Tag: Tim DeRuyter

DB coach Marcel Yates set to follow Tim DeRuyter to Texas Tech

Marcel Yates will stay and coach the defensive backs through the Alamo Bowl, but then he’s off to Texas Tech to follow Tim DeRuyter.

In a move that was entirely expected, Oregon Ducks defensive backs coach Marcel Yates is following defensive coordinator Tim DeRuyter to Texas Tech to take over the same role for the Red Raiders.

The move was reported by Bruce Feldman of The Athletic on December 8, and confirmed by a source via ESPN’s Adam Rittenberg on Monday.

Rittenberg reported that Yates will remain with Oregon through the Alamo Bowl.

Yates has a lengthy coaching history, having coached at Boise State from 2003-2011 as the defensive backs coach before heading to Texas Tech for two seasons as co-defensive coordinator. He ended up back in Boise for two seasons as the defensive coordinator in 2014-2015, before taking over as DC at Arizona from 2016-2019.

One season as defensive backs coach at Cal in 2020 was his final stop before landing at Oregon, where he coached an elite group of defensive backs including Verone McKinley III, Mykael Wright, Bennett Williams, and DJ Johnson.

Now he will once again follow DeRuyter, heading back to Texas Tech after spending the last six seasons in the Pac-12.

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Oregon DC Tim DeRuyter to become defensive coordinator at Texas Tech

Looks like DC Tim DeRuyter is leaving, and probably taking Marcell Yates with him.

It now appears that the Oregon Ducks aren’t only going to have to replace their head coach and offensive coordinator positions, but also the defensive coordinator spot as well.

According to multiple reports, DC Tim DeRuyter is expected to take a new job with the Texas Tech Red Raiders this offseason, taking defensive backs coach Marcell Yates with him. This doesn’t come as a huge shock, with a lot of the coaches on Oregon’s staff likely to assess their positions and potentially find new homes this offseason.

So while Oregon AD Rob Mullens searches far and wide for a new head coach, one bargaining chip that he now has is the ability to offer whatever coach he hires the ability to hand pick his coordinators and build a program. That could definitely be appealing.

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Dangerous Cougars offense will test Oregon’s secondary in potential trap game

After shutting down a run-heavy scheme with the Huskies, Oregon will now be faced with a pass-heavy, air-raid offense as Washington State comes to town.

Washington State has always been one of the toughest teams to defend as the Cougars have used the Air Raid offense ever since Mike Leach was there.

Two coaches later, WSU is still throwing the ball as much as possible and the Cougars will come into Autzen Stadium looking to test the Oregon secondary.

But Washington State also has the capability of running the ball with tailback Max Borghi just enough to keep the defense off-balance.

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The senior running back has had a heralded career in the Palouse and has scored eight touchdowns this season. The offense, however, revolves around the arm of sophomore quarterback Jayden de Laura.

As de Laura goes, so do the Cougars. In their four losses, with him playing in three of those, de Laura was held down to an average of 176 yards passing. In their five wins, the quarterback averages nearly 290 yards.

According to Oregon Ducks defensive coordinator Tim DeRuyter, the Cougars will provide a very different look than the previous opponent in Washington.

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“That’s the unique thing about this league,” DeRuyter said. “You go from playing a Washington team who played in a lot of big personnel sets against us and we had to play in our base package stuff. This week is a different challenge. We’re going to have to give some different looks. We’ll have to play some man coverage … hopefully disguise some coverages and obviously we’ll have to get pressure on this quarterback.”

Getting pressure on de Laura doesn’t seem to be much of a problem for the Cougars’ opponents. Washington State has allowed 20 sacks in their nine games so far and now they face a Duck defense that features one of the best defensive lines in the conference. Oregon has sacked the opposing quarterback 18 times.

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When de Laura does have time to throw the ball down the field, his favorite targets seem to be a pair of receivers; Senior Travell Harris leads the team with 54 catches for 574 yards and six touchdowns, and Calvin Jackson, Jr., a graduate senior, has 49 catches for 667 yards and five touchdowns.

“He really has a gunslinger mentality,” DeRuyter said de Laura. “The scheme is a little bit unique, but I think de Laura ran that scheme in high school, so he understands the concept. You have a couple of really good slots that have been running this thing now and it seems like they’ve been there forever. It’s going to be a heck of a challenge.”

It’s a challenge that, should Oregon pass, will give the Ducks complete control of the Pac-12 North as they would be up two games in the standings with just two left in the regular season. If Oregon State happens to lose to Stanford on Saturday and the Ducks win, Oregon will clinch the Pac-12 North outright.

