Good Luck Ducks, Week 2: Buckeye Fever

The Ducks hit the road for one of their biggest ever nonconference games. 

 

COVID-19 wiped out the home portion of the agreement with Ohio State to play a set of games that was signed a decade ago. Instead, the Ducks will just play one game against the B1G power, at high noon (eastern time) at the place they call The Horseshoe. None of this seems tremendously fair, but if we could go back in time and erase the pandemic altogether (that would be really nice!), it's tough to say that a Tyler Shough-led Oregon squad could have competed with the team that eventually went on to lose in the CFP championship game.

It never rains at Autzen Stadium, though, so you never know. No rain is in the forecast at Ohio Stadium tomorrow, either. Both teams had fairly lackluster opening games, each not securing victory until the fourth quarter.

The Ducks will likely be without their best and most dangerous player, Kayvon Thibodeaux. He reportedly did make the trip to Columbus, but otherwise not much positive news has been heard about his status. Thibodeaux hurt his ankle when his own teammate fell into him at the end of a play, which is about one of the most unfortunate ways to get hurt on a football field (next to celebrating a touchdown, I suppose.) This would put a bit of a damper on Oregon's hopes of knocking off the school that straight up punked them in the 2015 CFP championship, but all of these players were still in high school or middle school back when that was going on. A Ducks win today would establish themselves as an early playoff contender, while a loss could still provide some valuable experience that could be used later in the season. That is to say that the pressure may be on the Buckeyes more than the Fighting Ducks.

Series History: Ohio State is undefeated in 9 tries against Oregon, though they've only faced each other twice in the past 37 years. I dare not speak the name of the Dallas Cowboys running back that bulldozed the Ducks line (and secondary, and everyone else on the field) in that stupid championship game.

Opponent Talk: Ohio State has one of the most intense, content-heavy fan sites I've ever seen for a sports team on the internet. Just check out this gameday poster, for starters. It was hard to even look at this site, because I don't think I'll ever be as big of a fan of any team as much as these guys are.

This is where I usually embed a video clip of the Ducks doing something cool against today's opponent in the past, but I'm not about to put any footage of any of their 9 losses up here. (I'm guessing it would be hard to find anything online from the '80s or before.) Instead, let's check out some Thibodeaux highlights and hope he's on the field at full strength today.

Game time is at 9:00 AM PDT (sheesh!) on FOX. Go Ducks!