Tag: Sco-ing Long Podcast

As Oregon and Washington head to Big Ten, a new chapter in the rivalry begins

The Oregon Ducks and Washington Huskies will likely enter a new chapter of their long-standing rivalry as new members of the Big Ten.

The landscape of college football is going to look a lot different in 2024 than it has in the past, and that is especially true for the Oregon Ducks.

While the expanded College Football Playoff will have an impact on every team in the nation, Oregon is one of several teams that are moving to a new conference, joining the Big Ten along with Washington, USC, and UCLA.

The new expanded conference offers a ton of exciting matchups for the Ducks, but it could potentially change some things that Oregon fans have come to know and love over the last several decades. In particular, there’s a good chance that rivalries will look quite a bit different in the future.

Oregon will still play the likes of Washington, Oregon State, and USC going forward, but with the addition of games against Ohio State, Michigan, Penn State, Wisconsin, and several other Big Ten teams, there’s a chance that some of the existing rivalries get watered down.

This past week on the Sco-ing Long Podcast, co-hosts Jonathan Stewart and Zachary Neel discussed this. In particular, they talked about Oregon’s rivalry with the Huskies. While it definitely stood as the biggest rivalry for the Ducks throughout their time in the Pac-12, Neel argues that it might lose some of its steam going forward, for various reasons.

“I think that going into the Big 10, this rivalry loses a little bit of juice,” Neel said. “The rivalry is at its best when both teams are good and competing for a conference championship. I don’t think that we’re going to see that again for quite some time with Oregon being at the top of the Big 10. I don’t think Washington’s there right now. They won’t be this year, and they likely won’t be next year. Five years from now? Maybe, but that kind of depends on where Jedd Fisch is and how long he stays at Washington.”

While the Huskies made it to the national championship game in 2023, the departure of a number of their best players to the NFL draft hurts, and the subsequent destruction of the roster, once head coach Kalen DeBoer left to take the top job at Alabama, left Washington with uncertainty going into 2024.

The past few years have been great for the Oregon-Washington rivalry, as the two teams competed for conference championships. Earlier this century, though, the Ducks had a massive advantage, which led to a watered-down hatred between the two schools.

“There was a stretch when Oregon beat Washington 12 times in a row,” Neel said. “I’m not saying that’s going to happen again over the next decade but I think we will see a bit more Oregon dominance because of where Oregon is and where Washington currently is. The game definitely matters. It’s very important for fans, there’s so much heart and so much history there. I just don’t see the rivalry really gaining importance now that you’ve got Oregon up against teams competing for those conference championships like Ohio State, like Michigan, like Wisconsin.”

Stewart, who experienced the Washington rivalry up close and personal, and never lost to the Huskies in his career, had different thoughts on the matter.

“I’m always going to go down to the history,” Stewart said. “The history is more than just football. It’s a local battle, a battle on the gridiron, and a battle between two states. I think it’s just an important game as far as bragging rights go, as far as recruiting goes.”

Even if the era of dominance returns for Oregon, and they do find a way to get past Washington more often than not over the next decade, that doesn’t change how big of a rivalry this should be to Stewart.

“You can play a team 10 times and beat them 10 times and still hate them,” Stewart said. “That’s kind of the tradition that I think you’ve got to carry. Oregon must look at UW as a threat through recruiting and its existence in the Northwest.”

We will see how the rivalry feels in the first year of the new expanded Big Ten for both Oregon and Washington in the final week of the regular season. The hate and vitriol may be there, but it’s hard to say that there will be a ton on the line when it comes to season outcomes.

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Which Big Ten teams will be the biggest rivals for Oregon going forward?

A look at which teams in the Big Ten will likely be the biggest rivals for the Oregon Ducks when it comes to the new expanded conference.

For the past several decades in the world of the Pac-10, and then the Pac-12, the Oregon Ducks have been comfortable in the fact that they knew who their biggest rivals were. You had Oregon State, you had Washington, you had Stanford, you had USC, and you even had Utah to an extent later in the lifespan of the conference.

Things are going to change in the future, though.

