The Rereadables: How Oregon beat Ohio State for the first time in history

Our updated gamer from Oregon's 2021 win over the Buckeyes.

No. 3 Oregon hosts No. 2 Ohio State on Saturday in one of the most important games in UO program history. The Ducks are undefeated. The Buckeyes are undefeated. They’re conference rivals now and seeking to establish hierarchy in this new Big Ten.

There’s quite a bit of ego on the line here, too. Back before the Pac-12 imploded, the Ducks and Buckeyes were scheduled for a home-and-home series, with the Buckeyes coming to Eugene in 2020 with the Ducks returning the favor in 2021. But the 2020 game never happened thanks to the pandemic, a huge blow for an Oregon program that was readying to bring Penei Sewell, Brady Breeze, Thomas Graham Jr. and Jevon Holland to the fight. Mario Cristobal had spent countless hours on the recruiting trail priming Oregon’s roster for a battle in front of a national audience, and while they did get one, it came a year later, on the road, against an Ohio State team favored to win by two scores.

Of course, that’s not what happened.

Welcome to The I-5 Corridor’s ReReadables, where we periodically revisit some of our favorite game stories from over the years with updated thoughts and footnotes. This website was a month old when I filed this story from Columbus on Sept. 11, 2021.

And it’s one of my favorites.

'We did that': How Oregon beat Ohio State for the first time in history

COLUMBUS,¹ Ohio —  Oregon was already down one five-star linebacker and another five-star defensive end when Noah Sewell crumpled² to the Ohio Stadium turf. 

The Oregon linebacker just made another big play, tracking down Ohio State receiver Chris Olave for a one-yard gain on third down when the Buckeyes needed 20. But Sewell connected awkwardly, and for about 30 seconds Oregon’s sideline quieted for the first time Saturday. The 100,000 Ohio State fans in attendance filled the void, voicing their collective frustration with a chorus of “Bullshit” that rang throughout the stadium. 

Maybe they couldn’t believe Sewell was actually injured. They certainly couldn’t fathom everything else that was happening.³ 

See, No. 12 Oregon wasn’t supposed to be in this game. Not with Kayvon Thibodeaux, the best defensive player in America, in street clothes. Not with Justin Flowe⁴, who led the Ducks with 14 tackles last week against Fresno State, in a walking boot. And certainly not with the No. 3 Buckeyes playing in front of their home crowd at the Horseshoe for the first time in nearly two years.

This is a Buckeyes team that has made consecutive playoff appearances with favorable odds of making it again.⁵ This is a Buckeyes team that expected to run through Oregon just as it had all nine times the teams have met since 1958.

But Ohio State was losing. So the fans booed and cursed and yelled. Eventually Sewell stirred, and as he got back to the sideline a faint but growing sound could be heard from the northeast corner of the stadium. 

“Let’s go Ducks.” 

Ten minutes later, Oregon had a 35-28 win and players, led by Sewell, made a beeline for that corner of the stadium. Oregon fans flocked down from the upper deck and sprinted down the aisles to meet them. It was controlled bedlam, and once pictures were taken and palms were slapped and Sewell had said what he needed to say to family and friends, he turned around and saw his final target, locking Oregon coach Mario Cristobal in a hug and squeezing the air out of the former offensive lineman. He then put his finger in his coach’s chest.

“We did that!” Sewell yelled. “We did that.”⁶ 

Tyson Alger @tysonalger

"We did that."

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The offense didn’t look ready for this a week ago. 

The Ducks needed Anthony Brown’s 30-yard run on fourth down in the fourth quarter to beat a Mountain West opponent, and with three four-star freshmen quarterbacks on the bench, there was a vocal contingent of fans calling for the Ducks to get on with the future.⁷  

Just wait, Brown’s teammates cautioned throughout the week. 

“Even if you guys don’t think he had the best game, I’m telling you that he has so much potential to be one of the best quarterbacks in the nation,” receiver Mycah Pittman⁸ said Tuesday. “We’re going to let it loose against Ohio State and he’s going to show his true colors.” 

A week later, Oregon put up 505 yards of total offense against the third-most talented (per 247 Sports) team in the country. The Ducks carved Ohio State up for 269 yards on the ground, led by CJ Verdell’s 161 yards on 20 carries behind an offensive line that bullied the Buckeyes on the edges. It was all expertly guided by Brown, who threw for 248 yards and two touchdowns. He only completed 48 percent of his passes, but he didn’t turn the ball over and provided an overwhelmingly calm presence for the Ducks while leading scoring drives of 99, 65, 84, 75 and 74 yards.⁹

The 99-yarder was key. It gave Oregon’s thinned defense an extended break at the end of the first quarter and included an 18-yard Brown run that saw the quarterback lower his shoulder and truck through Ohio State corner Lejond Cavazos for extra yardage. Verdell¹⁰ scored from 14-yards out to cap the drive and Oregon led 7-0 in a game it would never trail. 

