After time off, Oregon Ducks set to attack CFP with fresh legs, hunger
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A year ago, the Oregon Ducks seemingly had it all laid out for them.
An undefeated season with wins over Ohio State, Michigan, and Penn State. A Big Ten Championship. The No. 1 seed in the College Football Playoff. A first-round bye with a spot in the Rose Bowl, close to home, on New Year’s Day. It would have been hard to script a scenario better for Dan Lanning, his team, and the fans throughout their first year in the Big Ten.
And then came the month of December. For 25 days, the Ducks sat idle, accumulating rust. The holidays came, players went home, and the three-plus weeks of rest initially meant to be advantageous for a team looking to get fully healthy ahead of a championship run quickly became detrimental.
On January 1, Oregon got boat-raced by the Buckeyes, 41-21. I’m not here saying that, had the Ducks not had time off and not been rusty, the result would have been any different. Ohio State was a phenomenal team in 2024, every bit deserving of its national championship. I do think rust played at least a small part in Oregon falling behind 34-0 in the first half. After that, the rest is history.
Now, a year later, as Oregon prepares for a first-round matchup against the James Madison Dukes at Autzen Stadium on Saturday night, they will be coming off a 21-day rest, with their last game on November 29 against the Washington Huskies.
What makes this layoff different from last year’s, other than a matter of four days?
The answer is experience.
“Certainly some lessons learned,” Lanning said of how the team approached the time off this year. “I won’t share all those, but taking a little bit different approach to some of the things we attacked this season.”
One of the most significant differences this time around was the fact that, shortly after the playoff schedule was announced, the Ducks took a break. With players taking their finals and wrapping up the school year, Oregon’s football program took a few days off and told players to step away from the facilities. For S Dillon Theineman, this meant an opportunity to see his family. For RB Noah Whittington, it meant time to reset, take a deep breath, and find the hunger again.
“It was like a breath of fresh air, honestly,” Whittington said. “We came back with tremendous energy; guys seemed like they were itching to get back.”
TE Kenyon Sadiq said that after the grind of a 12-game regular season, these few days allowed him and many others the simple chance to stop thinking about football for a few days. Or at least to stop thinking about it for every waking moment. During this time, Sadiq was able to get his body right, get his legs back, and feel prepared for the second half of the season.
“I think it was good for everyone to kind of get away for a second, clear their head,” Sadiq said. “You just feel fresh when you get back in the scheme, and you get back running again.”
Last year, one of the few issues with Oregon’s time off was that the ramp-up to bowl season didn’t have a distinct feel from what came before. Matayo Uiagalelei says that once the guys got back into the facilities, they fell into the same old patterns that they held before. While that may not necessarily be a bad thing, considering those patterns led Oregon to a Big Ten Championship and an undefeated record, it opened the door for staleness down the stretch.
“I think last year felt like we kind of went into fall camp again, kind of like every day, just going to practice,” Uiagalelei said. “Now, we’re still doing stuff every day, working on what we felt we could have gotten better in the season, but just more strategizing, more thought about.”
While the short break might have been great to reset and clear heads in Eugene, the ramp-up has been more strategic this year, as Uiagalelei pointed out. It’s involved a lot of physical work to get the pads back, and even a “mock game,” as EDGE Teitum Tuioti put it, to get everyone’s mind back in the right spot.
Unsurprisingly, it was hard to keep LB Bryce Boettcher out of the gym and away from the facilities during the time off. He took that time away from hitting people to hit the weights and break down the film. Through it all, though, he made sure that he wasn’t going to lose a step, especially with his cardio.
“You’ve got to still prepare and work hard, get in the weight room. You can’t let your lungs go too much,” Boettcher said. “But there’s something to be said for, you know, getting a little break from each other, and then once you come back, everything is a little fresh and exciting, and everyone wants to work a little bit harder.”
Now, as the Ducks prepare to play their first real game in 21 days, their conditioning and preparation will be under a microscope. What did they learn from that fateful day, almost a calendar year ago?
It’s unrealistic to think that all rust has been avoided going into Saturday’s game against James Madison. There’s a good chance we’ll see a drive or two in the first quarter with some miscues and errors, which can be attributed to time off. What’s most beneficial, though, is that these missteps are going to come against a Dukes’ team that, with all due respect, is not Ohio State. They have also been off for three weeks and, unlike the Buckeyes last year, did not get the benefit of a tune-up game a week before playing Oregon.
These are all things Lanning knows and has used to prepare his team for this game. More than anything else, though, he has the experience of the 2024 CFP, and he’s willing to learn from it. As Iapani Laloulu says, that’s what makes him one of the best coaches in the game.
“That’s why I really love Coach Dan. He’s ready to adapt and execute.”
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This article originally appeared on Ducks Wire: Oregon Ducks prepared for long CFP run with fresh legs, hunger
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