Beavers can compete, but not at same level as the Ducks
Oregon quarterback Dillon Gabriel rambles 54 yards for a touchdown in the first half of the the Ducks’ 49-14 romp past Oregon State Saturday at Reser Stadium (courtesy Oregon sports communications)
CORVALLIS — It took just over a half Saturday for Oregon State to find out that Oregon isn’t Idaho State or San Diego State.
The Beavers hung in for a half, then caved as a clearly superior Oregon team steamrolled its way to a 49-14 Civil War victory at Reser Stadium.
The score was 22-14 at halftime, with Oregon State holding the advantage in total offense (218-217), first downs (15-11), total plays (42-21) and time of possession (21:03 to 8:57. Then the ninth-ranked Ducks (3-0) applied the tourniquet, stuffing the Beaver offense and outscoring the hosts 27-0 over the final two quarters.
“I am disappointed in the outcome,” OSU coach Trent Bray said afterward. “At halftime, I thought we were in a good spot, (within) striking distance. We just didn’t execute well enough in the second half. That pretty much sums it up.”
“They have good players, and they out-executed us,” OSU coach Trent Bray said after the Beavers’ Civil War defeat by Oregon
Or as Oregon State radio analyst Jim Wilson put it, “The first half went the way the Beavers hoped it would go. The second half went the way they feared it might go.”
Oregon State managed four first downs and 91 yards total offense in the second half. Oregon, meanwhile, piled up 15 first downs and 329 yards total offense after intermission.
In the first half, the Beavers kept the ball away from the Ducks, who had only three possessions before the break. OSU’s defense never really stopped Oregon, though. The Ducks had nine possessions in the game and came away with seven touchdowns and a pair of field goals along with 249 yards rushing, 306 yards passing and 546 yards total offense. UO punter Ross James got on the field only to hold for the frequent placekicks by ex-Beaver Atticus Sappington, who had escaped to the Dark Side through the transfer portal in the offseason.
“We played to our standard today,” Oregon coach Dan Lanning said. “Our offense was effective all day. Our defense was the tale of two halves. (The Beavers) were able to run the ball effectively and had some QB scrambles early. We were able to close that out in the second half.”
On Oregon State’s first possession, quarterback Gevani McCoy got loose for 42 yards on a scramble, though the Beavers backed up 15 yards after a cross-field personal foul penalty on the play. That was their only explosive play of the game. McCoy completed 22 of 34 passes for 172 yards, with a long completion of only 15 yards. OSU’s longest run was 18 yards by Anthony Hankerson.
Meanwhile, Oregon QB Dillon Gabriel was dicing up the Oregon State defense with short, precision passes.
Gabriel completed his first 15 attempts and finished 20 of 24 for 291 yards and a pair of TDs. The Oklahoma transfer also broke an option keeper for 54 yards down the left sideline for a score in the second quarter. In all, Oregon had 13 plays of 15 yards or more.
“We weren’t tight enough in coverage,” Bray said. “That was an issue. They have good players, and they out-executed us.”
“The intent was to take what they gave us,” Lanning said. When the Beavers had the ball, “They did what we thought they would do and our coaches had a good plan for that. We were able to take advantage of that plan.”
Oregon State got no pass rush at Gabriel, who sat in the pocket and found targets all day. He wasn’t sacked once. In the second half, the Beavers could get little going on the offensive side.
“It came down to when plays are supposed to be made, Oregon did a nice job of making them and we didn’t,” Bray said. “When you’re playing a group as skilled as they are, you have to be at your best. We just weren’t today.”
Oregon State mixed the run (116 yards) and pass (102) effectively in the first half, but the Beavers managed only 15 yards with the run after halftime.
“Early in the game, we did a nice job,” Bray said. “We had some success on the ground and (the offensive line was) protecting pretty well. We just ran out of gas at the end.”
Looking at it another way, the Ducks put the pedal to the metal after the break.
After closer-than-expected wins over Idaho and Boise State to start the season, causing the Ducks to fallen from second to ninth in the polls, they were more than sufficiently mentally prepared for the visit to Corvallis.
