The Herald’s weekly Duck football commentary: It’s underwhelming once again — Oregon 41, Arizona 19

By LLOYD PASEMAN/For The Herald — Yes, the opening Pac-12 conference win over the Wildcats extended Oregon’s home winning streak to 15 games. Yes, Oregon is now 4-0 to start the season for the first time since 2014. Yes, the Ducks are 18-1 at home under head coach Mario Cristobal. And, yes, Oregon remains No. 3 nationwide in the Associated Press poll released Sunday and moved up to No. 3 from No. 4 in the USA Today coaches’ poll.

Despite the three-TD margin of victory, though, it was another underwhelming win Saturday for the Ducks that came on the heels of their wildly uneven 48-7 defeat of New York-based Stony Brook a week earlier.

Statistically, except for the final score, Arizona—which has now lost 16 straight games going back to a 51-27 thrashing by Washington in October 2019—topped the Ducks in almost every category.

The Wildcats beat the Ducks on first downs (31 to 17, with twice as many first downs rushing and 13 to 9 first downs passing), net yards rushing (202 to 187—Arizona averaged 79 yards rushing in its previous three games), rushing attempts (53 to 31), net yards passing (233 to 206), passing attempts (35 to 24), passing completions (21 to 10), total offense (435 yards to 393), total plays (88 to 55), touchbacks (4 to 1), possession time (just shy of 38 minutes to Oregon’s 22 minutes), fourth-down conversions (4 for 4 to the Ducks’ 0 for 1), and quarterback sacks (2 to 1). Arizona even bested the Ducks on kickoffs, with an average of 65 yards to Oregon’s 64 yards.

But it was turnovers, including five Duck pass interceptions, that essentially decided the game by producing 17 of the final 22 points difference in the score. The first interception, at the Arizona 23-yard line, resulted in a 21-yard FG by kicker Camden Lewis; the second came early in the second quarter and led to an Oregon TD after an 80-yard drive downfield, and the final one was run back 68 yards for a TD by junior safety Bennett Williams about halfway through the fourth quarter.

Kudos to the Duck pass defenders, but it should be noted that the Wildcats’ sophomore QB, Jordan McCloud, making his first start at Arizona, had transferred from South Florida during the summer and missed Arizona’s spring training camp. Although occasionally chased out of the pocket by Duck pass rushers, he completed 21 of his 35 passes Saturday for 223 yards and a TD in addition to rushing for 64 yards—and apparently has won Arizona’s starting QB spot for the rest of the season.

After the game, Cristobal told reporters the Wildcats’ offense was “on the field for 80-plus plays, which is way too much. We’ve got to do a better job controlling the football . . . We want to play complete games and we haven’t played our best football yet.”

Arizona first-year head coach Jedd Fisch took the loss philosophically: “One of the things we talk about all the time is before you learn how to win, you’ve got to keep from losing. When you turn the ball over five times and commit nine penalties [for 111 yards], that’s what’s going to happen.”

By the way, Oregon’s 24 first-half points was its first-half season high thus far.

The Good

 Pass interceptions

Bennett Williams, who had the 68-yard interception returned for a TD, also had an earlier interception in the first quarter. Sophomore safety Verone McKinley III, sophomore cornerback Mykael Wright and senior inside linebacker Nate Heaukulani each had one interception. McKinley had made three previous interceptions this season. It was the Ducks’ first five-interception game since getting six against California in 1999. The single-game school record for interceptions is seven, picked off in 1949.

Noah Sewell

The freshman inside linebacker swarmed all over the field Saturday and led all defenders with 14 tackles. The only blemish on his performance was a 15-yard penalty in the third quarter for roughing the passer.

CJ Verdell

The junior RB carried the ball 11 times for 45 yards and a TD, which moved him into sixth place on Oregon’s all-time career rushing list with 2,866 yards, ahead of Terrance Whitehead. His 26 career rushing TDs ties him for eighth all-time with De’Anthony Thomas.

The only question about Verdell’s performance Saturday is why he didn’t get more rushing opportunities—QB Anthony Brown led all Duck rushers with 12 carries.

Travis Dye

The junior RB netted 92 yards on five carries while also catching a pass for 22 yards. Late in the first quarter to broke away for a 53-yard run, the longest of his career (he had a 49-yard gain vs. Portland State in 2018).

