Send The Message

OK Ducks, now you're just showing off.

Just like in the old western movies, Oregon put Tennessee's dead body up over it's horse, pinned a note on it, and slapped the horse's butt to send it running back to the SEC ranch.

What did the note say? If you listened, you heard the Autzen crowd chanting it.

"WE WANT 'BAMA!  WE WANT 'BAMA! ...."

Or LSU, or Georgia, South Carolina, A & M . . . . We don't care. Send out your best. Send out someone who can play against us. Let's finish this.

59-14? Are you kidding? The Ducks coaching staff were left scratching their heads asking, "How did Tennessee ever score 14?".

The point spread was 28. Tennessee was hoping to keep it closer, maybe make it a game, a little bit of a struggle. Instead they got their worst defeat since 1910 -- back when people who were living are now all dead.
Pics from Oregonian and Daily Emerald

Say what?!?
Does somebody need to explain the definition of 'homecoming' to them?

I was really hoping the Vols would have given Oregon a better game. Indeed they came out hot to start, stopped Oregon's first drive, scored first, held Oregon to a rare field goal on their next drive. . . .

Then Oregon fired off eight touchdowns, including one on a 4th and 6 in the middle of the field.

Gotta be the shoes!
The Vols' Adidas failed against Nike U.

The Duck calls it as Huff cruises to the endzone.

 

March of the yellow hi-liters.



Gotta be the shoes 2.
Still not getting to Mariota.



Who will end up with the ball, DAT or Mariota?
Your guess is as good (or bad) as Tennessee's.

Taylor Hart: Yellow People Eater

DAT's fast. But good blocking makes him faster.

OK now that's just pretty.
Like a yellow daisy with an orange center.

Nope. Still not gettin' him.

DID THE DUCKS FIND THEIR GEHRIG?


Freshman Jon Mundt, #83. "The Mundster"

Oregon has a man-child for a third string tight end. True freshman John Mundt,  blasted his 6'4", 232 pound frame over poor defenseless defensive backs with just five catches for 121 yards and two touchdowns. He played in the absence of Colt Lyerla, who was out for unclear reasons (He's ill.  No, he's being punished.  He's
being punished for being ill . . . ???)
 
But as Columnist John Canzano tweeted: Colt Lyerla… meet Wally Pipp.
(For you young kids out there, Wally Pipp was a Yankee first baseman back in 1925 who sat out a game and. . . . Oh just google it, dumbasses.  I ain't your history teacher!)

OREGON HAS A DIFFERENT AND INNOVATIVE . . . DEFENSE?!?!?
Another surprise may have been brought to our attention by a Vol player. Just how especially good is Oregon's defense? Read this quote from the Oregonian:
Added Antonio “Tiny” Richardson, the Vols’ 6-foot-6, 327-pound left tackle, who is a preseason All-SEC lineman: “You know what, I don’t want to get too technical, but the defense they ran, it was tough on us. It was hard for us to get any angles, double teams. It was different.’’

What does he mean "different"?  What makes a guy who supposedly has seen the toughest defenses in the SEC and perhaps the nation get taken aback by Oregon's.

At around the 9 minute mark of the third quarter, the commentator begins to explain Oregon's defense. Oregon only has three or four linemen up front playing what he calls "2-gap" assignments, meaning that they are responsible for the gaps on either side of the O-linemen in front of them.

Their primary job is to find and plug the running gaps, then the rest of the defense finds the ball carrier who may be searching for an unplugged gap.

He goes on to note the Duck D-linemens' set stance. "They squat down like frogs," he says, "and they're actually reading the helmets of the offensive line and just trying to build a wall. It's an incredibly difficult technique to learn. It's very hard for a team to get ready to play . . .You don't have anyone on the team of Tennessee that knows how to play this technique." 

And as I look, I see that he's right. They Ducks are in a four-point set with their butts squatted as low as they can. When they come forward, they shift to one side of the offensive linemen or the other, and then the rest of the D fills the other holes.

It's interesting to watch, I just still don't understand WHY it works. Do me a favor. Watch it for yourself, then explain it to me. Click on the video below and if it's not already there, slide the play bar about two-thirds of the way down to the 11-minute mark of the third quarter (1:33:36 on the video time counter). That's when they start talking about Oregon's D and how it is manhandling Tennessee's all star offensive line.



