Nevada Dawg

Rashada is indeed talented. But Kirby took him, I'm told, for two reasons. First, Kirby practically insists on having four scholarship QBs on the roster and Rashada fits that niche. The second reason is that Kirby was impressed by the kid's competitiveness. Rashada could have been a starter elsewhere but preferred to sign with UGA despite having little if any chance of seeing playing time in 24. Plus, the current and future QB room is absolutely stacked through 2026 with top commits, so there is no assurance that he will ever start in Athens. Yet, Kirby sold the "development" factor and loved that the kid was willing to bet on himself. Who knows if Rashada's bet will pay off, but ya gotta love the kid's confidence in himself.

And this is how the invasion can come to pass. The economic incentive could end up too enticing to pass with fans who hold extra tickets. And I'd not assume that there aren't people, seeing the appeal of the battle of the Os, purchased blocks of tickets to cash in on this opportunity. (Sure hope that I am wrong however).

Having lived in Ohio for four years, I can almost assure you that, if it looks like the game in Autzen is shaping up as the B1G game of he season, I'd suspect that there will be far in excess of 3,000 Bucks fans in the stadium that night. Hopefully it will be fewer than 10,000 of them, but Ohioans will pay what it takes to get in that stadium if sufficiently motivated. Fans there are about as rabid as they are in the SEC.

Are there controls over what students can do with their tickets? When Georgia played at Notre Dame in 2017, Dawg fans were able to obtain many of the student tickets I am told. They were also buying far more tickets, literally thousands of them, by flashing the green to ND partisans that saw the opportunity to make a quick buck. The result was that the crowd that night at Notre Dame Stadium was estimated at about 35-40% Dawg fans. Lets hope that the Oregon fans have a little more discipline and risk temptation to sell out to the enemy.

Those of you who replied (either directly or indirectly) to my skepticism make some really good points. I know well the way the PAC-12 was barely visible to those east of the rocky mountains except at r\Rose Bowl time. And even then, many had to look to see who had won the conference out West. I remember lamenting the fact that Christian McCaffrey, IMHO the far and away best player in college football during his senior year, was snubbed for the Heisman because many voters had never seen him play. I do understand your sentiments! But I also still fear for the future of college football. Can't help it; it is a legitimate concern to me. Now I'll promise to go mute on the subject and see how it all plays out. Oh, as for being at the top of the college football heap- how recent that has been. My Dawgs had spent what seemed an eternity wandering the wilderness, every so often putting together a very good team that always faltered at some point, robbing themselves of a chance to grab the brass ring. Yes, I can breath easier these days knowing that the Dawgs have a coach that will put them in position to win it all, almost on an annual basis. But actually winning it all is not as important as being in position to win it all if things break right. Oregon is not that far away from being in the same position, and that is why, I think, that many of you are quite all right with the move to the B1G. But, nevertheless, I will still miss the ole Pac-12 and its traditions.

I guess I'm still a skeptic in some ways. Charles's point #1 still resonates with me. I have hated the Big-10 since I was about 10 years old (almost seven decades) and still do. For better or worse the Ducks are now in it so I will root for them to kick butt. This is do-able I feel with Lanning at the helm, but maybe not as quickly as many of you suspect. But, hey, maybe I am wrong. Charles's point 4 also strikes a cord--and that's tragic for college football IMHO. At this point, it is impossible to know what transpires over the next decade, but if the glory is distributed only among the 34 members of the Power-2, the ole game I knew and loved is badly diminished. I would sure as heck hate to see 30-40% of Div-! teams give up the expensive sport of football because they have little of any chance of hoisting the big glass trophy, and for this reason, no one much cares about football any longer. Maybe I'm overly pessimistic, but I am no where as giddy about recent events as many Duck fans seem to be.

Straight line speed is for more important for CBs and Stars than for safeties. There are several safeties in the NFL who run 4.7-4.8 but have the instincts and ball skills to make up for it. Plus, I suspect that after a year of strength and conditioning Woodyard will be running in the mid to low 4.6s. I trust Georgia's and Saban's Alabama evals of Woodyard and will stand on my earlier comment. I think you'll be glad you have him.