Amazingly, Dye, who at 5-feet 10-inches and 190 pounds and one of the fastest runners on the team, was chased down with about five minutes left in the first quarter and tackled at the Wildcats’ 11-yard line by Arizona’s Christian Young, a “viper” (defensive end/linebacker/safety) who is a 6-feet 3-inches, 217-pound junior.

Arizona standouts

In addition to McCloud, other Wildcats who impressed Saturday were sophomore RB Drake Anderson, who had 21 carries for a net 67 yards and one TD; sophomore RB Michael Wiley, who had 15 carries for 63 yards, and redshirt junior WR Stanley Berryhill III, who had 11 receptions for 75 yards.

The ESPN announcers

Play-by-play announcer David Flemming and analyst Rodney Gilmore did a superlative job calling Saturday’s game. They were observant, incisive and focused solely on the game instead of wisecracking and blathering on about unrelated topics, as many sports broadcast teams are prone to do.

Flemming currently works as a play-by-play announcer for the San Francisco Giants baseball team as well as handling college football, college basketball and Monday Night Baseball on ESPN.

Gilmore is a graduate of the University of California law school at Berkeley. He is a Stanford graduate (and alumni association board member) who played defensive back for the Cardinal football team for three years. He’s a partner in a Silicon Valley law firm and has worked for ABC and ESPN since 1996.

Cristobal’s post-game news conferences

Unlike some of his UO predecessors and other college football coaches around the nation, Cristobal has been generally forthcoming in his dealings with the news media. For example, the transcript of his post-game interview with reporters after Saturday’s game is about 2,000 words. He also meets midweek each week with reporters.

The Beavers beat the Trojans

Oregon State’s game against the University of Southern California was broadcast simultaneous to the Duck game Saturday night, on Fox Sports 1. Neither team was ranked in the Top 25 nationally. The Beavers upset USC 45-27, defeating them at the Coliseum in Los Angeles for the first time since 1960 and adding a bit of spice to conjectures about the pending Duck-Beaver “rivalry” game on Thanksgiving weekend.

 The Bad

The Ducks

Nearly everyone—coaches, players, reporters—acknowledged after Saturday’s game that the Ducks had underperformed for the second straight week after their attention-grabbing defeat of then-No. 3 Ohio State 35-28 on Sept. 11.

Cristobal said after the game, “You’ve got to understand if you have got a chance to really take the momentum, you’ve got to take it because all these teams have really good football players and if you allow a team to continually make plays and get in there you can find yourself in a dogfight. Credit to Arizona and their coaches and their players. They played a real tough game.

“But in the fourth quarter is when we felt we finally took control of the game and closed it out.”

The Oregonian reporter James Crepea was less generous: “For the second time in as many weeks, Oregon played down to its vastly overmatched and inferior opponent. Only this time, the No. 3 Ducks kept around an Arizona team that had lost 15 straight games dating back 721 days in a one-score game with less than nine minutes to play.”

QB Anthony Brown

After leaving the Stony Brook game at halftime following two sacks toward the end of the second quarter, Brown was stuffed two times by Arizona, once in the second quarter for a loss of three yards and again in the third quarter for a loss of four yards and a two-point safety. But he passed for 206 yards and three TDs on 21 attempts in addition to rushing for 41 yards.

The fact that Brown carried the ball more times than did Verdell or Dye prompted the ESPN broadcast crew (and me) to question whether the Duck QB should be running the ball so often himself, or at least more often than Verdell.

Brown is the only experienced QB on Oregon’s team; all three of his backups are freshmen (one, Ty Thompson, played the second half against Stony Brook). Brown transferred to Oregon last season after playing three seasons for Boston College, where he sustained season-ending knee injuries in two of those seasons.

Duck QB Justin Herbert missed five games in the 2017 season after breaking a collarbone on a short-yardage run near the end zone. Oregon, which finished 7-6 that year, lost four of the five games Herbert was out. I’m reminded of that, and Brown’s previous injuries, every time he carries the ball.

It was also a bit startling to see Brown keep the ball on an option play instead of pitching it to a wide-open Verdell on third-and-goal early in the first quarter. He was stopped for no gain and the Ducks settled for a FG by Camden Lewis.

