If the Oregon Ducks were an actual stock, then the people who were left holding their shares after Saturday’s game against the Oregon State Beavers would be in a world of hurt.
Not only were those stakeholders left holding onto a bunch of stock for a team that is likely going to the Holiday Bowl, or the Alamo Bowl, but you can guess that the same stakeholders were likely pretty ambitious early on in that third quarter, buying up as much stock as they could with it looking like the Ducks were headed to Las Vegas for a matchup with the USC Trojans in the Pac-12 Championship Game.
According to columnist John Canzano, that was the case with at least one major Oregon booster.
Now, we’re left to pick up all of the pieces and see what happens next. There are a lot of unknowns for the Ducks, including what bowl game they will go to, and who the next offensive coordinator will be. While those two main questions won’t be answered for a bit, let’s take stock on this last game and see who impressed us, and more importantly, who disappointed on Saturday.
Here is our weekly stock report following the Oregon State debacle.
Stock Down: Dan Lanning
I’m not here to say that Dan Lanning is a bad coach. I’m not here to say that he is not the right man for the job, or that the Ducks messed up in hiring him. I still believe that, with him at the helm, Oregon has a bright future ahead and should be very good in the coming years.
However, this was a tough display.
After his first year in Eugene, Lanning is 0-2 against the team’s biggest rivals. Not only that, but Lanning held leads in the fourth quarter of both games — 34-27 over Washington, and 34-17 over Oregon State — and was unable to come away with the victories. On Saturday, the Beavers were able to mount a 28-point comeback in the second half while throwing a total of two passes after the break. The Ducks came away with three defensive turnovers but still choked the game away. It was a mismanaged affair that was blown by overly aggressive decisions and inept play.
The players didn’t execute, sure. The coaches also didn’t get the most out of them. There are a lot of fingers to point, but in the end, the man that has to answer it all is the head coach. For Dan Lanning, this one needs to hurt for a while.
Stock Down: Rushing Defense
Soobum Im-USA TODAY Sports
The Oregon State Beavers completed 6 passes for 60 yards on the day. They attempted just 13 passes in the entire game. They rushed for 268 yards and 5 touchdowns. In the second half alone, the Beavers rushed for 149 yards and 3 touchdowns, mounting a 28-point swing without attempting more than two passes after the break.
How do you not defend against that? If you’re any team in the nation, let alone the Ducks, who had the No. 19 rushing defense in the nation coming into this game, how do you not load up the box and try to fill some of the running lanes, knowing that Ben Gulbransen is not a threat to pass?
I’m not a college coach, and I obviously know there’s more to it than throwing 9 guys in the box and saying “stop the ball.” However, it seems crazy to me that Oregon’s defense knew exactly what the Beavers were going to do for two straight quarters and still were unable to stop it. That’s an incredibly tough look, especially in a rivalry game.
Stock Up: Chase Cota
Welcome to the Oregon vs. Oregon State rivalry, Chase Cota.
For this Oregon-born kid to finally get a crack at playing in the rivalry game that he has grown up watching, it was incredible to see him have such a major impact. Cota has missed the last three weeks with a leg injury, but he didn’t let that slow him down, leading the Ducks with 9 catches for 136 yards and one insane circus catch TD in the first quarter.
Aside from a bowl game at the end of this year, Cota’s collegiate career is over. It was really nice to see it have a high note on the way out.
Stock Down: Kenny Dillingham
It seems a bit odd saying that Kenny Dillingham saw his stock fall in this game, since in reality, he went on to accept his first head coaching job with the Arizona State Sun Devils just minutes afterward, becoming the youngest head coach in college football.
Regardless of what happened after the game, it became quickly apparent that Dillingham might have been a little bit distracted during the actual contest. The play-calling was sloppy and predictable, and the Ducks seemed to lack quite a bit of juice on offense.
There were a couple of instances that displayed this well. Facing a 4th and 3 from the OSU 15-yard line in the 2nd quarter, the Ducks decided to go for it instead of kick the field goal. That’s not surprising, considering Lanning’s aggressiveness, but the play-call was strange. Rather than pound the rock up the middle, like many expected would work, Dillingham drew up a jet-sweep reverse to Troy Franklin that got stopped for a yard.
