Oregon gets its rematch with Washington
Oregon got its revenge Nov. 24 with a rivalry win against Oregon State. Now the Ducks get their rematch. It’ll be No. 5 Oregon and No. 3 Washington playing for the final Pac-12 title Dec. 1 in Las Vegas.
The Huskies (11-0, 8-0 Pac-12) locked in their spot in the championship game with a win against the Beavers on Nov. 19. The Ducks (11-1, 8-1) did the same last weekend, beating Oregon State 31-7 in Autzen Stadium and in front of a crowd of 59,987.
The win came a season after the Ducks lost to the Beavers in Corvallis despite a 21-point second-half lead and missed a chance to play in the 2022 Pac-12 championship game.
Next is another shot at redemption. This time against Washington, which beat Oregon 36-33 in Seattle on Oct. 14.
It was a loss that could have sent the Ducks into a tailspin. Instead, it became a rallying cry.
“Right after the game in Seattle, that was the first thing that I said, I said to the whole team and especially on the defensive side, I said, ‘We’re going to see that team again, I promise you that. Don’t lay your heads down,’ ” linebacker Jeffrey Bassa said. “We didn’t see that in the locker room. Guys were ready to go to work and they knew what was at stake. They knew we could control our future and control our destiny.”
The Ducks will be playing in their sixth Pac-12 championship game. The last time a team in the Pac-12 championship game defeated an opponent it had lost to earlier in the season was in 2014, when the Marcus Mariota-led Ducks beat Arizona for the conference crown and eventually played for the national title.
“After what happened at Washington, we’ve practiced really hard,” Oregon quarterback Bo Nix said. “But I think that on top of everything else, it adds a chip on your shoulder. We didn’t really have a choice. We couldn’t lose another game, and now that we put ourselves in a situation like this we’re going to continue to practice hard and put ourselves in the spot to go win the game.”
Oregon was in position to beat the Huskies six weeks ago.
In a wildly entertaining game with nearly 72,000 packed in Husky Stadium, the Ducks and Huskies traded blows all afternoon.
There were seven lead changes, including the final one with 1:38 left when quarterback Michael Penix Jr. threw an 18-yard touchdown to put Washington in the lead.
Oregon had a chance to tie the score, but Camden Lewis missed a game-tying 43-yard field goal try as time expired.
The Ducks outgained the Huskies 541 yards to 415.
Nix threw for 337 yards and two TDs. Penix threw for 302 and four scores.
“Just a chance to really prove ourselves, really prove what type of defense we are, really prove what type of team we are, you know?” cornerback Dontae Manning said when asked what it means to play the Huskies again. “We shouldn’t have lost that game. We’re a better team than that. We’re a totally different team from that game.”
And moving in the right direction, said Oregon coach Dan Lanning, who knew in October the Ducks were still in position to make the Pac-12 championship game despite the loss to the Huskies.
“You know it’s hard to celebrate in this profession when you’re always focused on what’s next,” Lanning said. “I expected us to be in this position because I know what our team’s capable of.”