With Oregon’s jump to the Big Ten Conference, we are losing a lot of rivalries that became commonplace over the years. The Ducks will still play the likes of Washington, USC, and Oregon State going forward, but now they have a new pool of teams that will be on the yearly schedule, and a whole pool of potential rivalries to jump into.

This past week on the Sco-ing Long Podcast co-hosts Jonathan Stewart and Zachary Neel discussed which teams in the Big Ten would end up being the biggest rivals for the Ducks going forward.

To decide who the best candidates were, both Stewart and Neel assigned a number value to each team in the conference from 1-10 (10 being the strongest) for how fierce the upcoming rivalry would be.

Here’s what they came up with, and some of their reasoning.

Oregon Ducks legend Jonathan Stewart joins Sco-ing Long Podcast as new co-host

Oregon Ducks legend Jonathan Stewart was announced as the new co-host of the Sco-ing Long Podcast, part of the Bleav Podcast Network.

One of the most popular Oregon Ducks in school history is getting into the media game, bringing his extensive football knowledge and experience to the podcasting world in Eugene.

Jonathan Stewart, a former Pro Bowl running back with the Carolina Panthers and one of the most prolific RBs to play in Eugene was announced as the new co-host of the Sco-ing Long Podcast on Monday morning, joining Ducks Wire’s Zachary Neel. The two kicked off their partnership with an episode previewing the upcoming NFL Draft, finding perfect landing spots for all of the future Pro Ducks who are expected to get drafted.

This is not Stewart’s first podcasting experience; he is currently also a co-host on Bleav Network’s ‘Bleav in Panthers’ podcast.

Stewart played for three years in Eugene, from 2006-2008, where he rushed for 2,891 total yards and had 31 touchdowns. Currently, Stewart is the fifth-highest leading rusher in school history.

Throughout the remainder of the offseason, both Stewart and Neel will record episodes of Sco-ing Long on a weekly basis, bringing former Ducks players and coaches on to get a new perspective on the team. Once the season starts this fall, Sco-ing Long will be released on a bi-weekly basis, with post-game reaction shows and mid-week previews.

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What should Oregon fans expect as Dillon Gabriel takes over for Bo Nix?

With Dillon Gabriel taking over for Bo Nix at Oregon, here’s what the Solid Verbal’s Dan Rubenstein thinks Duck fans should expect in 2024.

Oregon Duck fans have had a couple of great year offensively, getting the chance to watch quarterback Bo Nix resurrect his career in Eugene and lead one of the best offenses in the nation since transferring over from Auburn.

In 2023, Nix was one of the best QBs in the nation, finishing as a finalist for the Heisman Trophy, and he is now expected to be one of the top quarterbacks selected in the 2024 NFL Draft.

So for the Ducks going forward, how will the transition be going from Nix to incoming Oklahoma transfer Dillon Gabriel? The veteran has had a lot of success in his five years of college football, but will he be able to meet the high expectations of Oregon fans who have been spoiled with the most accurate QB in college history over the last two years?

That’s a question that I asked Dan Rubenstein, the co-host of the Solid Verbal Podcast this week on the latest episode of the Sco-ing Long Podcast.

“Dillon Gabriel is accurate, he’s unafraid to go downfield,” said Rubenstein, an Oregon alum. “He does not have the arm that Bo Nix has, and that is to be seen in terms of what the architecture of this offense is with both Dillon Gabriel’s strengths and weaknesses. He is enthusiastic about running when it’s there, but I don’t think he forces the issue.”

Things are set up well for Gabriel, who will have top-ranked talent around him both at the RB spot and out at the WR spots, while his offensive line returns several pieces from a unit in 2023 that was among the best in the nation.

With all of those things put together, the stage is set for Gabriel to be everything that Oregon fans hope he can be, and more.

“I don’t think he’s going to be asked to do all that much athletically,” Rubenstein said. “I think Oregon’s offensive balance is going to be at a point where I don’t think his job is going to be terribly difficult in terms of having to do everything himself. If the play call is right, and the offensive line is where it should continue to be, I think he has one of the easier jobs in the sport. I think he’s capable of winning the Big Ten and taking this team to the playoff.”

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