Asked about that after the game, Cristobal agreed Brown should have tossed the ball to Verdell “but he tried to make a play. He’s made some really good decisions with that before. That was one I know he’d like to have back. Our run game, we do involve the quarterback a lot . . . We run the quarterback. He’s a big guy. He’s a physical guy. And he likes it. It gets him going, so it’s certainly part of our game.”

COVID-19 face masks

First announced in August, the UO policy regarding pandemic protocols remains: “All guests ages 5 and over are required to wear face coverings in all areas of all athletics venues, per direction from Lane County Public Health.”

There was a sprinkling of masks apparent in Saturday’s crowd—more than were visible during the Stony Brook game—but it’s clear that the vast majority of Autzen Stadium fans continue to ignore the mask requirement, at their and everyone else’s peril.

Late night games on TV

The Pac-12 had six football games scheduled Saturday, with four beginning at 6:30 p.m. or later. Which prompted Oregonian reporter Ken Goe to remark that scheduling a night game on the West Coast means “the only people awake to see it in New York or Philadelphia are insomniacs or gambling addicts.”

Which may help explain how the Ducks have been able to keep their No. 3 ranking despite two consecutive sub-par performances against weak opponents.

More universal viewing shouldn’t be a problem for this week’s Stanford game, however. It will be broadcast at 12:30 p.m. on ABC-TV.

 The Questionable

Kayvon Thibodeaux

The highly rated third-year sophomore defensive end entered Saturday’s game at the end of the Wildcats’ second drive but didn’t record any tackles. It was his first time back on the field since spraining his left ankle in the first half of the Ducks’ win over Fresno State in the season opener.

He left Saturday’s game before halftime after appearing to land awkwardly at the end of a play. He remained on the sideline in the second half, wearing a pair of basketball shoes.

Cristobal said after the game that Thibodeaux had been scheduled to participate in only six to 10 plays and didn’t re-aggravate his ankle injury, adding, “We really feel good about how he is going to be for this upcoming week.”

Closing out the game with pass plays

Leading by 22 points with less than a minute to go in the game and the ball on Arizona’s 43-yard line, Oregon Offensive Coordinator Joe Moorhead called for three pass plays—all of which were incomplete—among the Ducks’ final four plays. Those plays took 22 seconds off the clock and when Arizona took over on downs, it ran one rushing play in the final 24 seconds.

Asked why Oregon didn’t just run out the clock, Cristobal said, “I think sometimes people misunderstand play-calling late in the game. We don’t have many opportunities to get these young guys [in this case, QB Ty Thompson] reps. That is the only reason we are running those plays and being aggressive.  . . . I know a lot of times when you have a game like that you may just sit on the ball and run it out, but these are opportunities—live football against some good football players—that we want to take advantage of.”

So I guess Duck coaches weren’t just trying to run up the score against an inferior opponent, which is what it looked like?

Kicker Camden Lewis

The sophomore kicker made two FGs of 21 and 43 yards, plus five PATs. But only one of his nine kickoffs was a touchback preventing a kick return. Arizona returned the other eight for 151 yards, an average of 19 yards each. Lewis kicked five touchbacks on nine kickoffs against Stony Brook.

 The Ugly

 Penalties

After averaging just under 80 yards per game in penalties in their first three games, the Duck were flagged nine times for 95 yards on Saturday. Two of the penalties were particularly egregious, including Sewell’s roughing the passer penalty.

The other foul came in the second quarter after freshman WR Kris Hutson caught a 29-yard sideline pass from Brown. After the play stopped, Hutson turned to look at his defender, dropped the ball so it would spin on the turf, then folded his arms at glared at the Arizona player.

The 15-yard penalty pushed the ball from the Arizona 48-yard line back to the Oregon 37-yard line and derailed Oregon’s final possession of the half, which ended with two incomplete passes.

To say Cristobal was livid would be an understatement. He walked onto the field, yelled at Hutson, removed his headset and slammed it to the ground. After the game, he called the infraction “selfish” and said it was “a penalty that we need to avoid and can’t have.”

Lloyd Paseman is a graduate of Crow High School and the University of Oregon. He was an all-state B League quarterback in his senior year in high school when his team, the Cougars, finished 6-1 on the season. He’s lived all but two years of his life in Lane County, with two years out for U.S. Army service, and retired from The Register-Guard as a local news editor after nearly 40 years. Paseman’s analysis is provided as a service for the many Duck fans in Highway 58 communities who can no longer find such expert commentary in their local print newspapers.