Making a game-saving fourth-quarter tackle against the North Carolina Tar Heels on third and goal to help secure a victory in his first bowl game in last season’s Holiday Bowl was a big moment in the collegiate career of Casey Rogers.
The graduate student has come a long way since he was coming off a knee injury and entering the transfer portal to leave a crumbling program at the University of Nebraska almost exactly a year ago.
Rogers loved all four years of being in Lincoln, Neb., he said. But he had to face the reality of the situation and look out for his best interest. The Cornhuskers were struggling to win games, and his head coach at the time, Scott Frost, was on the hot seat to be fired. A new coach, staff and players they’d bring on could have hurt Rogers’s chances of playing in the NFL.
“I was thinking about transferring,” Rogers said. “I was definitely going to put my four years in. I told our coach when I committed to him that I was going to play four years for you and would never leave. So once I put my fourth year in, I was like, ‘Let’s see what’s out there. Things are kind of crumbling here.’ Not that I want to abandon ship, but I kind of had to protect myself a little bit.”
Rogers announced his intent to transfer on Monday, April 18, 2022. That Wednesday, he officially entered the portal and was at the University of Southern California for a visit with the Trojans that weekend. The next weekend he came to Oregon. He wanted to take a visit to Auburn but was busy studying for the finals of his last semester at Nebraska.
With a degree and no more ties to Nebraska, Rogers announced he would be a Duck on May 4, 2022. Tony Tuioti, who was the defensive line coach at Nebraska, was brought on by Dan Lanning last season and was a big factor for Rogers deciding to land in Eugene.
“I didn’t want to deal with an all new position coach,” Rogers said, “because a whole new position coach is going to teach a new technique and I don’t have time to worry about learning a new technique when I’m trying my best to get into the NFL. When I ended up putting my name in the portal — and obviously Tuioti knew who I was; I worked with him for four years — he called me up and he offered me a scholarship to Oregon.”
Matching up dates and logistics of Nebraska’s semester system to Oregon’s 10-week-term schedule was the initial hurdle for Rogers. He graduated at the end of May, drove out west in the first week of June and wasn’t allowed to be on campus or with the team until a week after finals of spring term. He was able to rehab his knee from a surgery in December in the facilities.
The logistics of semesters to terms made the academic side of things difficult for Rogers too. All of the deadlines for Masters programs had passed by the time he was able to register. He had to take the first one he could get, a Masters in Education. It ended up not being something he enjoyed, so he switched to a Masters in Journalism.
Being an experienced collegiate athlete, Rogers knew what to expect being the new guy in a locker room. He knew he was going to have to earn the team’s respect. It was an instant connection, he said. Tragedy helped to form a stronger bond with him and his new teammates.
“I was here for probably like three or four weeks before Spencer Webb died,” Rogers said. “As bad as the situation that was, it brought the team closer together. It would have helped me get to know some guys on a personal level, because that was such a tragic thing. I had to be there for a lot of the guys even though I didn’t really know him that well.”
He put himself in their shoes, thinking about what it would have been like if he lost a teammate in Nebraska. It was a tough situation that brought the team together into a “let’s do this for him” mentality.
There were big changes in the atmosphere and fan interaction from Memorial Stadium compared to Autzen. Nebraska loves gameday. If Memorial stadium became a city during a game, it’d be the third biggest city in Nebraska.
“In Nebraska,” Rogers said, “ basically like the pro team of the state. There’s no other D-1 school in Nebraska. When I was driving to Oregon, I was in the westernmost part of Nebraska in a town called Scottsbluff, and I stopped to get gas and I went into pay and the guy at the counter knew who I was. He was eight hours away from Lincoln.”
Autzen is the loudest environment he’s played in. Not being able to hear someone two feet away from you is insane, Rogers said. It’s fun for him having Oregon State right around the corner, it makes the rivalry that much more intense.
“Oregon’s more fun to play in because of how electric the atmosphere is, and Nebraska we just weren’t that good,” he said.
Rogers is his own biggest critic and doesn’t think he lived up to the expectations in his first with the Ducks, despite making 34 total tackles, two pass break-ups and a fumble recovery. He was playing at 75% on his previously injured knee, he said.
“Take advantage of all the resources available here,” Rogers said for advice to incoming transfer athletes coming to Oregon. Go to the coast. The pacific northwest is a pretty unique place. You can go to the mountains or the coast. Get out, explore and use all the resources available to you.
“The Holiday Bowl was cool and all,” Rogers said about goals for the upcoming season. “It would have been a lot cooler if it was a Rose Bowl or Natty Championship.”
Personally, he’d like to get a couple sacks and make explosive plays. The NFL wants to see guys who make stand out plays, he said. He takes pride in technique and doing his job, which is cool and all but he still has to be able to make plays.
“Be a leader,” Rogers said. “This is my last year in college football, so just enjoy it and be in the moment all the time. Two years ago, I thought I had a lot more time than I did. I realized that this is it after this. If I don’t play well, there could be a chance that I don’t play football again.”
