There are a lot of things about this 2021 Oregon Ducks football team that are different from last year. A new and improved defense, led by coordinator Tim DeRuyter, and of course, a new-look offense with Anthony Brown at the helm has this team humming through the first three games of the season, on pace to potentially play in the College Football Playoffs for the first time since 2015.
One improvement which has helped this team hit the ground running is their ability to not only prevent turnovers on offense but to capitalize on opponents turning the ball over as well.
[lawrence-related id=8174]
Through three games, Oregon has a +7 turnover differential, good for third in the entire nation.
“It’s a good start,” coach Mario Cristobal said at Monday’s press conference. “You know, we always talk about turnovers and penalties, we were doing good with penalties until this past game, we had a couple too many, which is not good enough. The one fumble that we have at this year ironically was on a screen pass…so we have invested a significant amount of time for ourselves into not turning the ball over.”
Oregon struggled mightily in this area in the shortened 2020 campaign, posting an ugly -9 turnover differential thanks to a lot of careless mistakes from the offense.
[lawrence-related id=7814]
“In 2020 we did a poor job of hanging on to the ball,” Cristobal continued. “I don’t want to say the exact percentage but it was the 15-16% of the time or so, of our drives would end up in a turnover, whether it be on downs or coughing the ball up or throwing an interception.
“Coach Morehead, the entire staff, Coach Mastro, Coach McLennan, all those guys, Coach Williams, they’ve done a great job, emphasizing the importance of ball security, and how to tuck that thing away. And then Anthony [Brown] has done a great job with his decision making, and making sure he doesn’t put the ball into defenders laps.”
Of course, having a great turnover differential is about more than just taking care of the ball on offense. Oregon’s defense, under DeRuyter, already combined for eight takeaways on the season – along with five forced turnovers on downs.
[lawrence-related id=7845]
“From day one, when we talk to our defense, our major emphasis is on taking the ball away; not to make a tackle, not to get off the ball, you know, it’s get the ball to our offense,” DeRuyter said. “And I really am pleased, I think we’ve got great buy-in from our players. Coach Cristobal has put together a fantastic culture here that our guys are just sponges, wanting to soak up everything that we want to teach them. And we talked to them about the importance of takeaways and how we’re going to do it and how we approach it and the opportunities to take the ball away…I think it’s just a testament to one: the character of our players. We’ve got guys with great athletic ability, but we also have guys who have great buy-in and believe in what we’re doing.”
Oregon will need to continue to force turnovers on the defensive side of the field while taking care of the ball on offense if they want to escape conference play unscathed. Should that happen, the Ducks willVeron potentially get a chance to take on Alabama in the College Football Playoff this season.
[listicle id=7828]