What Dan Lanning said after Oregon beats USC

DAN LANNING

Opening Statement…

“All right, that was a fun one tonight. Our crowd, again, was unbelievable, great atmosphere there. Really proud that we were able to go do that in that environment with our seniors. There’s some moments when you sit in that game and you’re frustrated because you know that we’re not performing to the best of our abilities. A great challenge—their team is obviously very explosive on offense. Ultimately, I think a lot of it comes down to the physicality that we talked about for us to be able to go out and rush for almost 180 yards and hold them to 52 rushing yards. Gives an indication of how do you win this game, what’s it look like? Special teams were special tonight. Obviously a huge punt return there from Malik. Disappointed in general, just our lack of composure at times. Thought obviously we were penalized in this game, gave up 130 yards of penalties. Some of them made sense, some of them maybe didn’t. But ultimately, there’s certainly some ones that we can clean up and attack. And we got to be better on third down, defensively. They had some moments there, but I thought defense showed up big there at the end of the game to get a stop. I thought they were big there at the beginning, into half for us to be able to control the middle eight, get the ball back. We didn’t do enough coming out at halftime, but we won the fourth quarter. That’s an area we wanted to be able to go attack. But overall, I’m really proud of our guys, proud to go beat a good team. These guys are a good team that we just played. And ultimately, looking for the opportunity for us to grow from this moment.”

On embodying strength in numbers this season…

“Yeah, you said it. I mean, all those moments showed up. And guys always talk about being ready for your opportunity, not waiting for your opportunity. There’s some guys that were ready for their opportunity when their number was called, and there’s some stuff that we can clean up. But we got a bunch of guys that want to go out there and battle for the man next to them. And they take a lot of pride in what they do. And to be able to take six minutes off the clock there on that last drive when they got a loaded box every down and the numbers for them are right, but we’re still able to out-push and finish physically. That’s what really matters. And you got a bunch of guys on this team that have unbelievable heart. Noah Whittington showed up the last four weeks in a big way for us. The way he’s run the ball, the way he works. You got Bryce Boettcher, you got a bunch of seniors that give it their all. Charlie Pickard, whose number hadn’t been called all year, and he comes in on senior night. I know that’s got to be a special moment for him, and there’s some moments to clean up for sure. But what an awesome way for him to get to enjoy senior night.”

On the Bryce Boettcher rushing touchdown and his performance on senior day…

“Yeah, he’s been asking for the ball a year, so you know. But we really put that in this week, something we worked it multiple times this week, worked it again yesterday, worked it Thursday practice, Wednesday practice. It’s something we felt like that we might be able to carry, and there’s some other defensive guys out there as well with A’mauri and Bear. But excited to see what it looks like on film. I don’t know if anybody could have kept Bryce from getting in that end zone whenever we gave him that opportunity.”

On keeping the pocket clean despite multiple offensive line injuries…

Yeah, I have to go back and watch the film, but I mean, you said it. We were able to keep our quarterback clean. I thought he did a good job of decision making. I know he had the one turnover, but ultimately, when you have a lot of changing parts, that’s tough, especially with a unit that has to play together in a cohesive unit. And those guys went out there and did that. There was some pre-snap penalties that we have to clean up, a couple errors that we definitely have to get better at and work on getting our guys healthy to see what we can look like moving forward.”

On Malik Benson’s punt return touchdown and being prepared for that role…

“Another great example of a guy being ready for his opportunity. And you saw his speed. We’ve seen his speed all season, especially when he’s able to go feel that punt. We did feel like we were going to have some aggressive opportunities for us on punt return there. He was going to have a chance. I thought he did a great job of fielding the ball and getting the high gear and getting vertical quick. I’m sure we’re going to turn on the film and see some great blocks on that as well. But it was an awesome play, huge momentum swing in the game for sure. And great opportunity for them to feel like now that they have to chase some points, right, rather than us be battling back and forth.”

On keeping the players levelheaded but still competitive…

“Yeah, for me all week we’ve talked about not worrying about that because the fire and passion are going to come on its own.We’ve talked all week about execution, not emotion, and it’s unfortunate that that showed up. But I hope that can be a learning lesson to this group, and we can take that and grow from it. You’re going to play this game, you’re going to play with juice, especially if you play here.These guys care about each other, they love it, right? But we got to be able to reset and get to the next play. We didn’t do that enough today. We did that in the second half much better.”

On putting pressure on USC’s offense…

“Yeah, I mean, I think it’s huge when you can take away a team’s strength. I think they’ve been able to run the ball really well this season and for us to be able to stop it was big. But obviously we want to go back and clean up some of the passing attack that they had, their quarterback’s special. They have some wideouts that made some big-time plays today, contested catches. It was a physical game from that standpoint. They were certainly going to attack the ball, our guys were trying to battle and fight and keep them from getting the ball. And we can go improve that and get better in that area. And then just go evaluate it. But proud that we can, like I said, coming in here rushing for 180 yards and then rushing for 52, I think tells a big story.”

On Fox Crader being ready for his moment…

“Yeah, no, I mean, he prepared really well this week. Our coaches have a lot of confidence in him. And again, a guy being ready for that, that means he did a lot of work until he got that opportunity to, right? That doesn’t just happen on accident. That’s a guy that’s working his tail off. World rolled his ankle in the very first play of last game. Right, and played the entire game. It tells you a little bit about his toughness. But it was severe enough that we felt like he was pretty limited today. Coming in and felt like he could go at moments, but Fox was ready. And certainly have to watch the film and evaluate it. But thought he did some really good things today.”

