Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things that you
didn’t do than by the
ones you did do.” ~ Mark Twain
Before Saturday’s game, he might as well have been Superman.
In the first quarter of Saturday’s game, he was nearly flawless.
As his desperation heave fell to the ground to end Saturday’s game, he proved fallible.
What do you say when you have the weight of a team, a school, a city, a state resting on your right arm … and you fail? What can you say when you lose a game you know you should have won, in your own backyard?
Joey Harrington sat in front of a media horde, an ice pack taped around his golden gun, and said little after a 49-42 loss to Stanford. Quiet and sullen, the senior quarterback’s hoarse voice seemed to barely reach the microphones sitting just inches in front of him.
“We lost,” he said. “It doesn’t matter how or why or who, we lost.”
His mood characterized the end of a dream season. A season that had the Ducks playing for the national championship and Harrington heading to New York to receive the Heisman Trophy, given to the country’s best collegiate football player.
With Saturday went those hopes, those dreams. No more Rose Bowl. No more Heisman. No more streaks.
From here on out, though, the Ducks must do the only thing they can: forget Saturday.
Forget the consecutive fourth-quarter blocked punts. Forget the interceptions. Forget Stanford. Forget the streak.
Of all the things Harrington didn’t say after the loss Saturday, it was the few mumbled words he did speak that said a lot about him and the Oregon football team.
Is the team’s confidence shaken?
“No.”
Where do you go from here?
“I’d like to think we can look this week like we’ve got something to prove.”
In a disappointed and frustrated state, Harrington found, if only a tingle, hope. He still has to prove the Ducks can win consecutive Pacific-10 Conference titles. Prove fourth-quarter miracles are still possible. Prove a No. 5 ranking was no fluke.
And it starts now.
Harrington celebrated his 23rd birthday Sunday. Let’s call it 23 wishes for the 23-game home winning streak, now evaporated. Now make a new wish, reach for the stars.
In the season of all seasons, now is not the time to bow down or to lose confidence, no matter how shaken that confidence may be. Now is the time when Harrington and the Ducks must be their strongest.
A quote outside Oregon’s locker room perhaps best dissects the remainder of the season: “If you want to play in January, you have to play today.”
For the Ducks, today comes in the form of four more Saturdays.
Today is a new day and a new opportunity.
Saturday’s gone. Done. Over.
It’s the next four Saturdays that will again define Joey Harrington and the Oregon Ducks.
Twenty years from now, don’t wish you could have them back.