Aside from the improbable Rose Bowl/Cotton Bowl run of 1994 and 1995, the Oregon Ducks in the pre-BCS Pac 10 era (1978-1997) were the definition of mediocre. Terrible no, their counterparts up the road in Corvallis can take that title. Oregon was a slowly building program under Rich Brooks that typically played just well enough to lose to the better teams in the Pac 10 and would pull a home upset from time to time but typically found themselves in the bottom half of the Pac 10 and on the outside of the bowl picture. Oregon typically followed the model of playing one team from the Big 10 or Big 8 and two teams from western part of the country to round out the OOC schedule. Here are my picks for the Top 5 non-conference wins by the Oregon Ducks from the pre-BC S Pac 10 era:
5. 1995 Oregon 34 Illinois 31 – Illinois was certainly no juggernaut but they did have two future NFL draft picks in their linebacking core in Kevin Hardy and Simeon Rice and were a consistent bowl participant in that time. This was a close exciting and a bit higher scoring game they perhaps would have been projected with Gang Green facing off against the illini. This back and forth game was won by the Ducks when safety Jaiya Figueras forced Illinois to fumble and then recovered the ball in the endzone. This was the first of Mike Bellotti’s many home wins at Autzen Stadium in a season that saw Oregon go to the Cotton Bowl.
4. 1994 Oregon 40 Iowa 18 The Iowa Hawkeyes had some glory years under the legendary Hayden Fry but at the time of this game were a mediocre program as Fry’s career came to its end. No one expected anything out of Oregon who had gone 5-6 in 1993 and had just lost back to back games to Hawaii and Utah in pretty convincing fashion. The Ducks put together a 40-18 win that not many around the country would notice. The win over Iowa did however turn around Oregon’s season and the players gained a lot of confidence from the solid win over a traditionally strong Big 10 team. The next week the Ducks would be noticed by the entire college football world as they would go down to LA and knock off the heavily favored Trojans and would go on to their first Rose Bowl since the 1950’s.
3. 1989 Oregon 44 Iowa 6 – Iowa did not have a very good 1989 season however the next year they would find themselves in the Rose Bowl and in the previous 7 years before that they had been to bowls. This era was probably the height of the Hayden Fry era and for that 1989 game to start the Hawkeye’s season they were ranked in the Top 5 of the AP poll. Oregon was coming off a very disappointing 6-6 campaign that had stared out great for the Ducks. They had climbed as high as 12th in the poll and had a 6-1 record with only a close loss to #2 in the country USC. However, Oregon would lose a 22-21 game at Autzen to Arizona State and in the process also lose star QB Bill Musgrave. Without Musgrave the Ducks never won another game and had no national expectations for much success as they had not played in a bowl game since 1963. To almost everyone’s surprise the Ducks went on the road to Iowa City and pulverized the Hawkeyes who were one of the few teams to ever be ranked in the Top 5 to start a season and not have a winning record. You could say Oregon ruined their season before it even started. The Ducks on the other hand took the momentum from this game and ended up winning their first bowl game since 1963, an Independence Bowl win over Tulsa. In the 26 seasons previous to 1989 Oregon played in zero bowl games, since 1989 Oregon has only failed to play in a bowl game 4 times.
2. 1987 Oregon 10 Colorado 7 This low scoring affair was played in Boulder, Colorado to start the 1987 season. Oregon had just seen their best QB since Dan Fouts, local boy Chris Miller move on to the NFL as a first round draft pick of the Atlanta Falcons. In his place stepped in a freshman from Colorado that virtually no one had ever heard of named of Bill Musgrave. Musgrave lead the Ducks to a win over the steadily improving Buffs in his very first start. All of a sudden Oregon fans had something that had been lacking since the days of Mel Renfro and that thing was hope. The Ducks would finish 1987 with a winning record but were denied a bowl bid mainly because of a mid-season four game losing streak.
1. 1990 Oregon 32 BYU 16 – BYU was on top of the college football world of beating then #1 and defending national champion Miami the week before in Provo. Perhaps they overlooked the Ducks or perhaps it was Musgrave and Autzen magic at play but the favored Cougars were physically beat down by Oregon in this game. Ty Detmer would have over 400 yards passing but BYU could not get any running game going at all and Detmer would throw five picks three of them to Darryle Smith. I am still not sure that Autzen has ever been louder than it was for this game. The game was shown to a large audience on ABC and gave great exposure to the program nationally.
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