Pac 10 Fans Home
Pac 10 Football
Pac 10 Basketball
Pac 10 Baseball
College Fansites
Pac 10 Apparel
Pac 10 Tickets

Oregon Ducks vs UCLA Bruins Week 6 recap

After the first half of Saturday's game at the Rose Bowl stadium, it appeared that the Oregon Ducks' dreams of reaching the Rose Bowl game were in serious jeopardy. But then, in an abrupt departure from a haunting part of the past, the kids from Eugene wrote a very different script in their not-far-from-Hollywood location.

On November 24 of 2007, an Oregon team that led the Pac-10 and was closing in on a conference championship--complete with a New Year's Day ticket to Pasadena--ventured down to the Rose Bowl to take on UCLA without the services of star quarterback Dennis Dixon, sidelined with a knee injury. UCLA's offense wasn't anything to shout about, but because Dixon did so much for a UO offense whose coordinator was a man named Chip Kelly, the Ducks and then-coach Mike Bellotti had no answers against the Bruins. UCLA rolled to a 16-0 win that knocked Oregon out of the Rose Bowl and kept USC atop the Pac-10. One hard-luck afternoon in Southern California prevented UO from returning to the same part of the United States on the first day of 2008.

Two years later, an eerily similar scenario was playing out before Kelly, now the head man in Eugene, and the rest of the 2009 Ducks. Once again, UO came to UCLA atop the Pac-10 but without its star signal caller, Jeremiah Masoli. Oregon roared and romped in a conquest of Cal and a waxing of Washington State, but after flying into Los Angeles and then busing to Pasadena, the Ducks knew they could no longer depend on their main trigger man against Rick Neuheisel's Bruins. When halftime arrived, and the Bruins were once again pitching a shutout against their visitors from the Wilammette Valley, the followers of the Quack Attack had to be wondering if history was going to repeat itself for 60 full minutes.

> Browse the selection of Pac 10 apparel & merchandise online as well as Pac 10 tickets through Pac 10 Fans and partner sites.

Fortunately, it didn't take long for this year's Oregon team to avoid the fate of its 2007 predecessor. In 26 seconds, the leader of the Pac cemented its grip on the league without forcing backup quarterback Nate Costa to do a whole lot.

Kenjon Barner took the opening second-half kickoff 100 yards to paydirt to give Oregon a 7-3 lead, but if Ducks fans relaxed after that explosive game-changer on special teams, they must have felt like they were on a sandy Hawaiian beach when UCLA got the ball just moments later. With 14:34 left in the third quarter, UO's Talmadge Jackson III took a pass by Bruin quarterback Kevin Prince and took it 32 yards to the house. The pick-six gave the Ducks a 14-3 lead, which--given the quality of the quarterbacks on the field--had to feel like a 31-point lead more than the 11-point advantage it actually was.

Costa would lead UO's offense to one touchdown on the afternoon, but that score wound up being erased by a highlight-reel pick-six from UCLA's Akeem Ayers. Oregon's offense scored 10 points in this game while giving up seven, good for a net gain of only three points. The plain fact of the matter is that without a huge 1-2 punch from their kicking game and their stand-up defense, the Ducks could have endured that familiar 2007-style feeling. As it is, though, a shorthanded squad found the moxie and magic needed to compensate for the loss of Masoli. The Ducks now stand atop the Pac-10; they can only hope that with this win at UCLA, they've bought enough time to get their star quarterback healthy for the showdowns that lie ahead.

By Matt Zemek
DFN Sports Staff Writer