[Quack Attack]

A costly comeback

By Ron Bellamy
The Register-Guard


Published: September 14, 2008

Chris Pietsch/The Register-Guard

Sports: Duck Football: Story

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — After spending much of the football game looking like a team trying to find different ways to lose, Oregon found a way to win Saturday, but lost another quarterback along the way.
A valiant defensive effort, a game-changing punt return for a touchdown by Jairus Byrd, the clutch place-kicking of Matt Evensen and the bruising running of LeGarrette Blount were the key factors as the No. 16 Ducks defeated Purdue, 32-26, in double overtime before 54,666 in Ross-Ade Stadium and the ABC television cameras.

“I was thinking ‘Oh my God, this game is ours,’ ” Blount recalled, describing his thoughts on the hot, muggy afternoon as he ran into the end zone from three yards out, the last of his 132 yards on 12 carries, for the winning score. “It’s time for us to go home and celebrate this win.”

However, any celebration by the 3-0 Ducks would be tempered by the fact that quarterback Justin Roper injured his left knee trying, unsuccessfully, to get a first down during Oregon’s first possession in overtime. Roper’s parents told a reporter after the game that a UO athletic trainer gave them a preliminary initial diagnosis of a partially torn medial collateral ligament, pending an MRI exam to be conducted in Eugene today, with the results of that expected Monday.

But Oregon coach Mike Bellotti’s initial assessment was that Roper would be sidelined two to four weeks, meaning that with Nate Costa already lost for the season after a knee injury, true freshman Chris Harper and junior college transfer Jeremiah Masoli will be the Oregon quarterbacks next week against Boise State — and possibly through Oregon’s games at Washington State and Southern California, as well as the UCLA game at Autzen Stadium. And that freshman Darron Thomas, whom the Ducks still want to redshirt, will have to be ready to play.
“It will be the kids vs. Boise State,” Bellotti said.

One of those kids, Harper, directed Oregon’s winning drive in the second overtime, entering the game, Bellotti said, because the Ducks, starting from the Purdue 25, knew they could win with a field goal, and wanted to run the ball. Harper lost five yards on his first carry, but then Jeremiah Johnson, Blount and Harper ran for nine, 10 and eight yards, in order, to set up Blount’s game-winner.
“I’m not nervous,” Harper said. “I’ve been playing football too long to be nervous now. I know what I can do. I’m confident in myself, so I’m not nervous.”

Oregon fans had every right to be nervous — and the emotions probably went beyond that — as the Ducks dug themselves a 20-3 hole in the first half, but all that did was set the stage for their biggest comeback since they trailed Fresno State 17-0 at Autzen Stadium and came back to win 37-34 in 2005.

What went wrong? What didn’t?
“We made enough mistakes tonight to last the rest of the season, on offense, defense and special teams,” Bellotti said. “But through all that, we never lost faith, we never lost hope, we continued to work hard and rally.”

First, the mistakes. Oregon’s defense, which hadn’t given up explosion plays through the first two games, was burned for an 80-yard touchdown run by Kory Sheets on the game’s second play. Byrd was blocked out of the play, rover Patrick Chung missed the tackle on the sideline at midfield — apparently trying to strip the ball, Bellotti thought — and linebacker Jerome Boyd dived late and came up empty.
Oregon answered with the first of Evensen’s four field goals, and Purdue came back with its own. Back came the Ducks, driving to the Purdue 18 when the first of Roper’s two interceptions was returned 60 yards by Brandon King to the Oregon 26. The Oregon defense held Purdue to a field goal that pushed the score to 13-3, but on the ensuing kickoff, the Ducks made another disastrous mistake.

The ball hung short in the wind and blew away from returners Andre Crenshaw and Talmadge Jackson III, who never touched it. Purdue recovered at the UO 22, and three plays later, on the first play of the second quarter, Sheets scored from two yards out, it was 20-3 and the Ducks were in trouble.

“We had moved them up already” because of the wind, Bellotti said of the kick returners. “It was extremely poor. We needed to move them up farther.We didn’t do a good enough job, they didn’t handle it very well.”
Neither, for a while, did the Oregon offense handle being behind very well. Roper, who threw a career-high 48 passes and completed a career-best 20, wasn’t throwing effectively on the run, and the Purdue defense was forcing that. And the Oregon receivers weren’t helping, either — drops by Jaison Williams cost the Ducks a pair of first downs that would have kept drives alive.

“We might have dropped 10 passes in all honesty,” Bellotti said. “The reality is we’ve got to be better at that.”
But the reality, too, was that the Oregon defense was beginning to take over the game. Byrd’s interception, Oregon’s first of the season, with 39 seconds left in the first half set the stage for Evensen’s second field goal as the first half expired.
Still, the Ducks had three possessions in the second half without results until Byrd’s 87-yard punt return pulled the Ducks within 20-13.
“I think Byrd’s return was the turning point of the game, no question about it,” Bellotti said.

The Oregon defense forced another punt, which backed the Ducks to their own 4. No problem, as Blount ran 72 yards to the Purdue 24, Roper picked up 11 on a bold fourth-and-two call by Bellotti, and Blount’s five-yard TD run tied the score before the third quarter expired.
A lost fumble by Jeff Maehl stopped the next Oregon drive, and the Boilermakers drove to the UO 16 before Chris Summers’ field goal put them up 23-20 with 7:30 left. However, Evensen tied it with a 38-yarder with 5:06 left after holder Tim Taylor handled a tough snap.
“It was exciting,” Evensen said. “It was a great opportunity. I felt comfortable out there. I wasn’t worried about anything.”
It took one more defensive stand by the Ducks in regulation — the Boilermakers held the ball for five minutes and reached the Oregon 27, but Summers was wide left into the wind from 44 yards as time expired.
Purdue won the toss for overtime, and forced Oregon to go first, and Evensen’s 33-yard field goal — after the play on which Roper was injured trying vainly to get the first down — kept the Ducks alive.

So back the pressure went to the Oregon defense, because the Boilermakers could have won with a touchdown, and they reached the Oregon 10 on a pass interference call. But defensive end Will Tukuafu came through with a sack, and on third down, safety T.J. Ward brought down quarterback Curtis Painter at the Oregon 4, and the Boilermakers had to settle for a game-tying 22-yard field goal.

The Boilermakers had the ball first in the second overtime, but Tukuafu and Nick Reed combined to force Painter into a fumble that wound up an 11-yard loss from which Purdue couldn’t recover, and when Summers couldn’t connect from 47, the Ducks, for the first time in the game, had the ball with a chance to win.

With Harper at quarterback, they did. Now, it seems, they’ll have to find ways to do that again.

[Quack Attack]

With the toughest part of the Ducks schedule coming up, they are now faced with playing their 3rd and 4th string QBs. I know how UCLA Bruins staff feels having to start their 3rd string QB Craft to get through the year.