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EUGENE – It's an awkward sight to see 10 adult men who have just tried to embarrass each other in a stack of chess in an elevator and watch their shoes. But that's exactly what happened Saturday night at the Autzen stadium.
Oregon beat Arizona State 31-29 in a match as both teams tried to give themselves again and again before the weather ran out. Check mate? The Ducks assistant coaches on the fifth floor of the stadium put their earphones on the counter and stepped out of their training box to get into the elevator. Then the ASU coaches did the same thing.
An elevator. Ten silent passengers.
"So calm that you could hear a feather fall," said the operator of the elevator.
That's how the home football season has ended for Oregon. The Ducks scored three points in the second half. They improved to 7-4. The elevator doors came to an end and the offensive coordinator, Marcus Arroyo, and his colleagues headed down the ground floor, two seconds per floor, towards the week of the Civil War .
That's the thing about a lift ride, is not it?
You know how it ends. He goes up neither. Or down. Maybe it stops on a floor or two. But eventually, you arrive where you hoped and planned to go. And that is how much such conduct is different from that of a university football.
All lessons should not be painful.
The Oregon Ducks proved it by winning the game Saturday night. They played a respectable first half, then rolled into a ball, scored exactly three points in the second half, returned the ball four times in the game and still won.
"We started to support," said Cristobal, "we dropped some balls and made critical mistakes."
But the Ducks have won. And I feel a little bit like Oregon has one like that to come.
Let's face it, fumbling over Stanford's victory was painful. Getting 27-zip boat racing in the first half in the state of Washington hurts. Stacking the Arizona season in Tucson was a killing. The lessons were learned there in the midst of pain and anxiety, and these lift rides were not as enjoyable as the one that was mostly silent.
The first season of Cristobal will have at least seven wins. Maybe eight or even nine, if there is a bowl victory. But I wonder how many lessons have been learned and I'm determined, week after week, whether Arroyo will be the playmaker for next season.
Defeat Oregon State and win the Red Box Bowl or Cheez-It Bowl. You are a team of nine victories. Do this and keep your recruiting class and you are a team of nine wins with future talent. But I left Saturday night hoping especially that the lessons will be learned.
While Oregon was in the fetal position, hoping to lose the ASU win, Washington was busy scoring 69 points for Arizona, a win that overshadowed everything. Gardner Minshew threw for 300 yards and five touchdowns – in the first half. Then came out in the second half and continued to kill.
The Ducks won their match. But the pumas have won the night. It's the world of college football in which we live. And I wondered then that Oregon managed to win if the Ducks left knowing that the points you have on the board at the beginning of the third quarter are never enough.
"We felt we could run and continue on the track and the dynamics we had in the first half," said Cristobal. "We had some mistakes."
Oregon has nine real freshmen on the list. There are five other freshmen. There are 15 sophomores. The Oregon formation counted 75 stock players – 10 less than the norm – because of a mismanaged training of Willie Taggart and Mark Helfrich.
Cristobal had to call 24 people to complete his team of scouts. Then the wounds came. The left tackle was injured. The two offensive guards fell. A defensive key player was lost.
No excuses. Explanations In addition, Arroyo simply does not use quarterback Justin Herbert as he should. Not sure he'll ever do it. Still, the Ducks have won 8-9 games this season. And that's where they are. Despite the painful lessons learned and some difficult evenings of their past.
Oregon has played four ranked teams in the Top 25 this season. He lost at the time-no. Stanford. He beat then-No. Cal. He beat then-No. 7 Washington. And he lost at the time-No. 25 WSU.
"Our goal was to go to the locker room tonight at 11:30 pm and be 1-0," Cristobal said. "Ironically, it was 11:30 pm when we entered."
In addition, they were 1-0 Saturday.
I do not stop thinking about the thought-provoking scene a month ago in Pullman, when the Ducks lost by two touchdowns to the Cougars. Two Oregon defensive players who stopped as they left the field to watch the WSU supporters sweep the field impressed me a lot.
Safety Brady Breeze, was one of the onlookers.
He was standing right at the edge of the field, looking at all of it, absorbing perspective. Because, as Breeze told a teammate, "I want to remember it."
We all look back from the edge of the field sometimes.
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