Oregon football coach Mike Bellotti doesn’t concern himself or his players with the toughness of the schedule. Therefore, there is no need to worry about the fact that this year’s schedule is arguably the most daunting during
Bellotti’s tenure.
Oregon opened with a conference opponent (Stanford), traveled to Fresno State and hosted top-10 Oklahoma to start the season.
“We’ll know a lot about this program, a lot about this football team after the first three weeks of the season,” Bellotti said when fall camp began.
No matter what Bellotti knows about the Ducks after the first quarter of the season, the schedule doesn’t get
any easier.
Following a bye this weekend, Oregon plays back-to-back road games at arguably two of the most potent offenses in the nation. Oregon faces Arizona State on Sept. 30 in Tempe, Ariz., where the Ducks won 31-17 last season.
The following Saturday, Oregon plays at California, the team most media outlets have predicted will challenge USC for the Pacific-10
Conference championship.
“We take the challenge of where we have to play very seriously,” Bellotti said. “I think the key in the Pac-10, you expect to have an advantage at home. You expect to win at home. You have to win on the road. For us to be the type of team that we want to be, the type of program that we want to be, obviously we have to be prepared to play our best both at home and on the road.”
Oregon hosts UCLA, a team the Ducks didn’t play last year because of the previous rotating eight-game conference schedule, on Oct. 7. The Bruins finished last season with 10 wins and third in the conference standings.
The Ducks travel to Pullman, Wash., to play Washington State on Oct. 14.
Oregon has played at Washington State for the past three seasons and 7 of the last
9 seasons.
The easiest portion of the schedule follows the Ducks return from the Palouse, when Oregon hosts Portland State, a Division I-AA school, and Washington in back-to-back weekends, respectively.
Next, Oregon travels to Los Angeles to play the conference favorite USC on Nov. 11. The Trojans lost the previous two Heisman Trophy winners in Reggie Bush and Matt Leinart to the NFL, but coach Pete Carroll corralled the top-ranked recruiting class during the offseason.
The final home game for the Ducks is against Arizona on Nov. 18 before Oregon plays in-state rival Oregon State in Corvallis on Nov. 25, a game that is being played the day after Thanksgiving for the first time in 79 years.
The first three games of the season as well as the Cal, USC and Oregon State games were selected to television broadcasts prior to the season. All home games are currently scheduled for
12:30 p.m. kickoffs.
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