If it’s ever going to happen, it will be in the next 3-4 years. The window of dynasty and dominance opens only for a brief and undefinable time in a college football program. It’s an elusive mixture of the right coach collecting strong foundational players, developed by a capable staff and supported by a fervent fanbase. It takes location, image, promotion, planning and luck. You have to escape the wrath of the NCAA and the encroachment of complacency. A dream doesn’t endure forever, but while it does, the magical glow of possibility lights everything in its path. The glow of winning a Rose Bowl will last until kickoff next fall.
Photo left: Oregon comes up in every conversation about national title contenders. To stay there, they have to work their program and live the mantra.
Here’s Oregon’s checklist for football immortality:
1. Retain the brain
Chip Kelly is the perfect coach for this program at this stage of its road to the football pinnacle. He’s driven, passionate and laser-sharp in his focus. He creates a compelling message and gets a 100% commitment from his team. Kelly has a clear vision and coaches to it impeccably. The scheme, the system, the evaluation and preparation are fiercely executed for one purpose: winning the day. He’s made it more than an empty slogan. It’s the way of life in the Oregon program, and it works.
What’s mind-boggling is this: while he certainly took over a team that was in fine shape, this is his third recruiting class, set to sign on February 1st. Only now is he beginning to assemble a team of his players recruited for his philosophy. The talent, energy and character he’s stockpiling in Eugene is powerful.
If Kelly can fend off the overtures of the NFL, Oregon stands to have him for another five fabulous years. If they do, they stand to be five incredible years of college football, fast, entertaining and beautifully, wonderfully competitive. Without him, the clock starts over. The Webfoots may recruit a very capable coach from within, or entice a very good one from around the country, but Chip Kelly leaving introduces an unsettling f-bomb of uncertainty into an impeccable vision of excellence. Maintain the brain, and the body thrives.
2. Turn young two young guns into one cool hand
The quarterback situation will sort itself out. With two supremely qualified candidates, Kelly, Helfrich, Frost and Greatwood will have no trouble selecting and grooming the right one to operate the potent Oregon offense. Marcus Mariota told Rob Moseley of the Register-Guard this week what he learned watching Darron Thomas was that the quarterback’s chief job in this offense was to get the ball to the playmakers. Both Bennett and Mariota have the ability and smarts to do that very well.
That said, one of them has to win the job. Seize it. Establish themselves as the leader and the man, in terms of being comfortable, in terms of showing their teammates they can handle the pressure and take the shots Thomas used to take every weekend. DT had his detractors, but he also had 23 wins and 66 touchdown passes. Dipped in hot water Bennett or Mariota have to deliver the full flavor and the pleasing aroma of victory. They have to be prepared and consistent, increasing their command of the offense enough by game eight to be ready for this year’s Game of the Century.
3. It’s Kenjon’s team now
With a new quarterback, the Ducks will need leadership and a steady, mature voice within the team. Thomas, Asper, James and Paulson are all gone. Poised, articulate and a gifted football player, Kenjon Barner is the natural choice to be the voice and the focal point of this team. They’ll have other weapons, including a fully-unleashed De’Anthony Thomas, but Barner is the tailback, the bread and butter of the offense, the reliable, consistent, experienced center of the attack. He’ll be the go-to interview and the go-to guy, and he has the maturity and ability to handle both roles with supreme grace. Duck fans will say thank juju he came back.
4. Dion becomes a prime time player
Ted Miller named Dion Jordan as one his two most-improved players on defense in 2011. The most crucial and devastating injury of Oregon’s season was probably Jordan missing three quarters of the USC game. Unable to get adequate pressure on Barkley, he feasted on the young secondary, the SC quarterback enjoying the upset so much that he decided to return for his senior year.
Like Barner on the offense, Jordan is the engine of his unit. If he continues on his improvement curve and makes himself into a first-three-rounds NFL draft pick, becoming the complete package at defensive end with athletic ability and every-down determination, he can be a disruptive force on the field that will spearhead Oregon’s defense. A fierce pass rush instaneously improves the secondary. It forces opponents into bad situations and bad decisions. If Jordan achieves double-digit sacks, he becomes a weapon opposing offensive coordinators have to account for and makes the entire defensive line and defensive scheme vastly more effective. Dion Jordan could have a breakout year on top of a very good junior year. If he does, the Oregon defense, already very good and seriously underrated, takes a leap forward into intimidating.
5. A young Colt matures into a stud
In a part-time role due to a mid-season injury and a stalwart in front of him, Colt Lyerla had a good beginning to his Oregon career. He caught 7 passes for 147 yards, and five of those went for touchdowns, flashing big-play potential by averaging an impressive 21.0 yards per catch, particularly impressive because his longest play went for a 39-yard touchdown.
