It’s hard to come up with a worse loss for Oregon football in the Mario Cristobal era.
Oregon’s playoff hopes were already hanging on by a thread heading into a key test against Utah. But by the end of the first half, they had all but vanished.
Each of the Ducks’ biggest concerns were exposed Saturday night — poor quarterback play, poor tackling and poor discipline. It led to an ever poorer result: Utah 38, Oregon 7.
“We’ve been really good at responding, and tonight as an organization we didn’t respond,” Mario Cristobal said. “We did it this year, we’ve done it throughout the years… didn’t do it tonight.”
The Ducks had a plethora of injuries to deal with on both sides of the ball, but for a team that beat Ohio State in Columbus without Kayvon Thibodeaux, anything less than a playoff appearance would always be disappointing.
The Ducks didn’t just lose, they were dominated in every phase of the game. Everything went wrong.
“We should’ve put ourselves in a better situation,” Cristobal said. “We thought we schemed it well, thought we practiced well.”
But ultimately, he admitted the Ducks didn’t practice, scheme or execute well enough.
Dropped balls, missed tackles and special teams mistakes buried the Ducks in the first half. The second was not much better.
Still, the Ducks had overcome two-score deficits on the road already this season in tough environments. In Pasadena, it was 14-0. In Seattle, 9-0. Oregon dominated the middle quarters of both and took control.
But it was Utah who controlled the pace of Saturday’s game, taking five of their first seven drives for scores. That doesn’t include a 78-yard punt return by Britain Covey to snag a 28-0 lead as the first half expired.
Cristobal noted that the defense struggled to recover after the offense lost the ball.
“We didn’t get the type of pressure we usually get on the quarterback,” he said. “They found some windows [in the defense].”
The hardest gut-punches came at the worst times. The Ducks gave up a touchdown run on third and nine. One Oregon field goal was blocked and another was missed. A holding call stalled a crucial drive in the second quarter while trailing 14-0. Covey’s punt return was the knockout.
Cristobal said that punter Tom Snee “tried to pin [Covey] out of bounds… but it didn’t work out that way.”
The Ducks knew they would need to control the trenches to get a win. They didn’t, couldn’t.
Cristobal called the locker room “upset and disappointed” postgame. “And we should be,” he added.
The Ducks were out-rushed by 145 yards (208 yards to 63, Oregon’s lowest total of the season). The Utes went 11-for-14 on third downs. The Ducks went 6-for-14. By halftime, Utah had a 99% win probability, per ESPN.
“They were running the ball well,” Cristobal said bluntly. “We weren’t.”
The Ducks may get another shot at the Utes in Las Vegas for the Pac-12 Championship, but they need to get past Oregon State first. The Beavers will be out for blood after their most successful season in over a decade.
“Most of our goals are still ahead of us, and we have to prepare for them quickly,” Cristobal said. “It hurts. It needs to hurt, and anybody who feels that hurt needs to use that as motivation.”
Oregon will host Oregon State next Saturday at Autzen Stadium.
