For the Oregon Ducks, there’s always an expectation that they can come back from any deficit they encounter. Their reputation as a second-half team has been earned with come-from-behind victories against Arizona State this season and against Stanford and Tennessee last year.
So, when Oregon went into halftime against USC with a two-touchdown deficit, it almost felt like business as usual at Autzen Stadium. One three-and-out later, that perspective was shattered. When star USC safety T.J. McDonald@@http://www.usctrojans.com/sports/m-footbl/mtt/mcdonald_tj00.html@@ blocked Oregon punter Jackson Rice’s@@CE@@ kick and the Trojans recovered the ball on Oregon’s 12-yard line, the Ducks faced an insurmountable task. Though USC would be held to a field goal on that drive, the Trojans held a three-score lead at that point.
“We can’t have a punt blocked and all of a sudden they get a field goal out of it,” Oregon head coach Chip Kelly@@CE@@ said. “The difference in the game was a field goal. This is a game where you’ll toss and turn and look at a lot of different plays and say ‘If this went this way’ or ‘If this went that way,’ but they didn’t go our way.”
Oregon freshman running back De’Anthony Thomas@@CE@@ took the ensuing kickoff to USC’s 43-yard line, jump-starting a four-play drive that ended in a Kenjon Barner@@CE@@ touchdown run.
But USC rallied for consecutive touchdowns around Oregon’s third three-and-out of the game, extending a 24-point lead and seemingly shutting the door on the game. Fans took note, as students began filing out of the student section.@@could be broke into two sentences@@
But then Thomas ran the ensuing kickoff back for a 93-yard touchdown, and it again felt like the Ducks might be able to get their second-half magic back.
“I just thought I had to make a play for my team and get my team back in the game,” Thomas said. “I felt like we got back in the game, we just came up short.”
Once Thomas made that play, the rest of the Ducks responded. The defense stiffened up to stop the Trojans on two consecutive drives, book-ending another Barner touchdown and bringing Oregon back within 11.
Once David Paulson@@http://www.goducks.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=500&ATCLID=1149812@@ made a one-handed catch in double coverage on the one-yard line and the Ducks plunged in for a touchdown a play later, it seemed that Oregon was going to come back all the way.
“I thought we always had a shot at it, right until that last tick off that clock,” Kelly said. “But that’s what this team does. They don’t get down.”
As the Trojans marched down the field to make a game-sealing drive, Ducks defensive end Brandon Hanna@@http://www.goducks.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=500&ATCLID=1149788@@ recovered a fumble from running back Marc Tyler@@http://www.usctrojans.com/sports/m-footbl/mtt/tyler_marc00.html@@ on Oregon’s 14-yard line.
“I thought we had a shot, even before that,” Hanna said. “No one had their head down on the sideline. Everyone was believing that we had a shot, and that helped.”
With 3:13 left on the clock, Oregon drove down the field and tried to make the comeback complete. The Ducks marched all the way to USC’s 20-yard line, and set up sophomore kicker Alejandro Maldonado@@CE@@ with a 37-yard field goal with five seconds left to send the game into overtime.
Instead of tying the game, Maldonado’s kick sailed left of the uprights, and the Ducks took their first home loss since Sept. 20, 2008, against Boise State.@@http://bleacherreport.com/articles/947037-usc-vs-oregon-why-the-ducks-will-cruise-to-victory@@
Despite Maldonado’s missed field goal, Oregon’s lackluster first-half performance was what did it in, with two red-zone fumbles lost and a dropped fourth-down screen pass by Rahsaan Vaughn@@http://www.goducks.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=500&ATCLID=205238572@@ that could have gone for a touchdown.
“You can’t make the mistakes we made, especially early, against a good football team like that, and they capitalized,” Kelly said.