What Oregon coach Dan Lanning said after the Ducks defeated Nebraska

The Nebraska Cornhuskers suffered a heartbreaking 17-14 defeat to the Oregon Ducks on Saturday night. The loss drops Nebraska to 6-3 all-time against Oregon.

The Blackshirts held the Ducks to 3-of-16 on third-down conversions in the game, including 0-of-8 in the first half. In Big Ten play, Nebraska has allowed opponents to go 8-of-48 on third downs.

This was the seventh straight game the Huskers have opened the season allowing 23 or fewer points. This is the first time Nebraska has allowed 23 or fewer points in the first seven games since 2001.

Oregon coach Dan Lanning met with the media after the comeback win and talked about his team's mindset as they headed into the fourth quarter trailing at home.

"Unbelievable game, right? Nebraska is a really tough opponent. Coach Rhule coached those guys extremely hard. They had a really good plan. Obviously it was a defensive battle. It felt kind of like old-school football. For them to be able to score there at the end of the first half pulls a little bit out of your wings there. But our guys didn't flinch; they just responded. Our defense played outstanding throughout the day. Even the plays that were made, they were contested. It wasn't easy. The one you want back is the third-down run. We can be much better there, but I thought coach Hampton did a great job having those guys prepared. I thought those guys never flinched, wherever, whenever it was. They got put in some tough moments again. Back-to-back weeks where I thought the defense really showed up."

The Huskers led until late in the fourth quarter, when backup Dylan Raiola came off the bench and found Jamari Johnson for the game-winning touchdown. The former Husker quarterback finished the game 11 of 18 for 59 yards and 1 touchdown. Lanning praised his quarterback for his role in leading the team back in the second half.

"And then the flip side of that is Dylan. Throughout the game, was really remarkable in the first half with his communication. 'Hey, here's what to expect. Hey, those plays that hurt you on defense, you're going to see those again in the second half.' He's going to come back to it completely engaged at halftime. 'Hey, think about this pass,' and then just ready for his moment. We got out there and didn't look exact. None of it was necessarily pretty. It was a gritty, ugly win in a lot of ways against a really tough opponent that had a lot of success this season for a reason. But there was just a little bit more time left, and it came down to a 2-minute drill, and it came down to us calling some of our 2-point plays there at the end that we practiced. You don't get a lot of time to practice those, but we put them in this week based on the coverages that we saw from Nebraska, and we're able to go execute the 2-point play; Hudson Lewis catches that on 2-point. He didn't have that ball thrown to him a single time in practice. We didn't throw that route once in practice the entire week, so that's the first time he's ever run that concept and been able to execute and put it in for two points at the end. Obviously, it mattered where they were in a position where they had to at least get a field goal to be able to tie it. So I'm really proud of our team. There's a lot of things to fix, and we're gonna fix them. We're gonna work to fix them."

Nebraska returns to action in two weeks to host the Washington Huskies at Memorial Stadium. Kickoff time is still TBD.

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This article originally appeared on Cornhuskers Wire: What Oregon coach Dan Lanning said after the Ducks defeated Nebraska