“Our guys were really cranked up,” Lanning said.
Was this the closest to perfect the Ducks’ offense has been during Lanning’s three seasons at Oregon?
“We can be better,” the UO coach answered quickly. Then: “Maybe. But we can be better. We’re going to watch this (game) tape and find some things that we can do better.”
Probably not too much better than they were after halftime Saturday.
“We want to walk away from the field saying we were the tougher, more physical team,” Lanning said. “That showed up in the second half.”
Well, the Ducks were certainly the bigger, faster, stronger team Saturday, as well they should be with the advantage in resources they hold over the Beavers.
It was a letdown to a partisan, standing-room-only crowd of 38,419, which began the bright, sunny late-summer day optimistic about the Beavers chances to upset the Ducks on OSU’s home turf. The student section was filled to the brim despite the school year not starting until Sept. 25. Reser was a sea of orange for the contest televised nationally on Fox.
Oregon’s dominance sucked the life out of the joint in the second half, though. By the time Oregon fans joined in a “Let’s Go Ducks” chant in the final two minutes, most of those rooting for the home team had left the building.
“I love that we had to go into a hostile environment and we played this way,” Lanning said.
The schools are scheduled to play again next season in Eugene. That oughta be it for a while. That’s right — the Civil War rivalry should be paused.
I went down the elevator toward the end of Saturday’s game with Phil Knight. We hadn’t seen each other for a while and exchanged some pleasantries. “Very nice new stadium here,” he observed. He said he had met Oregon State president Jayathi Murthy. “She seems like a go-getter,” Knight said. It seemed like he was going out of his way to try to say things kind about the Beavers on a dismal afternoon for the locals.
Primarily with Knight’s largesse, Oregon moved ahead of Oregon State in the college football hierarchy in the 1990s and has largely stayed there. The Beavers have stayed competitive, though, through good coaching by Dennis Erickson, Mike Riley and Jonathan Smith and a blue-collar work ethic that has served them well.
OSU’s grid foundation was on solid footing a year ago, with a new stadium and a program built from the bottom to be nationally competitive by Smith. Then the Pac-12 imploded, and combined with the onset of NIL and the transfer portal, the world collapsed on the Beavers.
Everything has changed now. While Oregon has been able to buy the necessary talent to get to the top, Oregon State lost 11 of its top returning 12 players to other schools in the portal during last offseason. You just can’t replace the continuity the Beavers had in developing their young players with new young players. It takes time, and when those players are developed, many of them will be off to a program that can pay them more money.
Answering a question about the disparity between the Ducks and Beavers, Lanning admitted, “We have more talent right now than they do. That being said, I know how much that game means to them and how much it means to us.”
Sometimes motivation can make a difference. It probably played a big role in Washington State’s 24-10 win over Washington on Saturday. But the want-to can only go so far. It would have taken just short of a miracle for the Beavers to pull it off Saturday at Reser. Nobody wearing orange and black was ready to walk on water.
Lanning wants to continue playing the Beavers.
“I’d love to keep this rivalry alive,” he said. “It’s great for the state of Oregon. It’s great for both schools. It’s not something we want to see go away.”
When I asked Bray about it after Saturday’s game, he was in no mood for such a topic.
“I haven’t even thought about that,” Bray said. “That’s a ways down the road. I’m not concerned with that right now.”
While I think not scheduling Oregon in the near future is in Oregon State’s best interest, I don’t see that happening. It’s too big of a payday — and money is a crucial issue for the Beavers as they reconstruct the Pac-12 and try to stay relevant on a national level.
Saturday’s loss doesn’t mean they will tank the season. Their next opponent is Purdue at Reser. The Boilermakers got hammered 66-7 by Notre Dame at home. Oregon State will be favored to get back on the winning track against them.
The Beavers have a chance to win all of the remaining games on their schedule. Only a win at Boise State seems far-fetched, but that’s more than two months from now. There are no other opponents on the schedule of the caliber of Oregon.
Bray has a fine group of coaches working with him. They have good enough talent to be very competitive the rest of this season. But to compete with Oregon in the future, the Beavers need their own Phil Knight to help level the playing field.
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