On the senior class and tracking them down after the game…

“Yeah, it’s just special. Again, this will be a day, I think all of us, as we play, we remember our last time getting to play, and especially at the stadium. And I told our guys, you probably just added another opportunity if we continue to do our job that you get to play here again. And ultimately, just for those guys to have that moment, to be able to enjoy that moment, we all wanted to put it on the line for the seniors today, and the guys did that.”

On if he likes the ball in Bryce Boettcher’s hands or if this was more a play for senior night…

“No, not really. I love Bryce, but I like our backs too. We got some pretty good backs back there, but I love Bryce. And I’ll tell you this, he’s going to remind me that he’s probably 100% every time he carries the ball getting a touchdown, so you might see it again. Unbelievable job by him, great job by our offensive staff, coming up with some creativity that we knew that they hadn’t prepared for. So really good execution.”

On responding to USC’s big momentum plays…

“There are moments I thought we responded really well, and there’s moments we could certainly get better. What I loved was the temperament of our team, right? Regardless, we knew they were going to throw some punches, right? That’s an explosive offense. They hit some big plays on us. I was really pleased with the guys being able to hit the reset button and saying, ‘Let’s go again.’ Obviously, the back-to-back pass interference calls are frustrating. There’s some moments that we definitely want to have back. But ultimately, nobody ever had a long face. When those moments happened, they were ready for the next play and realizing they could make an impact.”

On why he is always asked about his commitment to Oregon…

“I’ll start with one. No, I don’t mind the question. But I guess ultimately, people realize at this point that I’m not interested in being anywhere else. Like I’ve said for a long time, as long as I win, I get the opportunity to be here. That’s on me, right? So this is where I’ll be as long as I do that. What I can speak to is that my situation is so good that I feel really comfortable saying that, right? I love this place. And more than that, I love the commitment that they’ve given to me, right? Somebody gave me this opportunity; not everybody gets that. I can’t speak for anybody else’s situation when it comes to that. So it probably tells you how special Oregon is, right? And certainly how special I feel getting to be here and getting to coach here. What a privilege that is for me. That’s something I’ll never take for granted, and I want to be able to see it through.”

On our winning the turnover battle and its momentum in the game…

“Yeah, we thought takeaways would be a big piece of this game. It was a common denominator in some of the losses that they’ve had so far this season. We wanted to be able to protect the ball. Obviously, we turned it over once as well. But I thought our ball security was really good today. Those guys do as good a job as anybody of attacking the ball when it comes to their defense. But our runners ran well with the ball today. And then I thought our defense certainly attacked it. You could go argue that on the fourth down, it would have been better to knock it down and save us a couple yards, right, rather than take away. But some big plays today for sure.”

On having a variety of wins this season…

“Yeah, this is an example that we can beat you in multiple ways, right? We can outscore you at times, right? We can hold you to an 18-16 type game. We can win in tough environments, any weather. Put the ball down, let’s go play football. That’s the kind of team that we have. But I’m excited to see the growth that we can walk away from and say, okay, how can we do this better? And there’s definitely going to be some moments like that coming out of this game. We’re going to see some elite passing attacks throughout the season. That’s something where we can improve. But ultimately, proud overall of this team’s performance today.”

On how he wishes for the CFP Committee to view Oregon going into playoffs…

“Well, we just played a really good team. We beat them. And a lot of times we play really good teams that become unranked all of a sudden. That’s not our fault, right? Maybe it is our fault. But all we’re worried about is playing the teams that we play and doing the job that we need to do. And we did that job today, right? I think proof’s in the pudding, right? Played a good team, we beat them, right? All we can do next week is try to do the same thing, right? And this conference is a really good conference. It’s competitive, right? We didn’t play Chattanooga State today, right? Like some other places, right? We competed. So that being said, it’s tough playing nine conference games. It’s tough playing in this league. And we got to take advantage of playing a good team today and attacking that.”

On when “strength in numbers” became the motto for this team…

“Yeah, it probably started early in the season. We were playing some of those games, and we’re playing 70 guys in a game. We’re playing 80 guys in a game. You’re realizing, again, if you’re good enough, you’re old enough. If you can play winning football, you deserve an opportunity to be on the field. And those moments are starting to pay off for us. You never know when it’s going to play out. We’ve been really fortunate when it comes to the injury bug here. And this year, it’s been a little bit different. We’ve dealt with a couple of those things. But ultimately, guys have shown that they’re ready. And when you’re ready for your opportunity, that’s a special moment.”

On Kenyon Sadiq’s performance and if he holds his breath when Kenyon hurdles defenders…

“No, I just say, ‘I wish I could do that.’ Kenyon’s a special man. And I always have a good feeling whenever I’m able to touch base with him before a pregame, and he just kind of gave me that look, like I’m ready to roll today, which is awesome. And our other tight ends played well today, too. I mean, Jamari had some big plays. But Kenyon’s a special player, man. I think we’re lucky to have the best tight end in the nation. His play has shown that. We’re better when he’s out there with us. And certainly, he’s a tough guy to defend, right? Whether it’s him lining up at wide out or if he’s blocking in the C area, he does this at a really high level.”