Well, that was some football season.
A 12-1 record, Heisman Trophy finalist, and all the rest — we just witnessed a few months of (near) pigskin perfection that Oregon fans won’t soon forget.
And at this point, there’s not a whole lot to add to the Ducks’ magical season. At some juncture we’ll have to look forward to next year and the bright future at hand, how Dontae Williams could provide some much needed thunder to LaMichael James’ lightning, and the possibility of a quarterback competition between Darron Thomas and electric true freshman Bryan Bennett.
It’s really impossible to know how good Oregon will be next year with the loss of several key players (three starting offensive linemen, Jeff Maehl, Brandon Bair, Casey Matthews) but the return of James and Thomas still has the Ducks as a consensus top-5 team heading into next season. That, in itself, is an accomplishment. Either way, there’s plenty of time to analyze the 2011 Oregon Ducks.
For now, I find it more interesting to take a broader view of the Oregon football program. With Colorado and Utah moving West (not literally, just joining the Pacific-12 Conference) next season, Oregon will begin its first season in the Pac-12’s Northern Division, along with Cal, Stanford, Oregon State, Washington and Washington State.
There are several obvious reasons why it would be a good bet to predict the Ducks will be near, if not at, the top of the Northern Division for years to come.
They include Chip Kelly, Phil Knight, facilities, several consecutive seasons of elite recruiting and favorable competition. In the future, schools like USC and UCLA figure to rebound, while Oregon State, Washington State, Cal and Stanford haven’t ever been traditionally elite programs.
Those factors have been discussed plenty over the past few months.
But there’s another that hasn’t received as much attention — coaching staff continuity.
Six of the Ducks’ nine assistant coaches have been at Oregon for more than eight consecutive seasons. All nine have been on staff for at least two years.
Compare that to another Pac-10 school like Stanford, where no assistant coach has been at the program for more than four straight years. UCLA (five years), USC (four years) and Washington (two years) also rank below the Ducks in the tenure of their most loyal assistants.
This off-season alone, Stanford, Cal, Colorado, UCLA, Utah and Arizona (half of the schools in the conference) have had assistant coaching changes.
Continuity among assistant coaches is an important, but often overlooked, part of a program’s success, for several reasons.
A longtime assistant coach who has recruited for a particular school is more familiar with the program and knows how best to sell the school to recruits.
And, especially at a school like Oregon where each assistant has been on staff for at least two years, there’s ample time for the coaches to build strong relationships with recruits that are often determining factors in a recruit’s decision.
Obviously two straight 10-win seasons play a big role in attracting talent, but don’t underestimate the power of close personal relationships. As an avid recruiting follower, I’ve seem plenty of teams lose commitments from players because an assistant coach left for another school.
The other aspect of retaining assistant coaches is scheme continuity. Now, I don’t profess to be a football expert in terms of Xs and Os, but it seems logical that if a player has several years in the same offensive or defensive system, with the same terminology, he’d be more likely to succeed. Being a Bay Area native, I’ve heard time and time again that one of the main reasons 49ers quarterback Alex Smith struggled so mightily was that he had to endure a new offensive coordinator almost every season. That won’t be an issue for Oregon’s quarterback.
It’s just one, of many reasons, why the Ducks are primed to succeed now and into the future. You’d be hard-pressed to find a more stable, well-run football program in America. Oregon might not win multiple national championships in the next decade, but it’s become ever more apparent that the pieces — all of them — are in place for a sustained run of success.
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