Seeing his team turn a 14-0 first-quarter lead into a 42-14 loss to Washington, Onterrio Smith could hardly take it from the sidelines.
“What’s going on? Why can’t we get that fire back?” the hobbled Smith thought to himself Saturday as Oregon dropped its fourth game in five tries.
It had nothing to do with a little rain, as some tried to suggest.
The answers, quite simply, rested on Smith’s left knee, which he will have surgically repaired today.
What’s going on?
The Oregon offense, obviously, is struggling. Led by an inconsistent quarterback, Jason Fife — who was replaced, then soon reaffirmed in the third quarter — the Ducks haven’t been able to establish anything on offense. After starting off 7-of-9 for 139 yards in the first quarter, Fife finished 10-of-29 for 170 yards (you do the math). His second-half replacement, redshirt freshman Kellen Clemens, had his first pass intercepted and was gone after just two series.
“We tried some new things, we tried to make a statement in the third quarter. But we didn’t do it and we paid the price,” senior receiver Jason Willis said.
Why can’t the Ducks get that fire back?
Quite simply, there’s no Onterrio Smith. And, quite frankly, the Ducks are mediocre at best without him.
“We miss Onterrio every time he’s not in the game,” Fife said. “He’s the energizer of the offense. We need a pick-me-up. I don’t know what it is, but something’s going to happen to give us the spark.”
It’s definitely not going to be Smith, who rushed for 1,015 yards prior to injuring his knee against USC on Oct. 26. By having arthroscopic surgery to remove torn cartilage, he will miss this week’s Civil War game.
“It’s really been bothering me,” Smith said of his knee. “We’re going to do (surgery) this early so I can be back in time for the bowl game.”
Minus Smith, the Ducks will rely on backups Terrence Whitehead and Ryan Shaw, both of whom offensive coordinator Andy Ludwig said he has great confidence in.
Nothing against Whitehead and Shaw, but they’re aren’t Onterrio Smith. They can’t get a defense to stack the box and open the passing attack, and they can’t be the energizer.
Combined, Whitehead and Shaw put up a respectable 80 yards on 15 carries, though they didn’t alter the game.
But apparently, the rain did.
“The weather came and we didn’t handle it well,” Oregon head coach Mike Bellotti said. “We lost our momentum when the weather hit.”
No, the Ducks lost their momentum — their 6-0 start and No. 6 national ranking — when Smith went down with a minor left knee injury that has turned out to be much more than minor. The injury, Smith said, has not led him to make any decisions about next season, which many have speculated he will play in the NFL.
“I have not really been thinking about that,” Smith said. “I’m just trying to get my knee better and get back for the bowl game.”
In the final home game for Oregon’s seniors — and perhaps the last for Smith — the Oregon offense flew south for the winter without Smith. And the same thing could happen in Corvallis this week.
“I want to get out there,” Smith said. “We wanted to send out the seniors with a bang. I really wanted to be a part of that.”
If he had, things may have turned out differently, regardless of the weather.