Scout.com: Same old story, same old results.

Same old story, same old results.

This story originally published on eDuck.com

By Steve Summers

eDuck Sports
Posted Nov 2, 2003

In its 84th season as the home for University of Washington football Husky Stadium proved to be a place that fragile psyches need not apply. After leading at halftime, 10-7 the Oregon Ducks could not find the end zone and more importantly their cool.

Oregon lost to Washington 42-10 in a game too eerily reminiscent of last years debacle in Eugene when the Ducks lost 42-14.

The Ducks started off reasonably enough. Sophomore Kellen Clemens drove Oregon's offense from their own 20 yard line to the Washington's 19 and it was there Jared Siegel kicked a 36-yard field goal to give the Ducks a 3-0 lead. In Washington's opening possession, it appeared the Ducks were indeed bolstered by their win over Stanford last week. It was three and out and after exchanging possessions, Clemens scrambled out of trouble on his own 15 yard line and hit a streaking Demetrius Williams for an 84 yard catch and run for a touchdown. With Siegel's point after the Ducks found themselves in the driver seat and the Husky faithful found themselves sitting on their hands.

Then along came James -- Kenny James. The redshirt freshman hadn't done much in the way of having 100-yard games until Saturday night. James was impressive as he darted, dashed and proved to be the Huskies answer to Oregon's ability to stop the run. James rushed for 104 yards on just 18 carries with his longest of 56 yards and just like an ad selling a superset of ginzu knives, that's not all. James fellow redshirt freshman Shelton Sampson topped James impressive effort by running for 131 yards on only six carries, scoring three times.

So much for Oregon's vaunted run defense.

The first half went reasonably well for Oregon. Washington starting quarterback Cody Pickett was effective in finding receivers and keeping the ball moving but the only thing Washington could for their efforts was a 17 play, 83-yard drive ending up with Sampson first score for the night. Somewhere along the line Pickett, the cowboy from Idaho must have been thrown off his horse because when the second half started he was on the sideline because he had been kicked in the head. Enter Casey Paus. Paus didn't have that many throws, only eight in fact, but he completed five passes for 117 yards and two touchdowns. How does that happen?

One thing that happened was the No. 1, Reggie Williams was quiet during the first half but on one simple slant Williams caught the ball in full stride and took off for a 63 yard touchdown score. Lights out.

"Those explosion plays killed us," said Safety Marley Tucker. "Up until the second half we were controlling the game, we were controlling the ball and we were up. Then it took a turn for the worse."

Really though, Oregon Head Coach Mike Bellotti had forewarned Duck nation on what the problem could be -- execution and turnover to takeaway ratio. The Ducks came out in the second half and were penalized seven times in the second half for a total of 10 penalties for 74 yards. That in itself isn't bad, but the penalties in the second half came in bunches and resulted in Oregon finding itself in poor field position or at least needing to make long third down conversions to keep their drives going. The problem was that they didn't make the conversions ending up 5-of-14 on third down conversion compared to Washington's 10-of-17. The other factor that spelled doom for the Ducks was turnovers. Oregon played a flawless first half, but then the turnover bug hit. Clemens was picked off once and fumbled twice. One of his fumbles looked like an interception, but was ruled a fumble and Greg Carothers returned it for a 50 yard touchdown and the party was over. Incidentally, the Huskies did not turn the ball over.

"I think you have to create your own field position," said Bellotti. "I don't think we did that. I think the offense did not support the defense in the third quarter."

Perhaps Oregon fans have some ground to complain. Washington was only flagged twice for 25 yards and that was late in the game. One of their penalties was a personal foul on Khalif Barnes for a hit in the back on Keith Lewis. The hit was well after the play was over and clearly a personal foul. Too bad Lewis retaliated with some words, because Barnes then pushed Lewis and the flags flew. Offsetting penalties. Oregon's problem though was not what was called or not called on Washington, it was Oregon's inability to execute in the second half.

"We played very poorly," observed Bellotti on his team performance. "We turned the ball over, we gave them the big plays, we broke ourselves down. It was horrible."

There were some bright spots for Oregon. Dee Williams recorded his fourth 100-yard receiving game ending up with 110 yards on five receptions and one touchdown. The last Duck to have four 100 yards receiving games was Marshawn Tucker back 2000. Jason Fife was impressive running the ball. Fife had 42 net yards on six attempts. Terrence Whitehead was Oregon's leading runner with 54 net yards on 19 carries. One injury note, Marcus Miller may have torn his ACL, according to Bellotti.

All in all, it was another version of the same recording that has taken place over the last two years for the Ducks. Poor field position, a defense that wears down and gives up explosive plays and an offense that can not sustain drives. Oh and costly penalties and turnovers. Not much more to say about this other than saying that this year has been a bad one for Mike Bellotti would be an understatement.

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