Oregon gridiron fans eager for 2026 as two major worries linger

Like Bob Marley's three little birds, the kids will be all right.

Entering their fifth season as the masterminds of the Oregon juggernaut, head coach Dan Lanning and Chief of Staff Marshall Malchow have crafted a brilliantly constructed roster with two major potential flaws: They're replacing three starters on the offensive line, one an All-American, and inside linebacker Bryce Boettcher's 136 tackles are bound for rookie mini-camp with the Indianapolis Colts.

Don't worry...about a thing.

In SuperWest Sports composite of of post spring Top 25 college football rankings, an aggregate of 21 media polls, the Ducks are again That Team Out West and among the favorites for the national championship, yet at last week's Spring Game, the patchwork, split-squad offensive line gave up 10 touch-sacks with quarterbacks in a noncontact jersey.

It was enough to give the most fervent Oregon fans a case of Peach Bowl PTSD, but the concern has to be tempered.

In spring, defenses are always ahead. You'd be worried if they weren't

First, the Oregon defensive line is going to be really, really good, possibly the deepest, most disruptive, stingy, nasty defensive front in college football with four early-round NFL draft picks returning for their senior seasons, plus Aydin Breland, Matthew Johnson, Nasir Wyatt and Elijah Rushing coming off the bench as a fresh wave of mayhem.

Second, entering his fourth season, o-line coach A'lique Terry has established himself as a meticulous teacher of offensive line play. His previous three units have all reached the final twelve for the Joe Moore Award. He's turned tackle Josh Conerly and guard Emmanuel Pregnon into NFL players, Conerly developing into a first-rounder in just three seasons at UO.

Terry's trench monsters specialize in unity and cohesiveness. Think of the nail-biting wins over Penn State and Iowa, facing potent defensive lines and hostile crowds in legendary Big Ten road environments. The communication was perfect. The Ducks rushed for 176 and 261 yards, winning in double overtime before the White Out crowd in Happy Valley, 106,000 strong, turning away the Hawkeyes in the fourth quarter.

Terry taught them to master the silent count to combat crowd noise.

As outlined by newly retired CBS analyst Gary Danielson, this is discipline and technique executed at a high level under pressure. Despite Pregnon (1st round to the Jaguars,) Alex Harkey (Chargers, sixth round) and Isaiah World (ACL tear in the Peach Bowl loss to Indiana, undrafted free agent signing by the Chargers) departed for the NFL, the process is intact and in March it began again.

Center Iapani "Poncho" Laloulu returns as the emotional leader and triggerman, a passionate warrior from Farrington High school in Honolulu with 30 career starts. He's a projected first-round draft pick and the top center in college football, the linchpin Terry needs to build another Moore Award contender.

At one guard spot Dave Iuli takes his stance, a four-star from Puyallup, Washington with 19 career starts and five years in the program. Iuli excelled as a pass-blocker, allowing zero sacks in 486 snaps last season, just ten pressures. He and Poncho are the two stable building blocks.

Though new to the starting five everyone else has talent, most with multiple years in the program with one exception. Despite the turnover the Ducks brought in just one transfer, Michael Bennett III from Yale, two years All-Ivy first team coming out of Holy Innocents Episcopal School in Atlanta, Georgia, a three-year starter for the Brainiac Bulldogs who committed just one penalty in 2025 and once had 22 pancakes in one game as a prep.

At the pivotal position of left tackle Terry grooms four-star redshirt sophomore Fox Crader from Evergreen High School in Vancouver, Washington. Crader appeared in 10 games last year with a chunk of snaps at Kinnick Stadium and a start against USC in Oregon's November gauntlet, four straight wins against bowl teams.

He'll be pushed toward excellence by four-star redshirt freshman Ziyare Addison from Tampa, Florida, and two supremely talented true freshman behemoths, 6-7, 350 five-star Immanuel Iheanacho from Washington D.C., 6-6, 340 Tommy Tofi from San Francisco.

Grown men though barely 18, Tofi and Iheanacho will vie for early playing time somewhere in the rotation, either at guard or tackle. It's something to be sorted out in August, a task in which Terry and assistants Mike Cavanaugh and Ryan Walk specialize. They pride themselves on having three sets of eyes on every detail of the training.

Kawika Rogers and 2025 Bishop Gorman five-star Douglas Utu figure in the rotation somewhere. Rogers, a senior who started his career as a walk-on, has racked up 40 career appearances.

That's the thing. Terry's going to succeed again because the talent pool is too deep and the track record is too strong. In three seasons the Ducks have finished third, sixth and second in the conference in rushing offense (2023 in the PAC-12) while cranking out 199 yards a game last year.

With a veteran Bo Nix at the helm in 2023, the o-line surrendered just five sacks. Sacked 17 times in 2025, Dante Moore is now a redshirt junior with 20 college starts, so his ability to recognize protections and get rid of the football should tick up substantially.

On the other side of the ball the Buffalo Soldiers at linebacker will have to write their own Redemption Song. That's the next story. Meanwhile, the sun is shining in Eugene.

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