I still recall my first post on the OBD forum about how you would come to love Dan Lanning. Your comments tonight make me realize how I hadn't really stuck my neck out at all. I am overjoyed that Lanning has far exceeded my initial expectations, and the best part is that he is just getting started. Yes, indeed, you've hit the jackpot!

For the record in light of my earlier comment, I fully anticipate Woodyard to become a strong contributor for the Ducks.

Saw a number of favorable posts today about the Woodward pickup on the Talk'N Dawgs site. Woodward had at one time early been a Georgia commit who bailed when the DB room became too crowded in Athens for his taste. Most of the commenters thought this to be good pickup for Lanning and Co. The one reservation a couple of the coaches on the board had about Woodyard was his 4.8 speed in the 40. But another guy pointed out that this time by a 17-year-old likely improves after a year or two of strength and conditioning. He also noted that Woodyard's cousin Kyle Hamilton was also running 4.8s in high school and went on to become a consensus All American at Notre Dame and first-round NFL draftee, so obviously a 4.8 40 time at this juncture foretells absolutely nothing in itself. I found this information about Woodyard interesting and thought I'd pass it along.

I wonder about the criteria for arriving at these rankings. Is it number of needs addressed weighted by the perceived quality of the signees to address those needs? By these criteria, our Ducks would have to be rated very highly. I'd also think that coaches with the mindset that the best pathway to success is retention of people on the rosters whom are well known commodities, such as Kirby Smart and Ryan Day, might never be rated very highly on portal classes because they have fewer needs to address and would rather spend their NIL resources on known entities who could otherwise be tempted by "tampering" solicitations from afar. Having mentioned here Day here, Ohio State would almost certainly be rated highly this year in part by the pick-ups of ridiculously talented running back Judkins from Ole Miss and safety Caleb Downs from Alabama. But without knowing the set of factors involved in generating the ratings, I tend to take off-season lists of this type as of dubious value (though am still glad to see the Ducks rated highly' regardless of the criteria).

Wow a bombshell here. I was just wondering while watching the Natty tonight how much longer Cal would last at UK when his "high school superstar one and done" model was no longer the key to success in the NCAAs. Moving to Arky is not being banished to the netherworld. Nolan Richardson proved that big time winning is not impossible there, that's for sure. But the model has to change. For one thing, I doubt Coach Cal can have the success recruiting the elite of high school basketball to Fayetteville. And even if he could, his model is stale. I used to think that UK could be a consistently dominating program if Cal could get the guys he recruited to stick around three years, mature, and experience the value of teamwork. I remember thinking that NIL may be the key to bringing this about. Yet I have heard through the grapevine that many of the UK players did not ever go to class, had no interest in so doing, and probably wouldn't have remained eligible for much longer than a semester or two. It will be interesting, if this move comes to pass, to watch Coach Cal try to adapt to the changing landscape of college hoops.

Today was the first time I( have seen Paopao play. She hit a couple or three clutch treys to blunt the valiant Iowa attempts to come back in the second half. Otherwise, a relatively quiet but effective player who played good defense.

This was one of the least analytical, poorly reasoned football articles I have read in some time. Somebody (maybe as many as two people given the methodology) actually rated Deion Sanders as one to the top 10 college coaches today. I listened to the podcast of a Georgia fan, Uncle Lou. while walking today and thought he might have a stroke. Given his success year after year in the B1G, Ryan Day at 10. Given his long record of success at the top of college football, Brian Kelly left out of the top 10? I could go on and on. Ole Uncle Lou, who, like me, loves Dan Lanning was critical of DL's #6 ranking because he hasn't won anything meaningful yet. He thinks highly rated Deboer is crusin for a brusin at Bama. Several other well respected and very successful coaches get no respect in this trashy piece IMHO.

To those who responded to my post above, you make some valid points to be sure. The people I called out in that post are obviously not college football fanatics and (thankfully) have nothing to do with rankings, seedings, etc. The point I was making, tongue in cheek I might add, is that our Ducks' web print is not as wide as many on the forum believe it is. Sorry if I bruised some egos, but I'll stick with my wider characterization.