“That’s the ultimate accomplishment as an offense,” Cristobal said. “Anytime you can go 99 yards, that one stays on the teach tape going forward because you flip the field, you change the momentum. 

“…Besides being a playmaker, (Brown’s) poise is special. It’s different. He’s a really, really cool guy, and when you’ve been through what he’s been through injury wise — and everything he’s had to deal with in his career — it hardens you. You become calloused. He’s unfazed.” 

Brown started three years at Boston College. He had a pair of knee surgeries, never beat a top-25 opponent, transferred to Oregon after the pandemic started, sat behind Tyler Shough¹¹ throughout the 2020 season and then made it through a spring and fall camp where more than a few fans wanted to see the Ducks kick the tires on freshman Ty Thompson, the highest-rated quarterback recruit ever to sign with Oregon.

And while Thompson may¹² be the future of the program, Brown, the No. 798 player in the 2016 class, has the locker room behind him. 

“Honestly, it developed over the time being here,” Brown said. “We work together all the time and I love them. I would lay my life on the line for them. That’s something you can’t build and you have to keep pushing through it.” 

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Thibodeaux is the highest-rated recruit in Oregon history and he wore a black hat pulled tightly over sunglasses on the sideline. ¹³

Flowe is the second-highest in Oregon history and wore a boot on his left foot. 

“That was a surprise to all of us,” Cristobal said. “No one knew until Tuesday that something had happened, that something had surfaced in the game (last week).” 

With those 10 stars of talent on the sideline, the already 14.5-point underdog Ducks didn’t seem like they had much of a chance. Then backup linebacker Keith Brown¹⁴ got banged up and Sewell took his licks. 

After struggling in the first quarter, Ohio State freshman C.J. Stroud would go on to pass for 484 yards on 54 attempts. The Buckeyes had 612 yards of total offense and ran 85 plays. 

Really, the Ducks should have been gassed. But something felt familiar to Verone McKinley III in the fourth quarter with Oregon hanging onto a 35-28 lead in the final minutes. 

“I kept having dreams about getting the game-winning pick,” the Oregon safety said. “It just kept popping up in my mind.” 

With Ohio State facing a third-and-18 with 2:50 to play on its last tangible opportunity of the game, Stroud took the snap, rolled to his right, fired and was picked off by McKinley. The Ducks had already stopped the Buckeyes three times on fourth down, but this was the real first turnover. 

Through two games, an Oregon team that ranked 121st (-1.3) in 2020 in turnover margin per game now sits 12th (2.0). 

“In football you just have to respond,” McKinley said. “Sometimes you don’t want to be in those situations, but it’s always just about the next play.” ¹⁵

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The Ducks are no Cinderella. 

Oregon has won consecutive Pac-12 championships and its Rose Bowl win in the 2019 season felt like a stepping stone. Recruiting has padded the roster, moving closer to Cristobal’s vision when he took over the program at the end of 2017. 

But it hasn’t been smooth since Justin Herbert left. The Ducks appeared listless at times in 2020 with inconsistent quarterback play and five new starters along the offensive line who took their lumps. Joe Moorhead, whose hiring as offensive coordinator last year seemingly signified a change from Oregon’s conservative offensive approach into something more opened up, had the sixth-best offense — in the Pac-12 — in 2020. ¹⁶

“We felt that identity was coming and coming strong,” Cristobal said. “And last year we found a way to win the conference, but we didn’t play to our standard and we wanted to get back on track.” 

For much of the week, Moorhead’s name has been floated as a potential option for Connecticut's head coaching vacancy.¹⁷ It was there, after all, that the Pittsburgh native really started fine-tuning his offense more than a decade ago.

He casts a bigger figure in person. Tall with broad shoulders and a thick grey beard that he didn’t have when hired, he spent the final minutes of the best game he’s called at Oregon pacing the sidelines. And when the clock ran out, he slowly turned toward the Ohio State crowd and put his finger to his lips as chaos erupted on the sideline.¹⁸ 

— Tyson Alger

1. I like Columbus. It gets a bad rap, especially from a lot of us West Coast elitists — I include myself here, because could you imagine being on the beat in College Station? — but I had a great time walking around the OSU campus and feeling the buzz around this game. There’s some unique breweries in town —shout out Hoof Hearted — NHL, MLS and a beautiful minor league ballpark. Could be worse. 

