Mighty Oregon heads to Cowboy Country.
Despite the significant changes made to the sport over the last few years, it seems like the early season close nonconference win hasn't completely lost its relevance, at least in the public discourse. The days of a single early season slip-up ruining an entire season are gone now, but people are still free to dump on games like the one Oregon played against Boise State last week. The Ducks came away with a win and, unlike a couple of years ago, didn't quite need a final field goal to decide it. Nevertheless, it still apparently caused a dip in the public perception of the Ducks season, even though their opponent was the consensus (reconstituted) Pac-12 favorites.
It's time to turn the page, as is the usual procedure in sport, as Oregon looks on to their next opponent. It's Oklahoma State. When these teams last met, it was Dante Moore and the Ducks going nuclear on one of the other OSUs in a 69-3 win which would prove to be one of Mike Gundy's final games in his 20 year run as Cowboys head coach.
We're not in Eugene this year, and neither is Gundy. Oklahoma State brings in fresh new QB transfer Drew Mestemaker, who had an outstanding year for Mean Green UNT before making transfer portal moves as the sport expects these days. Mestemaker is suddenly a big-time NFL QB prospect, and when you combine that with the fact that Oregon will not be playing in friendly territory today, I wouldn't expect a repeat result on the scale of last season's debacle. The Cowboys did lose to Tulsa last week, however, so it's not clear how close of a match this should be.
Notes:
- It's hard to put any Week 1 struggles on the shoulders of Dante Moore, who looked just about how we would expect to look. I'm never going to claim to be an expert or anything, but a lot of the opening game weirdness could probably be traced back to yet another new defensive coordinator and another new offensive coordinator. They still have some more time to get things right, fortunately.
- I'm not sure what a 9:00 AM west coast start time serves exactly, especially when it's a 11:00 start in Oklahoma. It was a very long time ago, but I never went to any home football games that started before 12:30. (I mean, I know who it serves: the television
audiencecompanies.) It's hard to see a lot of students getting up for this. - Opponent fun fact: This building is called Old Central. It's probably haunted, right?
- Opponent history: The Ducks hold a 2-0 edge in the series. Aside from last season's debacle, Oregon beat Oklahoma State and Dez Bryant (ugh) in the 2008 Holiday Bowl.
- Game time is 9:00 AM PDT on ESPN in Stillwater. Go Ducks!