I think y'all might be surprised by how many people know absolutely nothing about Oregon and Oregon football. Prior to the 21 season opener against Georgia in the Benz. a Midwesterner I know asked me who Georgia had as an opponent in the opener. When I replied Oregon, he remarked "I didn't know they played football." Another women from Illinois who followed the B1G but nobody else, when told about Georgia's opener (she went to grad school in Athens) said "The Oregon Ducks! I never heard of the Oregon Ducks. You made that up!" C'est la vie.

I am not much of a golfer but I do enjoy the weekend rounds of he Masters. I heard an interesting story about the seeming miracle shot Bubba hit out of the right rough after he had apparently blowing the lead (and seemingly the tournament) late on Sunday. The commentators were absolutely amazed by that shot which damn near reached the green if memory serves me. Yet the tale was that the Georgia coaches and players were saying something like "Now Bubba's got them where he wants him", having seen him hit that same shot multiple times in his career. Another lesser known story was that Bubba marched to his own drummer and played far less than he probably should have in Athens over clashes with the coaching staff. Don't quote this information as it is heresay, but the source was in a position to have known if this was true.

Given where you live Jon, I can't imagine even thinking of any other golf contests now with Masters week on the near horizon. Were I in your neck of the woods, I'd almost certainly be trying (almost certainly unsuccessfully) to wrangle a pass to at least one round of the tournament in Augusta. The one round I did see a few years back was awesome and a former student and Dawg won the Green Jacket (Bubba Watson).

Agree that no conference should ever have 8 bids. A couple of years back I believe it was, the B1G had nine bids and I seem to remember that none of them or only one survived the third round. The SEC was down this year and may come close to matching the historically bad B1G performance above. I was unaware of them, but after reading a little about Indiana State, it is a absolute travesty that they were snubbed in the NCAA selection over teams 7&8 in the Big-12 and SEC, a couple of dud B1G teams and such ACC powers as Virginia who were eliminated on the court in the play-in round. Good mid-majors have proved for many years that they can often make real noise in this tournament. One even played for the title last year for gosh sake.

In all fairness, I thought that this was a major down year for SEC basketball. They (and the selection committee) have reached the point, (long enjoyed by the B1G) where they receive far more selections to the dance than they probably deserve. And too many of this year's selections were overseeded. Have your chuckles now:They are well deserved this year. But I guarantee that it won't take long for the SEC to rebound from the dismal showing of 2024.

I noted in the second half that the Ducks were working their as--s off shutting off the 3-point shot and told by good Duck buddy that if they can continue this effort they'd win the game. This is one factor I think, I think that contributed to their running out of gas in OT. This is hardly a criticism on my part for the Ducks had little choice; otherwise Creighton may well have shot them out of the arena. This Duck team was a pleasant surprise.; It was hard NOT to get caught up in the late season momentum, particularly the thrilling run to the PAC-12 championship This was hardly the most talented team around but certainly a damn gritty one. My hat is off to them.

I get the point about the built-in advantage of playing an 8-game conference schedule in the SEC. But Georgia's OOC games in 2025 include ,besides Furman or whomever, UCLA in the Rose Bowl and a rapidly improving Georgia Tech squad for 10 power-4 opponents.

As an SEC partisan, I absolutely hate the 1-7 8-game slate made even worse by repeating the same opponents in consecutive years. There is no guarantee that this will extend beyond the 2025 year, but why repeat the same opponents anyhow. Were it to persist with eventual rotating of yearly opponents, two traditional rivalries per team will not occur every year. I am forced to conclude that Jon J. may be right about this being a ploy to extract more $$$ from ESPN to schedule a 9th conference game. I suspect that a fair number of SEC partisans are going to have sour feelings about the SEC scheduling model. This complete recycling of opponents really stinks in my humble opinion!

As opportunistic as the Ducks were coming down the stretch, I'd pick them to win this one as well. South Carolina is talented but has been wildly inconsistent at times this season. For example, they let down their guard and lost at home to a mediocre Georgia team earlier in the season. You never know which version of the Gamecocks is likely to show up.

I should have noted that I like the Ducks QB room a lot.