You know it’s a marquee matchup when ESPN’s College Gameday has a planned visit.
It’s been a while since Oregon has hosted a game with this type of national attention, and it’s certainly the first of its kind in the Dan Lanning Era.
A national television audience will be watching as No. 9 UCLA comes to Eugene with a perfect 6-0 record to take on No. 10 Oregon.
If there’s anyone who knows what Autzen can be like it’s the coach on the other sideline in Chip Kelly.
The Ducks had a bye week to prepare for their biggest game since the Georgia contest in Week 1. But this time it’s against a familiar opponent and in front of a friendly, but raucous crowd of 56,000 inside Autzen.
Doing his best Chip Kelly impression, Lanning says the extra-curricular activities will be present, but ultimately won’t affect the overall outcome.
“The environment, the noise, the fans, all those pieces are great elements, but none of those things are playing the game,” said Lanning Monday evening from the HDC.
“So none of that’s really going to have a factor. Playing here before, that can be a factor in this game. He’s got great experience in this place. I’m sure he has some fond memories in this place. But none of that’s really going to carry into what actually has to happen from an execution standpoint on the field.”
When Kelly was coaching the Ducks, having a national audience, having GameDay in Eugene, and playing a Top 10 team were almost a weekly occurrence.
But it’s been four years since the Pac-12 has had two Top 10 teams face each other and Oregon hasn’t been a part of such a game since 2014.
“(It’s) about to be a fun one. Really exciting, obviously it’s gonna be a great atmosphere for our players, but also our fans,” Lanning said.
“I know me and including everybody else in our organization am really excited to see our fans come out in full support. I mean obviously having College GameDay here is going to be a great event. (We) get the opportunity to go against a top-10 team and a really worthy opponent. It’s going be a fun challenge for us and our players.”
This is also the first time Lanning and his staff have enjoyed a bye week.
Everyone will get to see how they handled it, what improvements have been made, etc. Staffs in the past have handled their bye week better than others.
The goal is to get better and Lanning feels like the Ducks did that.
“I thought they did a great job” Lanning said.
“You know, really, each day we had some individual improvement plans that each one of our guys attacked,”
“(They) got some great recovery and some great work in throughout the process as well. Had some really productive practices. Have been around a lot of teams during bye week and not every team gets better during by week. I thought our team got better.”
MONDAY PRESSER; LANNING DISCUSSES BIG UCLA MATCHUP