Retro Rebound
Sometimes you have to go back, to move forward.
Whelp, the Ducks lost the (first) Game of the Century.
To end a 36-33 instant classic, Camden Lewis’ game-tying 43-yarder slipped just right of the uprights, sending a sea of purple-clad homework-lovers out onto Alaska Airlines Field.
The missed field goal stung (especially since Camden has improved so much), but it certainly didn’t lose the game for the Ducks. Nope, it was ultimately lost on a collection of 4th & short situations for which Dan Lanning seems to be catching a lot of flack.
But every cover story that recaps this game seems to be highlighting two things: Lanning and Penix.
And because of that, I’m kind of tired of Duck players not being a more central part of the story this year, so that’s where I’m going to start.
I’ll get to the “going for it” later.
Bo Nix was 33-44 for 337 yards and two scores. He lead the offense into one of the loudest environments in college football—on a day where every eyeball was on him—and he continued his stellar season. He didn’t throw a pick like Penix did, and that contributed to one of the most mistake-free games I’ve seen out of him at Oregon.
All of that praise just rubs salt in the wound though, because the other team had Michael Penix under center.
With his winning effort and a 22-37, 302 yd, four touchdown, one interception stat line, Penix is now the consensus Heisman frontrunner. He rapped before leading the game-winning drive, he cried to Holly Rowe after the game, and he just generally had all the moments we wanted Bo to have.
Man, it really hurts to see your rival on top of the college football world for a day.
Now I know a little bit about how the Huskies felt between the years of 2001-2014.
To say Penix was accurate would be an understatement. I’ve never seen so many successful long bombs completed over and over with my own eyes. When I see the ball in the air that much, my football-watcher brain says, “oh, that’s just one of those ones that ain’t gettin’ caught.”
But my football brain clearly needs to be recalibrated to account for the “Penix Conundrum.”
On multiple drives—including their final one—it only took the Huskies two or three gigantic pass plays to move down the field and put points on the board.
I may have downplayed Penix a bit too much in my preview. That might be an understatement, too, but I was really trying to hype myself up there. I couldn’t handle the nerves. I had to shove them down.
However, I would like to note that all of his big plays ended up being highly contested, tight-window balls, and as crazy as it sounds, I didn’t walk away from that game with an overly gross taste in my mouth about our secondary.
They held Penix to his lowest yardage total of the season, and throughout the second half they made adjustments that clearly helped the Ducks grab the lead late.
In my preview I said we weren’t playing against three Tavon Austins, but we might have at least been playing against two Troy Franklins.
And if it weren’t for Odunze* out-physical-ing a few of those jump balls back from our guys, we might be talking about Khyree and Jahlil having done just-enough to win, rather than doing just-not-enough.
*Odunze, who didn’t outrun anybody on Saturday, but apparently didn’t need to.
Bucky had another monster game, and as it stands right now he might be the best football player on this team. It sucks that we out-rushed them so badly all over again, and still managed to lose the game on pivotal short yardage moments.
But even the loss, I think a lot of people walked away from that game feeling generally as confident or maybe more confident in both the Huskies and the Ducks going forward.
The Ducks dropped from #8 to #9 in the AP Poll, and that just might be the least they’ve ever fallen after a loss.
We came up three points short in a hostile road environment, and the effort looks extra impressive when you consider that they had twice as many Troy Franklins as we did, yet didn’t score twice as many points.
Everything is still laid out in front of this Oregon team. They just can’t afford to slip up again.
It has been said to death, but if the Ducks had converted on any one of those “go-for-it” calls, they’s have won the game. So—resisting any hindsight bias—it’s really hard for me to say that I dislike any of those decisions on Lanning’s part.
We applaud Dan’s aggressiveness when he calls a fake punt to ice the Colorado game in the second quarter. We love it when he out-Chips Chip with a surprise onside kick against UCLA. And when he goes 3-3 on fourth to put BYU away early.
Lanning is a young guy and I think he’s on the right track. Hyper-aggressive, opportunistic LanningBall already feels like a really fun and successful way to play the game (much better than Cristobal conservatism, I might add). He’ll probably make some more mistakes as he continues to strike a balance between his gut and his probabilities, and that’s okay.
Fun/not-so-fun stat: since the Georgia game of last season, the Ducks are a total of 0-9 on 4th Down in their three losses since (Washington twice, and Oregon State).
Not to be a percentages guy like Dan, but if/when this game is played again, it’s highly unlikely that we go 0-fer all over again.
It’s truly unfortunate that all of those losses have come against your biggest rival twice (and then against some other team you used to play every year), but I think I can ultimately live with it as long as the aggression comes with a slight improvement to Dan’s in-game feel.
Right now he’s a golfer that’s deathly afraid of leaving a putt short. He just needs to find some touch.
But I still think he is a big time head coach, and in the long run I hope he can make the Husky fans that were sitting next to me eat their words over the next 4-6 years of the rivalry after they gleefully mocked his “Danalytics” and cackled that they, “hope Lanning stays at Oregon FOREVER!”
Heck, I don’t even need the next 4-6 years, I’ll settle for December 1st in Vegas.
But for right now we’re dressing like it’s 1994, and we’re on to the Cougs.
At one point, WSU looked like a team that could sneakily challenge for the top tier of the Pac-12 after they beat Wisconsin and Oregon State, but then they dropped one to UCLA and got housed by Arizona last week.
Their offense with QB Cam Ward can be spunky, but it seems to have mellowed out a lot as of late.
Brandon Dorlus called Ward, “the most annoying quarterback to play against,” because of his ability to scramble and extend plays, along with his notoriously deep drop backs.
Ward will certainly be a challenge, but luckily Wazzu’s offensive line bears a strong resemblance to Colorado’s. I think our front seven (and even just our front four) will have a bit of a field day for the majority of the game tomorrow.
The Coug offense also averages a dismal 93 rushing yards per game, which places them at 123rd on the nation.
Despite being an agricultural college, they don’t have a ton of top tier beef along the line, and I fear (for them) that the mismatches up front alone are going to make this game get out of hand quickly.
Much like the rest of their team, the Cougar defense started out with moments of brilliance and have since been rather putrid.
But a guy to watch out for them is Edge, Ron Stone Jr. (#10). RJ has been in Pullman forever, but he is their leader, their anchor, and second on the team in both sacks and tackles for loss.
But even if Stone and the Coug defense flies around and looks reignited for a moment, I think our offensive line will set the tone and make it really hard for WSU to affect much of what our offense wants to do.
I expect Jordan James and Bucky to combine for four touchdowns and maybe 300+ yards on the ground.
It’s back to basics for the Ducks, and it’s back to the ‘90s with the throwback jerseys.
The second half of the season starts tomorrow, and they’ll have to focus on one game at a time if they want to stay in the playoff picture.
I think tomorrow—at home for the first time in a month—is the perfect place to start.
Oregon 43, Wazzu 24.
Go Ducks.