OTHER GAMES:
Hey 'Bama, 49-42 winners over Manziel's Aggies, congratulations on squeaking past the quarterback who decided not to come to Oregon when he heard Mariota was going there. (True story.)  At Oregon, Johnny "Football" would've earned his nickname for holding the football perfectly for point-after-kicks after every touchdown scored by Mariota. And then he would've been kicked off the team for being a pin headed idiot.


Oregon State went to Utah and defeated the Utes in a hard fought back-and-forth overtime battle. This win helps to make their fans forget they started the season with an embarrassing loss to Eastern Washington.
  So I'll remind them: HEY BEAVS. YOU LOST TO EASTERN WASHINGTION! 
HA HA HA HA HA HA . . . .


NEVER ASK A BADGER TO MANAGE YOUR TIME
Wisconsin was down by two to ASU. They drove down the field and got to the 17 yard line with 18 seconds left and no timeouts.

Stop the clock. Kick the field goal. Badgers win, right?

Watch this video.



Flash back to the Rose Bowl in 2012. Oregon and those same Badgers. Oregon is up by seven. Wisconsin is driving hard. Two seconds left, out of timeouts, they've given themselves one shot at the endzone, right?  Do you remember? Watch this:


Clock management in the final two minutes of a ball game is a game in itself. It requires a cool head, good instincts, belief in your team, knowledge of the rules, and most importantly, an awareness of the time.

Russell Wilson (a great QB for the Seahawks today) learned the hard way that you cannot spike the ball to down it with two seconds left. In fact these days it's an official rule in college football. Three seconds must show on the clock in order to spike the ball. If he had it to do over, he would've just run the play.

BREAKING NEWS: It has just been reported during the writing of this dribble that the refs of the ASU game have been reprimanded for their part in letting the clock run down. Fair enough.

But still, QB Joel Stive, WHAT WAS THAT? Don't make it hard for the refs. You've seen it a thousand times. Your coach says you practiced it. Drop FULLY to one knee, then give the ref the ball.

The truth is he panicked. He lost his cool. He lost.


Next week, BYE week. No game.
Oregon fans, surprise your sweetie next Saturday and tell him or her you want to skip your dumb ol' Duck game that day and do something special, just the two of you!

--kb

And then, lightning struck!

Not so good ol' Rocky Top after all.

Bummed Vol

When Tennesseeans crawled out and looked around after all the thunder, lightning, and pounding rain (Oh by the way, the weather was bad too.), they realized what they had just experienced.

   Oregon's lightning pace -- which comes from all the conditioning and preparation to maintain that pace -- was just too much for the Volunteers as the day wore on. If only that 70 minute storm delay had come later in the second half to give them time to catch their breaths, then they might've had a chance.

   Counting between snaps, sometimes Darron Thomas was able to get the next play off in as little as 10 or 11 seconds. Successful or not, the Ducks jumped up from the last play, ran back into formation and were ready for the next. That hustle is Oregon's routine in practice.

   For conventional old school teams like Tennessee, they only move that fast as punishment when they've made the coach mad. How is any team not used to that frenzy supposed to mimic it just the week before?

The Tennessean newspaper's caption for this photo actually said: "Tennessee's Justin Hunter (11) breaks up a pass intended for Oregon's Cliff Harris (13) during second half action Saturday." In all fairness, Vol QB Matt Simms at times looked like his intended targets were Oregon's defensive backs, especially Harris, who returned one for a score.

 Along with Oregon's, Tennessee's media got the story right. Here is an excerpt below from govolsxtra:

Ducks felt Vols getting tired

By Mike Griffith
http://www.govolsxtra.com/
Posted September 12, 2010 at 1:08 a.m.

Oregon coach Chip Kelly said he felt it would only be a matter of time before the Ducks' superior conditioning kicked in.

"We pride ourselves on our conditioning, and that's something we felt we could take advantage of,'' Kelly said. "Our guys at halftime said, 'Coach, I think they're dying, we need to really pick up the tempo and go.' "

Oregon (2-0) did just that, breaking open a 13-13 tie by outscoring Tennessee (1-1) by a 35-0 margin in the second half of the 48-13 win before the crowd of 102,035 at Neyland Stadium on Saturday night.

The Vols had jumped out to a 6-0 lead when the game was delayed 70 minutes on account of lightning.

"I actually asked the officials if we could start the game over,'' Kelly said. "They had taken advantage of some things with the unbalanced (line).''

UT tailback Tauren Poole rushed for 140 of his 162 yards in the first half before the Ducks' defense was able to adjust to the Vols' run game.

"They had a great plan and a great running back, and they got us with a couple quick counts,'' Oregon safety Eddie Pleasant said. "They ran a lot of flop (unbalanced) and we had to settle down and adjust to it.''

