CORVALLIS — Jason Fife said the Civil War “left a bad taste in my mouth.”
He’s right. This game was disgusting, a taste on par with the sour cream that’s been sitting in the back of the fridge for a year. Or cold medicine. Or moldy french bread.
This game was disgusting.
The first half was marred by penalties that the Ducks attributed to “emotion,” but were really just sloppy, stupid mistakes. The second half was filled with the offensive ineptness that has become Oregon’s calling card late in this now-disgusting season.
There were flashes of brilliance, especially from seniors Keenan Howry and Allan Amundson, for whom it was a bittersweet day.
But in general, Oregon just played awful. Beaver quarterback Derek Anderson didn’t have to be on his game to have a big day. Ditto to running back Steven Jackson, but he was on his game anyway and had a big day.
After a loss like that, you just want to remember better times, right? Back to when Oregon was 6-0, headed back to Tostitos-land in everybody’s minds, ranked in the top 10 as usual. Those were the days, right?
Wrong. Those good times make the bad times seem even worse. The expectations reached epic heights for this Oregon squad, building into an unstable structure that the Ducks eventually fell off, landing on the ground with a “thud” Saturday night in the second half.
You go back to Sept. 7. It’s early in the fourth quarter, and Oregon is losing to Fresno State, 24-15. On fourth-and-1 from the Bulldog 4-yard-line, Duck head coach Mike Bellotti makes a gutsy call to go for it. Onterrio Smith runs up the middle for a yard and the first down, and Oregon scores three plays later in a game the Ducks would eventually win, 28-24.
But what if Oregon hadn’t scored on that drive? What if Smith had been stopped, and the Bulldogs had won the game?
Oh, how nice that would have been.
The Ducks would have realized early that this team was no match for the Oregon teams of recent years. They would have loosened up. Heck, they might have even beaten Arizona State or Oregon State or maybe even Washington State.
Expectations suck. The Ducks had medium-sized expectations heading into the season, but Costco-sized those expectations by going 6-0. Admit it. Even though Oregon hadn’t played any good teams, you thought they were as good as Duck teams of the past. They creamed their preseason opposition not named Fresno State, and looked like a national power doing it.
But then the losses, and the expectations came crashing down with much more weight than had the Ducks been 5-1 or 4-2.
Sure, Oregon didn’t get many breaks. Yes, the Ducks were hampered by the loss of Onterrio Smith (but wasn’t it almost inevitable, when he started the season with 28 carries in a meaningless game against Mississippi State?).
But there are no excuses. The defense faded mid-season. The offense really faded at the end of the year.
And on Saturday, it all came crashing down in a disgusting loss in Corvallis. Contestants eating brains on Fear Factor look like they’re having more fun than the Ducks were on Saturday. According to Fife, those brains taste better, too.
Now, the Ducks are forced to adopt the mantra normally reserved for schools like Arizona, Duke and Kansas.
What time is the basketball game tonight?
The answer, by the way, is 7:30. See you there.