Oregon ended up losing by 3 points.
In the fourth quarter, with the game on the line, the Ducks also had a chance to go ahead with a 1st and goal from the Oregon State 5-yard line. On three straight plays, Oregon went with a heavy formation and ran the ball up the middle, getting turned away each time. It was predictable, and led to the incomplete pass on 4th down, losing the game.
Dillingham is a great play-caller and a great offensive mind. He did not have a great game on Saturday.
Stock Up: Turnover Defense
Something clicked for Oregon’s defensive secondary over the past few weeks. While they struggled to defend the pass against Washington, and they failed to stop the run against Oregon State, it’s been made clear that the Ducks are opportunistic, if nothing else. At this point in the season, Oregon is No. 24 in the nation when it comes to turnovers gained (24) and No. 5 in the nation in terms of interceptions (15). An impressive 5 of those interceptions have come in the past two games.
There are a lot of things that need to be fixed with this defense, and a lot of holes that need to be covered. it was encouraging to see down the stretch that the secondary was able to step up and make plays when they needed to.
Stock Down: Justin Flowe
Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports
The knock on Justin Flowe this year is that he’s struggled mightily in pass coverage, and is not always able to schematically break things down and be in the right position to defend. However, when going up against a team that, as Dan Rubenstein correctly described on Twitter, was starting “a broken Jugs machine at quarterback,” it seems like a perfect situation for Flowe, no?
See ball, attack ball. Blow up the line of scrimmage.
Justin Flowe played a total of 5 snaps in this game, registering one tackle. In fact, you’d have to go back all the way to the Colorado game to find an instance where Flowe registered more than 6 snaps in a game.
If Flowe, the highest-rated linebacker that Oregon has ever signed, can’t have an impact in a physical, run-heavy game as we saw on Saturday, then I’m not sure what he can do. We are going to need to see him have a lot of improvement in the offseason and are going into next year to witness his ceiling in Eugene.
Stock Up: Rivalries
It’s certainly a tough time to admit this for many Oregon Duck fans, but the losses to both Washington and Oregon State are good for the rivalries at large.
Coming into this year, the Ducks had won 15 of the last 17 games against the Huskies. Oregon had also won 12 of the last 15 against Oregon State. Both rivalries had grown stale.
No longer.
Washington can now say that they’ve won 3 of the last 6 matchups with Oregon. The Beavers can tout victories in 2 of the last 3 meetings. It may hurt to read that as a Duck fan, but for the good of the rivalries, and in the interest of competitiveness, this is a good thing. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt, but it will make the passion and hate even greater going forward.
Stock Down: Joe Lorig
Coming into this season, it was no secret that Oregon’s special teams game needed great improvement. Dan Lanning brought in Joe Lorig, the special team’s coordinator for the Penn State Nittany Lions, to try and overhaul the unit and turn it into a successful bunch.
Ahead of the season when interviewed about the change that was needed, Lorig was blunt, to be completely honest. He spoke about how bad the unit was under the previous coaching staff, and profused that things would be different under his staff. Every day at practice, we saw special teams act as the No. 1 thing that the team worked on after stretching each day.
A lot of good it’s done them.
At the end of the regular season, Oregon still has one of the worst special teams units in the nation. They rank No. 116 in kick-off return defense, No. 109 in kick-off returns, No. 116 in net punting, and No. 116 in punt defense.
That ain’t great.
On Saturday, the special teams miscues can largely be blamed for the loss. We saw a blocked punt, as well as a muffed punt that gave the Beavers the ball on the 2-yard line, giving Oregon State the chance to make it a 3-point game in the fourth quarter. We also saw a 48-yard kick-off return from Oregon State that set up a scoring drive, as well as a botched kick-return from Kris Huston that gave Oregon the ball at the 10-yard line in the 4th quarter.
Did you get all of that?
Whichever way you want to look at it, the special teams unit was awful on Saturday. That may be excusable if it was a one-off instance, but it’s been awful all year. I’m not sure what needs to change, but something’s got to give this off-season.
116 KOR defense
116 net punting
116 punt defense