2. No more crumpled. It never reads right.

3. That’s a good line.

4. It is impressive that Oregon beat CJ Stroud and Ohio State without Thibodeaux, who would finish that season with 7 sacks and 10 tackles for a loss before being drafted in the first round by the New York Giants. The absence of Flowe, who played in 12 games during his career at Oregon before transferring to Arizona, maybe wasn’t so notable. 

5. Ohio State would only lose once more, to No. 5 Michigan, and beat Utah in the Rose Bowl. 

6. Cristobal was hard at Oregon. He expected a lot, on his schedule and his intensity wore people, from players to staff, down by the end of his tenure. But the pureness of his emotion in big moments, and the connection he had with some of his players, were notably genuine.

7. Behind Brown sat Ty Thompson, Jay Butterfield and Robby Ashford. All three have transferred out of Oregon with varying levels of success. Ashford made 10 starts at Auburn and is now a backup at South Carolina. Butterfield played two games at San Jose State and is no longer in college football. Thompson, who came to Oregon as UO’s top-rated QB recruit of all-time, is the backup at Tulane.

8. Ah, Mycah Pittman — part of Oregon’s heralded 2019 #CaliFlock. The former four-star receiver from Calabasas was always good for a highlight-reel catch or two in camp, but injuries limited most of his time with the Ducks before he transferred to Florida State. He’s now a sixth-year senior at Utah. And a pilot.

9. Brown probably deserved better than what he got at Oregon. He was never particularly embraced by this fanbase, especially considering he’s still hanging around the NFL. He had talent. He was tough, particularly highlighted by a few of his runs in this Ohio State game. However, my what a different brand of football compared to what we’ve grown accustomed to the last three years with the Ducks. In 14 starts in 2021, Brown had four games with a 50-percent or worse completion rate. Bo Nix and Gabriel have totaled zero games below 50 percent in Oregon’s 32 games since. 

10. The success of Bucky Irving and Jordan James the last three years has overshadowed just how good of a runner Verdell was for Oregon when he was on. The dude missed a lot of games and he never made it past his first training camp in the NFL. But few running backs in Oregon history have had the pop potential of Verdell, who had four games in his career where he eclipsed 150 rushing yards.

11. Shough just turned 25. He’s also passed for 8 touchdowns and 0 interceptions in Louisville’s current three-game winning streak.

12. May…Might…Could…Should…Likely — what great safety nets for us sportswriters.

13. Thibodeaux held this title for six years until Dan Lanning landed 5-star WR Dakorien Moore in August. Here’s Oregon’s top-10 rated recruits, per 247, and the head coach at the time:

10. Arik Armstead (Chip Kelly)
9. Josh Conerly Jr. (Lanning)
8. De’Anthony Thomas (Kelly)
7. Cameron Colvin (Mike Bellotti)
6. Noah Sewell (Cristobal)
5. Jonathan Stewart (Bellotti)
4. Haloti Ngata (Bellotti)
3. Justin Flowe (Cristobal)
2. Kayvon Thibodeaux (Cristobal)
1. Dakorien Moore (Lanning)

14. Brown, who grew up in Albany, transferred to Louisville after 2022 and has since ended up in Pullman where he’s teammates once again with Kris Hutson. Brown has five tackles on the year for the Cougars, while Hutson has become a focal point of WSU’s offense with 25 catches for 379 yards.

15. McKinley was one of my favorite players to interview during his time at Oregon, and I’m still upset that one of those seasons had to be through Zoom during the Covid year. Few players knew as much ball, but he never made us media members feel bad for not possessing the same knowledge. Go check out the new “Turn Back the Flock” video series he’s doing for the school.

16. One thing that I keep coming back to this week with the No. 3 Ducks hosting the No. 2 Buckeyes is how unlikely it is that this matchup is happening. Remember, Cristobal saved the Ducks for a four-year period. He rebuild the foundation and quickly got the Ducks back onto a stage with national relevance. And then he left and Oregon, who is not a traditional blue blood, had to rebuild once more. That’s a feather in the cap for AD Rob Mullens and everyone else at Oregon who has been able to mobilize when the ground shook beneath them once again.

17. Moorehead took the head coaching position at Akron following the ‘21 season. The Zips are 5-25 in his two-plus seasons.

18. I don’t hate this scene, but I feel like this story just…ends. To be fair, I was exhausted and just about ready for that first postgame beer.