On the afternoon of Nov. 17, 1994, the Oregon Ducks beat the Oregon State Beavers 17-13 at Parker Stadium in Corvallis.
The Civil War victory cemented a 9-3 season for head coach Rich Brooks and his staff as the Ducks clinched their first Rose Bowl appearance since 1958. “SWEET!” read the headline in the Emerald the following day. The accompanying photo was of offensive lineman Paul Wiggins clutching a rose and screaming for joy.
On the night of Nov. 17, at approximately 9 p.m., the first two students set up their campsite at the Casanova Center in anticipation of Rose Bowl tickets. Distribution was scheduled for 9 a.m. Monday, Nov. 19.
By the following night, hundreds more students turned up in line for what would be the most important athletics-related campout in school history.
“It’s all worth it,” undergraduate business administration major Jason Brown told the Emerald. “This is a once in a lifetime opportunity. I’d camp out for a week to get tickets.”
The overall winner of the weekend may have been Domino’s Pizza, which accrued $1,649.51 in sales during Sunday night and Monday morning, but Duck fans, players and coaches were not far behind. Though Oregon would fall 38-20 to Penn State in the Rose Bowl, esteem surrounding the program would change for the better.
The 114th Civil War has had the script flipped in a major way — Oregon (11-0, 8-0 Pac-10) has clinched a berth to the Rose Bowl entering the game for the first time in the series history.
“You know right now you’re going to the Rose Bowl, but it’s really kind of interesting,” said offensive line coach Steve Greatwood, a former Oregon player and 25-year assistant. “For the previous two times we went, the elation that we felt — and make no mistake, it’s a great feeling — we all know in the back of our minds there’s unfinished business.”
Does the Rose Bowl still have cachet entering this game? Unquestionably.
“It’s always nice to win the Pac-10 Championship,” defensive coordinator Nick Aliotti said. “Now we’ve done it two years in a row. That’s behind us. I think our young men have their sights set on something bigger than that. But we’re going to do the same thing we do every week. We’re not going to make it larger than life.”
Recent memories run raw through the minds of Oregon and Oregon State fans alike.
In 2008, when the Beavers were on the cusp of their first Rose Bowl bid since 1965, head coach Chip Kelly and the Ducks blasted Oregon State in Reser Stadium for 694 yards in a 65-38 victory.
The 113th Civil War was a winner-take-all effort for the Rose Bowl. In a closer competition, Oregon ran the clock out on the Beavers for a 37-33 victory, clinching its first berth since that 1994 Civil War.
“It’s just an awesome feeling, when you’re Pac-10 champs and you know you’re going to the Rose Bowl. That’s the pinnacle, really,” Aliotti said. “We have a chance to do something different this year, but to go to the Rose Bowl is always a goal of ours.
“It’s just an unbelievable drug. The best drug is that win to go to the Rose Bowl because you won that Pac-10 championship.”
A win on Saturday brings the promise of even greater heights.
The BCS National Championship Game? Oregon players and coaches have danced around it for weeks now, describing the game as “it” or “that” or “Natty” (Cliff Harris only), or as a higher goal potentially within reach. Whether they refer to it by name or not, the Ducks have been filling the prescription for at least the past seven weeks, as the Associated Press poll’s No. 1-ranked team.
Current circumstances would be hard to conceive for the Ducks who took the field for kickoff at Parker Stadium, on November 17, 1994.
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