There’s nothing quite like the first weekend of a football season, for fans, players and coaches alike. After months of preparation and anticipation, the openings game signifies the official transition from theory to reality. We may think we know who the best teams, players and units are, but, until that opening kickoff, we don’t really know anything.
At least, that’s the conventional wisdom. But, how much do we really know after one week? Sure, we finally get our first chance to truly evaluate how new players play, how new coaches coach, and whether or not all the rumblings and rumors coming out of offseason preparations hold any weight whatsoever. But, with so much natural turnover on every sideline of every college team across the country (not to mention the general volatility of 18-22 year old males), what can we really tell from one game?
You have to look at every result and every statistic from Week 1 with a giant mountain of salt. Was what you saw because one team was that good, or because the other team is that bad? Was this a one game aberration or a sign of things to come? Is it time to invest in champagne bottles or heart meds?
Of course, while it can be dangerous to attempt to glean too much from the opening weekend, it can also be equally foolish to just completely brush over that first performance if it doesn’t perfectly jibe with your preseason expectations. As, always, the truth typically lies somewhere in the middle. And, with that in mind, let’s cover the whole gamut and make irrational over-reactions alongside thick-headed under-reactions rafter watching the Ducks eventful opening week 61-42 victory over Eastern Washington. Specifically, we’ll look at the two units that had, shall-we-say, “explosive performances.” From there, we’ll attempt to apply a touch of level-headedness to find that happy median that just may provide some real insight.
Or, you know, maybe not. But, what sportswriter ever let something as minor as “reality” or “usefulness” stop them from a running with some fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants analysis? Not this one, that’s for sure!
The Offense
Over-Reaction: This is the greatest offense ever. No, seriously. They could legitimately average 60 points per game! Sure, Eastern Washington is a FCS team, but, they are a very good FCS team. But, that’s not really here nor there. The point is that, with Vernon Adams at the helm, the Ducks were absolutely unstoppable. If it weren’t for a fluke fumble during a scramble, the Ducks offense would have been a perfect 12-for-12, scoring points on every possession it had. And, not only that, they did it without 3 of their best playmakers at wide receiver, with Charles Nelson, Devon Allen and Darren Carrington all sitting out for various reasons. All three are expected to return in the coming weeks, which will only make this ridiculous offense more potent and more difficult to defend. And, we haven’t even mentioned Royce Freeman and the running backs, yet! But, the most incredible thing, though, is that this was only Adams’ third week in the system. Imagine how good he’ll be after he really starts to develop some chemistry with all those weapons. Un-stop-able.
Under-Reaction: Yeah, they put up 60 points, but, that’s what you’re supposed to do against FCS teams. And, while Eastern Washington is good, they’re not known for having a lock-down defense. Plus, it’s not like the Ducks were scoring at will, breaking off 80-yard plays at will like you’re playing Madden on Rookie. And, remember, while Adams looked solid, he was going against a defense that he saw every day in practice for 3 years. If he didn’t pick them apart, then something is seriously wrong. Remember, this offense is tailor-made for dominating overmatched opponents. Even Justin Roper looked like a superstar in the making after one game. Once teams saw some game film and were able to adjust, he was exposed as mediocre at best. Until we see Adams perform at a high level against a few “legit” teams, we still have no idea if he’s capable of leading this team to the top of the conference.
Happy Median: While it’s certainly true that Eastern Washington isn’t exactly a measuring-stick defense, you simply can’t ignore the kind the machine-like marches down the field the Oregon offense made, each and every time they had the ball. That’s not something middle-of-the-road offenses do. Even top offenses against the dregs of the FCS are usually forced to punt once or twice. Someone drops a pass or misses a block on 3rd down. It may not be time to crown this incarnation of the Ducks blur offense as the “best ever,” or even “Mariota-esque,” but, it’s obvious that they will be able to score points, and that losing their Heisman winning QB wasn’t exactly catastrophic to the program. We’ll know a lot more after this weekend’s showdown with Michigan State’s typically stout defense, but, rest assured, this offense will certainly put up points this year. It just remains to be seen if they will put up enough points. That’s because…
The Defense
Over-Reaction: Let’s not sugar-coat this. The Oregon Ducks defense is bad. Putrid, really. Like, middle-of-the-road in the Big Sky, would be lucky to hold most Pac-12 teams under half-a-hundred terrible. It’s not just that they gave up 42 points to an FCS team, it’s how they gave them up. Missed tackles galore, little-to-no pressure on the quarterback, open receivers all over the field, and nary a red zone stop. All this against a team who averaged 44 points per game last season in the lower-division FCS. That means that this Ducks defense is, roughly, an average FCS defense. And, that’s EWU with all-everything, two-time Walter Payton Award (the “FCS Heisman”) runner-up Vernon Adams at the helm, not these no-name backups. And, it’s not just the results, it’s the lack of creativity in the schemes and the lack of passion being shown by the players. That speaks to not just poor, but incompetent coaching. This isn’t a conference title contender, let alone a national title contender. Sure, the offense will be able to bail them out more often than not, but, with the talent on this team, winning 8 or 9 games isn’t acceptable. And, frankly, that seems like ceiling for a team with this porous of defense.
Under-Reaction: Yes, 42 points to a FCS team isn’t good. However, if you knew anything about Eastern Washington, you wouldn’t be all that surprised. This is a very well-coached team, with quarterbacks that some Pac-12 teams would kill for, and a future NFL star in Cooper Kupp on the outside. Just like you don’t “shut down” the Oregon offense, you don’t “shut down” EWU, either. Just ask Oregon State and Washington. Plus, with the big intersectional matchup with Michigan State coming up this weekend, the Ducks played a completely vanilla defense. They rarely blitzed or even changed up their defense, not because of some sort of lack of football understanding, but, because they wanted to limit the amount of game film the Spartans had to study. This was the college football equivalent of the rope-a-dope. On top of that, can you really fault a bunch of teenagers for not getting up for an FCS opponent? You’ll see a completely different team when the lights really come on next Saturday in East Lansing.
Happy Median: The defense did play very vanilla against an Eastern Washington attack that is brutally difficult to stop against predictable defensive playcalling. It’s true that they probably were looking ahead a little, attempting to keep an ace or two up the sleeve for upcoming games that will no doubt prove to be a bigger challenge. That being said, even taking all that into consideration, this was not a good performance. Not for a national title contender, and, frankly, not from a Pac-12 team. Beyond that, we saw a lot of the same problems as last year: poor pressure on the QB, poor tackling by veteran linebackers, and a seeming unwillingness to make appropriate in-game adjustments. Yet, while all this is disconcerting, it’s far from hopeless. They have a very young secondary that has been routinely praised as maybe the most talented group long-time defensive backs coach John Neal has ever had, and they will only get better as the season progresses. And, while the experienced front seven didn’t get nearly the kind of pressure you’d hope for against and FCS offensive line, EWU started 5 seniors on the o-line and employs the kind of quick-hitting passing attack that is specifically designed to thwart ferocious pass rushes. So, while we can probably squelch the idea of this Ducks defense being among the nation’s elite, it’s probably a bit too soon to completely write them off as a sieve.
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