Lyerla has good hands and loads of ability, and with David Paulson gone, he’s the heir apparent to continue Oregon’s tradition at tight end. 6-5 238 with a 40-inch vertical leap, he’s a superb physical specimen with unlimited gifts. The challenge for him is to replace Paulson’s consistency and knowledge of the offense. It would be unfair to expect a sophomore to be the kind of mature leader the senior was, but he has to meet or exceed his productivity (Paulson 31 catches, 438 yards, 6 tds) and also be the kind of dependable blocker he was downfield. LaMichael James had 34 runs of 30 yards or more in his Oregon career, and a lot of them featured a key block by David Paulson. Lyerla has to fill that role now. He has to know where he’s supposed to be on every play, execute and stay healthy. He can become a great player.
It’s especially important because a tall, reliable target at tight end is a great comfort factor for a young quarterback. At the goal line, Mariota and Bennett throw fade-type routes very well, and Lyerla might be a potent target for them.
6. Josh Huff pours out the good stuff
Josh Huff had a brilliant freshman year. He was a big-play threat running, passing and returning kicks, a mainstay of Oregon’s drive to a 12-0 regular season and the national championship game. As a sophomore Huff battled injuries, including a stress fracture that hampered him all season, but he still turned in some very good games and key plays. He broke loose for 59-yard touchdown against Stanford and caught five balls against USC, but was a forgotten man at times.
Huff has a chiseled body and runs tough after the catch. He’s talented and explosive. He has to improve his consistency: sometimes the Oregon junior-to-be makes an unbelievably tough catch in traffic but will drop a ball that hits him in the stomach. A year of good health and a recommitment to good fundamentals would make the Houston, Texas product a focal point of the offense next season and the natural leader of a young receiver group. But Huff has to establish himself, practice well and have a durable, consistent season where he puts it together. He’s a sensitive kid with a tendency to brood or get down on himself. Huff has an NFL body at slot receiver if he becomes the player he can be. With a new quarterback and Lavasier Tunei graduated, Oregon needs him to become that player now.
7. O-time for the O-line
The Ducks lose Mark Asper, Darrion Weems and Ramsen Golpashin from an offensive line that piledrived the Ducks to 645 points and 7300 yards of offense in 2011. The group that remains, however, has awesome size, strength and agility, joined by four redshirt freshman and junior college transfer Kyle Long. Steve Greatwood’s group will be deep, smart and athletic, fully capable of continuing the offensive tradition of Oregon’s spread offense, anchored by returning starters Carson York, Nick Cody and Hroniss Grasu. York has to recover from a ruptured patella he suffered in the Rose Bowl. As a group, the line must take good advantage of four tuneup games at the beginning of the season to become a cohesive and efficient unit.
Again, as Mike Bellotti would say, with a new quarterback, consistency on the offensive line becomes even more important. The Ducks need fewer negative plays, keeping their new starter at qb in as few max-pressure situations as possible. They must protect him well and give him time to make good decisions. Good work by the offensive line fosters the rhythm, tempo and efficiency the Oregon offense thrives on. Penetration and disruption destroys that timing. The flash and style gets everyone’s attention, but the pounding, every-down dirty work up front makes it all possible. Andre Y. and Tyler J., welcome to Autzen Stadium. Their huge holes and crisp pancakes will trigger the full-throttle roars of 2012. By USC, this group has to be prepared for a war, a clash of Top Five teams. Oregon can’t win in The Coliseum without a superb performance by Grasu, York, Cody, Clanton, Fisher and their partners on the two-deep.
8. Duck linebackers create more mayhem than the All-State Guy
Michael Clay, Kiko Alonso and Bo Lokombo may be the most athletic swarming linebackers Oregon has ever had. They are all three big-time playmakers who have shined in big games with picks, sacks, big stops and turnovers, and their emergence in 2012 could make this a fierce and attacking defense. Don Pellum needs to coach up some depth behind them, as freshmen Rodney Hardrick and Tyson Coleman had discipline issues last season, Anthony Wallace predictably struggled as a true freshman, and Derrick Malone is still working on growing into a bigger role in the rotation. Bryce Cottrell, a verbal commitment from Plano, Texas, has the size and athleticism at 6-3, 230 to contribute as a true freshman.
