While the dream of an undefeated season came crashing down in shocking fashion for the formerly #2 ranked Oregon Ducks last Thursday night, all is not lost. Well, not yet, at least.
For the second week in a row, the Oregon football team has looked like a shell of its former self. Typically a team built around a dominant running game, an opportunistic defense, and a dedication to precision second to none, this season’s incarnation has excelled in precisely none of those aspects.
Even the “dominating” performances against the likes of lowly South Dakota and Wyoming seemed oddly precarious for far longer than expected, even if the scoreboard eventually said otherwise.
While the victory over Michigan State was a great example of what this team could be, it has been the outlier, much more so than the rule. A few weeks later, after a closer than it should have been win over Washington State and a lackluster home performance against a thoroughly mediocre Arizona team, this Ducks squad looks a lot more like one of a half dozen or so talented, but fatally flawed teams that make up the middle of the conference, than the preseason favorite it was supposed to be.
While even the best teams in Oregon football history have had their moments of mortality (see Cal: 2010), this year it’s been different. Once is a fluke, twice is a trend. We’ll likely find out by Saturday evening if this trend becomes a reality, or if this team has intestinal fortitude to buck that trend and turn their season around.
Luckily for the Ducks, the football gods seem to be on their side, for the moment at least. Things around college football are shaping up very similar to 2007, when after a flurry of upsets, a two loss LSU team emerged as the #2 ranked team and eventual BCS Champions. You may also recall that season, the Ducks rallied from an early season conference loss behind their leading Heisman Trophy candidate quarterback to storm back into contention. (We’ll try to ignore how that ended, though. Thanks.)
The point being that with so many of the top preseason contenders having also already suffered a loss, and a plethora of top 10 showdowns still remaining on the schedule, it seems unlikely that we have more than one undefeated team when the dust settles.
The more parity around the nation, the more likely the selection committee is going to simply choose the champions of what they perceive to be the four top conferences. At this point, that appears to be the SEC, Pac-12, Big XII and ACC (sorry, Big 10).
The committee has already stated that they will put an emphasis on conference champions, and with the SEC already starting to cannibalize itself, it’s getting tougher and tougher to imagine an unblemished SEC champ. If that’s the case, it’s going to be hard to justify a two loss SEC runner-up as more deserving than a one (or, even two) loss champion of another conference.
So, while the dream of an undefeated season may be over for the Ducks, everything else is still (technically) on the table.
This is a time when we will really get to see what these Ducks are made of. For the first time in years, they will be forced to win games with more than skill, speed and precision. For every game remaining on their schedule, the Ducks will have to out-work, out-hustle and out-scrap their opponents.
The fact everyone else in the North Division has already suffered a loss as well, means that the Ducks, despite their current struggles, still control their own destiny in their fight to earn a spot in the Pac-12 Championship Game. And, if they can somehow pull this all together and win the Pac-12, they still stand a great shot at being selected to play in the inaugural College Football Playoff.
Even if they don’t get selected, a Pac-12 Championship (a prize that has eluded this team for the past two seasons) is nothing to sneeze at. That should be the primary goal at this point, as it is the only goal they have any control over.
However, before any talk of division, conference, or national championships continues, they are going to have to improve dramatically over what they’ve showed the past two weeks. That starts this Saturday in Pasadena, against a UCLA team who has had a very similar start to season as the Ducks. They looked great in their one marquee matchup (against Arizona State), struggled way more than they should in their other wins, and suffered an inexplicable home loss to an what most consider an inferior opponent last weekend.
One team is going to come out victorious, claiming a huge win over a ranked conference foe, and possibly providing a springboard for which they can use to salvage their season. The other is going to find itself dangerously close to being eliminated from even winning their respective division, a mere three games into the conference slate.
Desperation often brings characteristics out of people and teams which you never knew existed. This goes for both the good and the bad. This Saturday we’ll see two extremely talented teams who have championship expectations, pitted against each other, with their entire seasons on the line. There will be more desperation in the air than last call at Taylor’s on a Saturday night.
While that may be an unnerving (and unusual) place to be sitting as a Ducks fan this early in the season, it will definitely add a heavy dose of excitement and intrigue leading up to kickoff, two things that have all but disappeared during the Ducks latest run of dominance. Considering all that’s still left on the table for this Ducks team that still qualifies as something to get excited about.
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