The Ducks' offense, meanwhile, felt itself hitting stride in the second quarter.

"On one of our scoring drives in the second quarter you could tell they were getting tired,'' Oregon tight end David Paulson said.

Running back LaMichael James said even through the game was tied 13-13 at the half, the Oregon players knew they had hit a rhythm.

``We didn't make any adjustments in the second half,'' James said. ``It comes down to tempo. Once the tempo gets going, it's hard to stop. Once those guys got tired we kept rolling.''
"In the second quarter we knew we were in the flow and sensing we were getting ready to break,'' James said. "They were doing a lot of talking and rah-rah before the game. . . I heard them in the pre-game saying 'you aren't that fast.' " [Oh ya? Well Elvis wasn't that great!]

Kenjon Barner returns punt for TD

  Forty two unanswered points and 447 total yards, Oregon scored like they were running downhill. They put up three points in the first quarter, ten in the second, 14 in the third, then 21 in the fourth.
   This was a convincing win for the Ducks. They convinced the AP to rank them 5th in the nation. But they had better forget about this one and move on.

   Next up for Oregon: PSU.

OK, maybe it's Portland State, not Penn State. But this is no time to get cocky!

Five minute hilite reel of game from goducks.com.

--kb

One of THOSE teams?

Defense recovers fumble- Oregonian

Miami. Nebraska. Oklahoma. Texas. Florida State. Ohio State. Michigan. Penn State.
   These have historically been the football teams to put up early season brutal scores like 72-0. They are the ones we would scoff at for their obscene beatings of lowly "St. Mary's for the Blind" patsies.
   But was that Oregon? Our Oregon? We can't and shouldn't read too much into their romp over New Mexico, except to say I think this team is much more prepared for the season's start than last year's team that walked into Boise State with vengeance on their minds but nothing to back it up.

  A good thing too, because ironically, a part of BS awaits them at Tennessee. A favorite Oregon son (and cousin), Justin Wilcox, is the new defensive coordinator for the Vols after his stint of the same position in Boise. It was his defense that made Oregon look tired and silly for two games in a row. Now he's looking to go 3 and 0 over his alma mater this Saturday.
  In the Oregonian today is a great article by John Hunt about Wilcox and the defense he'll have waiting for the Ducks. Below are a few excerpts. Read the entire article here.
While reading through this, I want you to think about the toughest test for the Ducks this Saturday. Will it be Wilcox's defense? Tennessee's fairly new offense? The more than 100,000 crazy orange rednecks in the stands? Or something much worse? Read on . . .

But first, click on the video below, then continue reading while it's playing.




Oregon football: Justin Wilcox tries to stop Ducks againEUGENE -


Published: Wednesday, September 08, 2010, 7:02 PM
In defending the Oregon Ducks, it seems, Justin Wilcox has all the answers. Dave Wilcox, Justin's father, former Ducks star and member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame, agreed.

In the 2010 season opener with his new team, Wilcox and the Vols shut out Tennessee-Martin 50-0. Like Oregon's 72-0 win over New Mexico, it was the school's first shutout since 2003. Granted, UT-Martin and the lowly Lobos aren't exactly challenging, but Wilcox already has proved himself many times over.

"If you think you know everything,'' Wilcox said, "you might as well change jobs.''

He did, and that's the problem for Oregon. Wilcox, who shut down the Ducks as Boise State defensive coordinator a year ago, is now coaching Tennessee's defense.

If Wilcox can do it again, he will have proved himself to be the biggest thorn in Oregon's recent rosy run of success. If Tennessee, a 13½-point underdog, can somehow - with the help of Wilcox - have Oregon's number, then he will have accounted for half of the Ducks' losses dating to the 2007 Sun Bowl:

Without Wilcox in the stadium, the Ducks would be 22-3. Against Wilcox, they would be 0-3.

Now play this video, even if the other one is still running. Keep reading . . .


"We're not playing against Justin Wilcox - we're playing against Tennessee,''

"Thank God - Justin's too old,'' he said. "And he's a little skinny guy now.''
Justin Wilcox is all of 33 years old. With Wilcox as defensive coordinator, Boise State was 49-4. Not only did he help shut down Oregon to open last season, but he and the Broncos capped a 14-0 season with a 17-10 win over TCU - that's a total of 18 points to Oregon and TCU teams averaging a combined 75.

