this bum. It’s always the same, non-creative stuff, and it’s almost too boring to even acknowledge, but Akili Smith also thought Braxton Burmeister should’ve dethroned Herbert a thousand different times.
I choose to trust the guy who won the conference and the Rose Bowl in his second season. I think that’s the safe bet.
Spin zone time: if there was ever a season to lose to OSU and Cal back to back, it’s ABSOLUTELY the year that doesn’t count, right?
Much like my golf game, this season is basically all mulligans. It still hurts all the same as a fan, yes, but it’s a lot of valuable lessons for every freshman and sophomore on this roster.
A loss or two in 2020 objectively costs less than a loss or two in any other season. And the same way that the Auburn loss last year was 100% consequential in being able to close out the Wazzu, UDub, and Wisconsin games, this kind of disappointment should also be channelled into close victories down the road.
But how many times do the Ducks have to learn the same lesson?
They let the Beavers beat them twice, and there has never been a more important time for this team to hit the reset button. They can still win the biggest game of the year—a version of this rivalry game that somehow has the largest post season implications that it’s had in the Pac-12 era.
As crazy as it sounds, the Ducks can still win the whole conference. 2020 is a helluva year.
The Cal loss made a pretty strong statement about who this Ducks team really is, and now the Husky game presents an opportunity for them to win despite themselves.
This is usually my favorite week of the year, and I’m sure I’ll hit my Husky Hate stride sometime midweek, but just like the Ducks, I’m doing a bit of soul-searching. Time for all of us to refocus, dig deep, and allow the hate to flow through us one last time.
You know what they say: don’t let the Beavs beat ya thrice.
Go Ducks.