Instant Analysis: Holiday Bowl

The Oregon Ducks’ progression in their ballyhooed bowl game mirrored the way they fought through their 2008 regular season. Slow, uneven and disjointed at first, the Ducks made mid-course adjustments on Tuesday night in San Diego, finding a furious finishing kick that left an orange and black opponent bloodied and beaten.

It took a good long while for coach Mike Bellotti’s boys to find a groove in 2008. Quarterbacks Nate Costa and Justin Roper suffered season-ending injuries before September came to a close, forcing an untested Jeremiah Masoli to take the reins under center. In a late-October rout of Arizona State, coordinator Chip Kelly’s offense showed signs of hitting its stride, but two turnover-plagued performances against Stanford and Cal left everyone around the program wondering if Masoli could deliver the consistency the Ducks needed. With reputations and bowl positioning on the line, everyone in Eugene braced for the fateful conclusion to another autumn in Autzen Stadium.

It was then, in the crucible of November football, that Jeremiah Masoli took hold of his career, and transformed his team’s season.

In his final two regular-season games against Arizona and Oregon State, Masoli oversaw an offense that produced 99 points (Oregon’s defense scored 21 points in those final two contests, enabling the Ducks to total 120 points overall) and accumulated 1,198 yards. Unleashing his complete toolbox of skills while displaying the ball security that had proven to be elusive at earlier points in the year, Masoli finally painted the pigskin Picassos that his coaches were waiting to see. At the end of a long and arduous journey through the Pac-10 season, Masoli had finally mastered football’s most glamorous and challenging position. Up against Oklahoma State—a very successful team in college football’s most cutthroat division, the Big 12 South—Masoli would need to be great once again if the Ducks were to defend the honor of the Pac-10 Conference that had plainly suffered over the past four months.

As was the case with the season he just endured, Masoli started slow against Mike Gundy’s group, but then delivered a sensational sprint down the stretch to take a competition by storm.

What is it about schools called “OSU” that fly orange and black colors? Oregon’s new star signal caller devours them. After taking the OSU Beavers to the woodshed on Nov. 29 in Corvallis, Masoli—sluggish and rusty in the first half—demolished the OSU Cowboys in the second half of Tuesday’s tussle.

Oregon’s seven-point first half—one 76-yard dash by running back Jeremiah Johnson—was the result of several drops by Oregon receivers, who lacked the timing that had defined the Ducks’s offense in their late-season romp against Oregon State. But after getting their teeth into the fight, and absorbing the best shots Oklahoma State had to offer, Masoli and his teammates pressed less and attacked more. The results proved to be quite convincing, as the Pac-10’s second best program this decade reaffirmed its credentials with a second-half surge that will carry Oregon football into 2009 with freight-train momentum. Masoli was the engineer that made UO’s train roar down the tracks in Qualcomm Stadium.

Yes, Chip Kelly’s prime pupil had to read defensive looks and spread the ball around, but the quality quarterback’s biggest contribution to his team’s sensational post-halftime performance in this game was his ability to run Oklahoma State ragged. Showing ample and equal portions of speed, elusiveness, and pure power, Masoli ran over (and around, and under, and through) the confused and cautious Cowboys. Leveling safeties with hits instead of being punished himself, Masoli—on a 40-yard touchdown run and many other second-half snaps—repeatedly put OSU on the defensive, both tactically and emotionally.

By producing plays that were both psychologically important and athletically impressive, Masoli didn’t just create uncertainty in Oklahoma State’s defensive huddle; far more than making OSU guess between running and passing plays, Masoli’s physicality shifted the energy levels on the two sidelines, filling Oregon’s offensive line with a full tank of confidence after a first half in which the Ducks ran on empty. By making statements that were both highly symbolic and scoreboard-based, Masoli conveyed to his team—including his defensive unit—the sense that he wasn’t going to accept defeat. That self-belief only increased as the game wore on, and when the smoke had cleared, the Ducks had clearly beaten the Cowboys to a pulp on both sides of the ball. The gang in green punished OSU quarterback Zac Robinson, who was bailing out on long passes in the game’s final minutes, a clear sign of both physical and emotional fatigue. In the meantime, Masoli—seemingly able to play another 60 minutes if he wanted to—was standing tall at game’s end, a hungry and happy warrior relishing his conquest of a Big 12 team that suddenly didn’t look or feel so big anymore.

As big as Masoli proved to be in the home of the San Diego Chargers, an adequate account of this contest would not be complete without a tip of the cap to Oregon’s defense, which—before smacking around Robinson in the final few minutes—held the Ducks together at a time when Masoli hadn’t yet found his mojo.

It’s definitely worth mentioning that Oklahoma State did lead by a 17-7 score for much of the second quarter. At one point, it appeared that star Cowboy receiver Dez Bryant had caught a long bomb from Robinson for a touchdown and a 24-7 lead. The play was ruled an incomplete pass, and surprisingly, Gundy and the OSU coaching staff never challenged the call. Given this reprieve, Oregon’s defense stopped the Cowboys twice in scoring range, keeping the Ducks within 10 instead of allowing the game to spin out of control in its early stages. By stuffing Cowboy running back Kendall Hunter and containing OSU’s option plays, Oregon’s defense—stout against the run—held the fort in particularly significant moments before halftime. Once in the locker room, the Ducks—led by Bellotti, the dean of all active Pac-10 coaches—received the corrections and calming comments they so evidently needed. The rest, as they say, is history. When Masoli allowed his considerable talents to spill out in full flower on a football field in the game’s final 30 minutes, the sons of Stillwater stood little chance of stopping the Oregon onslaught that came their way.

Arizona State received a lot of preseason publicity in 2008, as did California. Rick Neuheisel came to UCLA, and Mike Riley worked wonders—as usual—at Oregon State. But as 2008 comes to a close and college football fans turn their eyes to 2009, the second-best football school in the Pac-10—it can safely be said—is the one guided by the best coach with the smallest amount of national name recognition in America. While coaches in the Big 12, Big Ten, and the SEC instantly acquire a 24/7 presence in the major media spotlight, Mike Bellotti—in the cozy Pacific Northwest—just continues to crank out winning seasons and keep Oregon in the top tier of its conference. After this kicking of the Cowboys, the Ducks have positioned themselves to give the USC Trojans a serious run for the Roses next season. If Jeremiah Masoli can stay on track and duplicate the Dennis Dixon dominance that characterized UO’s 2007 campaign, the year 2009 could be a giant year for this emergent offensive juggernaut.