Three takeaways from Oregon's road rout of Colorado
Oregon got creative when in scoring position, Bucky Irving topped 100 yards on the ground, Bo Nix hit the scoring trifecta, and the eighth-ranked Ducks cruised to a 49-10 win over Colorado on the road Saturday.
Most expected the Ducks to win. Many expected the result to be lopsided. Saturday afternoon inside Folsom Field was, in so many ways, exactly what we expected to get. The Buffs (1-8, 1-5 Pac-12) showed off some of the youngsters that provide a glimmer of hope in a lost season. The Ducks (8-1, 6-0 Pac-12) lit up the scoreboard once again, sending another message to the College Football Playoff selection committee that they have a multitude of ways they can hurt teams.
The Ducks have won eight straight, with 41 points or more in all of them. Here are three takeaways from the latest.
Style points could prove to be both helpful and hurtful
Oregon opened up at No. 8 in the initial College Football Playoff Rankings this past Tuesday. That was a win. If the Ducks keep winning, they’re going to remain in the conversation. The committee told us as such in placing them ahead of USC and every other one-loss team not named Alabama.
The goal down the stretch is going to be winning with style. The Ducks need to help balance out the ugly 49-3 loss to Georgia in the opener. It’s going to be held against them in the CFP conversation. (And it’s going to be held against quarterback Bo Nix in the Heisman conversation.)
So coming out and absolutely lighting up Colorado was necessary. But doing it the way Oregon did it certainly qualified as “winning with style.” Oregon’s first offensive touchdown was a beautiful design out of its jumbo package: a play that forces the defense to crash hard to the strong side before throwing back to an offensive lineman (!!!) on the backside.
Nix hit freshman offensive lineman Josh Conerly Jr. for his first career touchdown… on Conerly’s birthday no less.
🚨 BIG MAN TD 🚨
📺 ESPN
📱 https://t.co/QaOH16zYiO#Pac12FB | @oregonfootball pic.twitter.com/PpX14xuNzU— Pac-12 Conference (@pac12) November 5, 2022
On the Ducks’ next possession, Nix paid off a 13-play, 85-yard drive by catching a touchdown.
Bo Nix with the touchdown!…reception?@oregonfootball is getting creative with it 🤌
📺 ESPN
📱 https://t.co/QaOH16zYiO#Pac12FB pic.twitter.com/KGugDRsslz— Pac-12 Conference (@pac12) November 5, 2022
The Ducks’ third possession (an eight-play, 70-yard march) ended with linebacker Noah Sewell lining up as a fullback and plowing into the endzone from 1 yard out.
LB Noah Sewell rushes for a touchdown.
That’s not a sentence we thought we’d type out 🤯
📺 ESPN
📱 https://t.co/QaOH16zYiO#Pac12FB | @oregonfootball pic.twitter.com/qGYCBIm8sy— Pac-12 Conference (@pac12) November 5, 2022
In a game where Oregon didn’t need to roll out new gadget plays, it did. In doing so, it gives Washington and Utah a number of looks they’ll have to prepare for they might never see again. Or, as we’ve seen with offensive coordinator Kenny Dillingham this season, the Ducks will build sequentially off what they showed Saturday against Colorado and bring some new wrinkles to the field later.
Dillingham is proving himself invaluable this season. He’s been remarkable since the Week 1 loss. If the mandate is to pick up some style points, you’ve got to think coach Dan Lanning feels pretty confident having Dillingham as his right-hand guy.
The thing I couldn’t help but think about during the game, though: Colorado doesn’t have a head coach in place. CU athletic director Rick George got a pretty darn good look at a pretty darn good option on Saturday. If Dillingham is good enough for Auburn — where he’s been linked to since the Tigers fired coach Bryan Harsin this week — he’s more than good enough for Colorado.
Dillingham has been linked to Arizona State, too. Surely other jobs will come open in the coming months. If Oregon keeps winning and the offense keeps playing like this, Dillingham is going to continue to look more and more attractive as an option. It’s hard to imagine Dillingham, given what we’ve seen, sticking as an offensive coordinator for much longer unless he’s just really committed to Lanning and this Oregon program. (And he might be!)
To the touchdowns, Oregon fans will proudly say, “Dilly, dilly!” Maybe just put the Ducks on the Pac-12 Network going forward so the folks in Auburn can’t see them.
Bo Nix dazzles again
Nix’s day was done midway through the fourth. He finished with 274 passing yards and two touchdowns while completing 20 of his 24 attempts with no interceptions. He had nine rushing attempts for another 16 yards and two scores. And he had the 18-yard touchdown catch.
It was the fifth time in nine games Nix has produced five or more total touchdowns.
He’s not putting the football in danger, playing his sixth turnover-free game of the year.
He’s not getting sacked.
He’s not missing throws.
He’s playing at a Heisman level.
And it sets the Ducks up for a potentially memorable close to the year. Oregon gets three marquee games now — Washington, Utah, and Oregon State. The Huskies boast their own top-shelf offense and quarterback. Utah is Utah; Lanning won’t need to say anything to the group after the way things went last year. And Oregon State has one of the conference’s best secondaries.
Nix will have his chances over the next three weeks.
Colorado’s mistakes too much to overcome
The Buffaloes were already at a talent and a coaching disadvantage. They couldn’t afford to beat themselves, too. If they wanted a chance to topple the top-ranked team in the Pac-12, they needed to be clean.
They weren’t. Colorado turned the ball over three times. Oregon corner and former Buff Christian Gonzalez got two of them. The Buffs were 0-for-3 on fourth downs and 0-for-2 in the red zone. And they snapped the football every which direction but at the quarterback. There were at least five poor snaps that put the ball in danger. The last one ended in a turnover.
You saw what makes CU quarterback JT Shrout so intriguing; the arm strength is undeniable, but the decision-making is questionable at best. Shrout finished 17-for-34 for 247 yards, one score, and two interceptions. The Oregon secondary once again proved gettable — we still haven’t seen Oregon’s best game — but Shrout couldn’t fully take advantage. So it goes.
The Buffs fight for interim coach Mike Sanford. That’s a good sign. But they never threatened the Ducks on Saturday.