The pundit class had an embarrassing day when Oregon manhandled Iowa

Oregon went into Kinnick Stadium this weekend and beat Iowa at their own brand of football, winning with the running game, special teams and defense, 18-16 on a cold, wet Saturday afternoon in Iowa City.

Before the game the voices of college football's podcasters, analysts and talking heads busied themselves forecasting doom for the Ducks. One by one they trotted out the worn, dated assumptions about Oregon not being physical enough for a bruising Big Ten game.

Kirk Herbstreit came on the Pat McAfee Show and whispered, "Oregon loses Saturday." Saturday morning on ESPN College GameDay he doubled down on the doubt. "Iowa in November, they always get somebody, and this is going to be the somebody."

On the Fox Sports postgame show ahead of the game panelist Bruce Feldman said, "I don't think the Ducks are going to make the playoffs." In the preseason he had them at 9-3, losing at Penn State, Iowa and Washington. So far he's 0-2.

At GameDay Herbstreit said, "Oregon can't run the football the way you would expect them to run the football." Nick Saban agreed. "When they've not been able to run the football and have balance, they've struggled a bit."

Somehow 12 years after Chip Kelly, Marcus Mariota and the Blur Offense the image persists of Oregon as a soft, finesse team with a hurry-up spread offense and a lack of physicality in the trenches, something that wasn't true then and isn't remotely true now.

Bryce Boettcher told the media after the game, Oregon's always been the team of the flashy uniforms and fast spread offense, explosive. Coming to the Big Ten, I get it, Iowa's been a classic team running the ball, I-formation, and we did it better than them tonight, which is pretty cool to see."

What happened instead was that the Ducks went into another of the conferences storied environments on a tough day for throwing the football and outgained the Hawkeyes 373-239. They ran for 261 yards, the most against an Iowa defense since 2022.

Oregon averaged 7.3 yards a carry in the pouring rain despite missing their starting right tackle and four best receivers. They held Iowa to 3.3.

Guard Emmanuel Pregnon led the way with a PFF run block grade of 82.3, but it was a team effort by the Oregon offensive line, which ran through an Iowa defensive line that going into the contest had limited opponents to 88 yards a game and 2.64 yards a carry. The Ducks pushed them off the ball.

All of the narratives about Oregon not being physical are utterly silly, and it's long since time they were retired. Nine games into the season the Ducks are No. 6 in the country in rushing yards per game and second in rushing yards per carry behind Navy, a triple option team that throws about 9 passes a game.

In fact, the Ducks are the only team in the country to rank in the top ten in both yards per play offense (6th, 7.28) and yards per play defense (3rd, 4.03). They win at the line of scrimmage, with physicality.

Instead of pace, they beat teams with variety and strength, an innovative attack that runs plays with the quarterback under center, counters, stretch plays and traps.

They powered through Iowa and when the game got tense they rose up and drove for a winning field goal. Note to the pundit class: Oregon is physical enough for the Big Ten, or anyone.