Oregon Ducks Season Is Not Lost, Experience Now Will Identify Team in 2016

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The Oregon Ducks are in a position for the rest of 2015 that they have not been in for close to ten years. With three losses on the year, the team needs to refocus and turn around the ship, that is clear, but they can do it without any pressure of the National Spotlight. There will be no College Football Playoff this season and no National Title run, which we already know. There may not even be a run for a Pac-12 Title, but that remains the one slight glimmer in a season that for many has already been written off as a failure. I will tell you this. The Oregon Ducks will turn this around.

Regardless of who is the Quarterback for this team, they still have one of the top rushing attacks in the nation led by Royce Freeman, who leads the Pac-12 Conference. He is in line to break the most rushing touchdowns by a back at Oregon, which is currently held by LaMike James. There is his ‘1B’ in Taj Griffin who has freaky fast De’Anthony Thomas speed and he likes the end zone pylon, which is never a bad thing. The rest of this season is about getting back for some, including Devon Allen who has broken the very deep Oregon Receiver Corps, but the rest of this season will look to get back to or near the top and become the threat he was before he was injured in the Rose Bowl last season. The pressure is off for this team, but the work ahead certainly is not.

The toughest part of the schedule remains ahead with games on the road at Washington and Stanford and home games against USC and Oregon State. Of course the Trojans are now a team that is reeling after the firing of their head coach Steve Sarkisian and also losing their Star Center Matt Turk to a knee injury for the rest of the season, but Cody Kessler is still better than any Quarterback that the Oregon Ducks can put on the field right know which should make for an entertaining game next month in Eugene.

It is a race for the record book, a chance to get the passing game back on track, and experience for some of these young guys in front of the crowd at Autzen Stadium, hopefully making the right decisions and the right reads the rest of the way, specifically on Defense. It is an opportunity to learn on the job, which they are always doing, but with a little less pressure that could make this team a key contender again in 2016.

The questions that have always seemed to surround this team will remain for 2016 concerning the Quarterback and the Defense, but if Oregon can put the pieces together and pick up some wins this season to at least get to a bowl game, those questions will be quieted slightly. Regardless of the rest of the year, Oregon faces Washington on the road this week, a game and series where the Ducks have the biggest winning streak in the nation. If nothing else this season, they need to win on Saturday night in Seattle. That will make at least part of the bandwagon bunch jump back on for the ride the rest of the season.

Oregon visits Washington for a 7:30pm Kickoff Saturday on ESPN2.

Next: Oregon Ducks and USC Trojans: More Similar Than You Think

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