"I think he's excellent,'' said Oregon defensive coordinator Nick Aliotti, who coached Wilcox for one season, in 1999, when he returned to the Ducks from the NFL. "I think he's a bright star, shining star, the sky's the limit for him.'' [He could be the Ducks D. Coach should Alliotti ever move on.]

But like many in the Ducks' program, Aliotti stopped short of crediting Wilcox with the win at Boise last year.

"All I can say, I would never have expected our offense to look like it did on that particular day,'' Aliotti said. "But he's good, he's a rock star.''

Mark Helfrich, who had a trying debut as Oregon's offensive coordinator in Boise, said it was a combination of the Broncos' preparedness and the Ducks' lack of any kind of cohesion.

"It wasn't an 'Oh my gosh, we didn't prepare for this' kind of thing,'' Helfrich said. "We played really poorly and they played great.''

OK. Now play this one. Ya, you see what I'm doing. JUST DO IT NOW!


If the 72-0 win had the Ducks feeling pretty good about themselves, this week has grounded them a bit. To prepare for Tennessee, the Oregon coaches had to pop in the Boise State tape one more time - in addition to Louisiana Tech tape, the most recent stop of first-year head coach Derek Dooley, and Texas Tech tape (special teams coach Eric Russell) and others.

"When we turned that film on, that was a great dose of humility,'' Helfrich said. "There are some things from that game that we can execute, and there are some things from that game that we can throw out.''

The problem, the biggest problem, was that there just weren't that many plays to look at. Oregon's first seven possessions, stretching well into the third quarter, consisted of six three-and-outs and one safety. Before the Ducks' lone scoring drive, Boise State had 19 points and Oregon had run 19 plays. . . . . .
In their third crack at Wilcox, the Ducks already have made some adjustments. Their system for sending in plays from the sideline has changed this season. Instituted in the spring, a series of poster-sized boards, each with four distinct images, is flashed from the sideline.

Kelly said the new signage system enables an even faster tempo. It also keeps Tennessee graduate assistant Peter Sirmon from cracking the code. [Oh no. Sirmon too?!?!?]

Sirmon, a seven-year NFL veteran, was a grad assistant at Oregon last season before joining his good friend Wilcox in Knoxville. The two were roommates and teammates at Oregon from 1996-99.

And finally from some drunk Vols . . .. Turn your volume WAYYYYYY UP!!!


There is no bad blood between Oregon and Tennessee, who have never met. Among the Ducks players, there is a healthy respect and maybe, just maybe, the desire to get back at Wilcox a little bit.

"Yes and no,'' center Jordan Holmes said. "He schemed us up pretty well last year, but when it comes down to it, it's just football. He's a really good defensive coordinator. If you can beat his scheme, you can beat a lot of schemes out there in the country. It would definitely be something that we would take pride in.''

By now you know the single scariest thing facing the Ducks this Saturday:
The dreaded heinous ROCKY TOP!  Coach Kelly knows it too . . . .


The following is from R-G writer Rob Moseley's blog:

“Once two strangers climbed ol’ Rocky Top looking for a moonshine still. Those two strangers ain’t come down off Rocky Top, reckon they never will.”


Yes, that was, of all people, Chip Kelly after practice today, singing the words to the unofficial Tennessee fight song, “Rocky Top,” which played on a loop for about the last three-quarters of practice today. Reckon we heard it 25 or 30 times.

“I love the song,” Kelly said, noting he’s done the same when USC is on the schedule. “... It’s a prominent factor for us, so just, get the guys used to it.”

It was also hot and humid in the Mo Center again today. Mike Bellotti was on hand watching and said the last time he created such conditions in the Mo were in 2003 prior to the opener at Mississippi State. But he just spent one day practicing in such conditions.

Kelly doesn’t want weather to be an excuse, he said, and so had his team practice in those conditions Tuesday and Wednesday. He said players are being weighed before and after each practice, as usual, to check that they’re staying hydrated.

“Getting in this type of environment has been really, really helpful for us,” Kelly said. “... We’ll be prepared from that standpoint.”

If the Ducks can beat Rocky Top, they can beat anybody. I'm not talking about the Vol's football team. I'm talking about a method of torture used at Guantanamo Bay.

Where is Osama Bin Laden?


I do not know.


"Oh Rocky Top, you'll always be, HOME SWEET HOME TO MEEEEEE
Goooooood Olllll' Rocky Top -- Wooooa. . . . . "

Please I beg of you, STOP.

Can't you just waterboard me?

Oregon at Tennessee Game time 4:00 PM Pacific. ESPN2
--KB