Pursuing, opportunistic, blitzing linebackers are the key to Nick Aliotti’s fly-to-the-football defense. Oregon has a great foundation in this group, but health and depth are concerns. Alonso has to build on his Rose Bowl MVP performance. Lokombo has sparkled as a special teamer and rotation player with a knack for the big play (three career defensive touchdowns) but now he has to be the full-time starter. Clay has had brilliant freshman and sophomore years with the Ducks, amassing 102 tackles this last season despite missing three games, including 11 against Stanford, 12 versus USC, 12 in the Civil War, and 13 at the Rose Bowl. Now it’s time for him to emerge as the leader of the defense, a role he’ll share with rawhide-tough safety John Boyett.
9. Unleash The Black Mamba
It was one of the most stunning and remarkable freshman seasons in the history of NCAA football. De’Anthony Thomas scored 18 touchdowns, averaging a td every 6.3 times he touched the ball on offense, compiling 2235 all-purpose yards despite not being the feature player in his offense. In fact, intentionally or not, Chip Kelly kept The Mamba largely under wraps this season, limiting him to 5-7 touches per game, even in the Rose Bowl Championship where DAT blasted for 314 total yards, including touchdown runs of 91 and 64 yards on his only two carries.
In 2012, assuming a dire prediction by the Mayans doesn’t interrupt the season, expect Oregon’s scintillating speedster to be on the field for 15-20 touches a game, driving defensive coordinators crazy as Mark Helfrich lines him up in a variety of roles that force the opponent to account for him every play. DAT will take plays at tailback, trail on the pitch as the third back, come around on options and reverses, line up wide as a receiver. Each time the defense will scramble to find where he is and account for him. The misdirection among the other potent weapons in the offense will create mismatches and confusion. The Mamba is the deadliest snake in nature. De’Anthony Thomas is a bolt of lightning in football cleats. If he stays healthy and Oregon achieves everything they could in his sophomore year, he and Kenjon Barner will both figure prominently in a fascinating Heisman race.
10. Time for the Fleet Four to show yesterday’s fast the door
Rahsaan Vaughn, Devon Blackmon, B.J. Kelley and Tacoi Sumler came to Oregon with a tremendous amount of anticipation and acclaim. Duck fans have watched with interest as receiver coach Scott Frost worked with the group at the Autzen pregame, viewed their highlight videos with relish, and suffered a little disappointment when the group didn’t figure prominently in the Ducks’ plan for 2011. The three freshman redshirted, and Vaughn, a junior college transfer with two years to play, a 1000-yard receiver at College of San Mateo the year before, played sparingly, getting acclimated slowly after a promising fall camp.
These four, combined with a couple of strong-armed quarterbacks, could give Oregon’s offense a new/old dimension as they prepare to defend their three-time conference championship. Remember Michigan in the Big House, when Dennis Dixon dazzled and befuddled the Wolverine defense, going up top for three long touchdowns? Remember 2010, and Jeff Maehl and company striking time and again with the Fake Bubble Screen/Four Verticals dagger into the heart of the defense? Bennett and Mariota can sling the rock, and these four can get open and catch it. The Ducks could stretch defenses in every direction if these four realize their potential in 2012. Bet they do. [Visit our player profiles tab for video and a scouting report on each of these receivers–ed.]
11. Beat USC, probably twice.
Make no mistake: Chip Kelly’s Ducks will focus properly on every opponent and every goal. Beating USC means nothing if they don’t beat Washington, Cal and Stanford along the way. They have to be 8-0 for that November 3rd game to mean what it’s supposed to. But the matchup with the Trojans is the culmination of a season of sustained effort. If the individual players and position groups discussed here do their work, they’ll have the talent and the discipline to beat a formidable USC team and the senior quarterback. There aren’t any shortcuts to getting there or achieving that. But to make the National Championship Game, Oregon has to go 13-0. They have to beat SC twice, once in L.A. and once in Autzen in the PAC-12 Championship Game. With their soft early season schedule, that’s the only reliable way to make it to the BCS final.
12. Pay utterly no attention to the National Championship talk
What’s worked for Oregon is the foundation of their success: this is a team that treats each day of practice and each game on the schedule as the most important goal of the season. Driven perfectly by their coach, they have been fiercely process oriented, resisting the temptation to grow over confident or look ahead or become complacent. They can’t be thinking about national championships or post season awards or a showdown with USC. None of those things are possible without a focus on each day of business.
The leadership on this team, Kenjon Barner, Carson York, Michael Clay, Dion Jordan and John Boyett, will continue to set the example and remember that lesson. They’ll speak that message into every microphone between now and November.
To win a national championship, a team has to remember there is only one way to win one: talent, opportunity, execution, and hard work. Talk never won nothin’.
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