Oregon and Washington State are scheduled to kick off at 7:30 p.m. televised on ESPN.

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A dominant turnover margin has helped the Oregon Ducks become a top-ranked team in 2021

The Ducks defense is forcing turnovers at a high clip, while the offense is protecting the ball. It’s this formula that’s led to Oregon’s No. 3 ranking in the nation.

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.

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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.

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“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.

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“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.

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DJ James and Jamal Hill to ‘compete right away’ for starting jobs on Oregon defense

After missing the first game of the season due to suspension, DJ James and Jamal Hill are expected to compete for starting spots right away.

In his press conference on Monday afternoon, Oregon head coach Mario Cristobal delivered the news that we were all expecting to hear — defensive backs DJ James and Jamal Hill will be available to play this week against Ohio State after serving a suspension earlier in the year.

Ahead of Oregon’s game against Fresno State, Cristobal announced that the two players would be reinstated for practice purposes, but would miss the Ducks’ week 1 game. Now, with the biggest game of the season just days away, it comes as no surprise that two of Oregon’s perceived starters coming into the season will be back on the field and ready to make an impact.

But how much of an impact will they have? After missing the majority of fall camp and not seeing any game action since the 2020 season, it’s a reasonable question to ask.

Defensive coordinator Tim DeRuyter doesn’t seem to think that the missed time will slow them up very much, however.

“They’ve been with us the last couple of weeks practicing,” DeRuyter said on Monday. “There was a little rust that they had to get knocked out, but they’ve been looking pretty good in practice this week, so they’ll be competing right away for jobs.”

Jamal Hill will be looking to knock off Steve Stephens IV for the boundary safety position, while DJ James will have to jump both Dontae Manning and Trikweze Bridges in the depth chart at the boundary corner position to grab a starting spot.

All three of those players performed well against Fresno State, but the secondary as a whole left a little bit to be desired, giving up 220 yards through the air in the first half before making some adjustments over the final two quarters.

Regardless of who starts, it is encouraging to know that the Ducks will now have some added depth at two of their most important positions on the defense. With a pair of All-American receivers for Ohio State — Chris Olave and Garrett Wilson — Oregon will need all hands on deck to slow them down.

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Stock-up, Stock-down: Which Oregon players made the biggest impressions in Week 1?

It’s unfair to call these guys winners or losers, but who do we feel better about after the win over Fresno State, and who needs to show more?

We’d be lying if we said that the Oregon Ducks stock as a whole was through the roof after their Week 1 performance against Fresno State.

With the betting spread favoring them to win by three scores, it was disappointing to see the Ducks trailing by a field goal late into the game, needing a go-ahead touchdown from QB Anthony Brown with under three minutes left to keep their home winning streak alive.

Nonetheless, they won the game, and it will ultimately be a small footnote in what hopefully turns out to be a memorable season. But still, in order to learn and get better, we need to look at the individual performances and see what needs to improve, and where the Ducks are on the right track. Here is who trended up, and trended down on Saturday:

First half reaction: Thibodeaux, Duck defense means business

The Ducks lead 21-13 at the half. Tim DeRuyter’s aggressive defense was on full display, but the offense left fans wanting more.

The Oregon Ducks enter the half leading Fresno State by a score of 21-13. Here are our instant reactions from the first half:

Aggressive Duck defense on full display: When Tim DeRuyter was hired away from California to be the Oregon defensive coordinator, one of the first things he said was that he wanted the Ducks to force a lot of turnovers. If the first quarter against Fresno State was any indication, it’s going to be a very fun season.

Kayvon Thibodeaux got things rolling on the Bulldogs’ second possession when he came from the blindside and nailed quarterback Jake Haener, causing a fumble and giving the Ducks the ball at the 3-yard line where they quickly turned into their first touchdown on the season.

Not to be outdone, Noah Sewell managed to strip tailback Ronnie Rivers of the ball on Fresno State’s next possession. Oregon again quickly scored to make it 14-0 midway through the first quarter.

Brown and the offense could have been better: If you take out the two possessions where the defense gave the offense a short field to work with, the offense wasn’t that impressive. There wasn’t much of a down-the-field passing game until towards the end of the second quarter when Brown found Johnny Johnson III for a 31-yard touchdown. But before that, Fresno State’s front four dominated the Duck offensive line, which is not a good sign heading into the Ohio State game next week.

Mycah Pittman showing he can be a factor: There weren’t many opportunities for the receivers to make plays, but when Brown did find time to throw the ball, Pittman seemed to be his go-to guy. Pittman ended the first half catching three of Brown’s five completions for 40 yards. Considering his career has been plagued by injuries, it’s nice to see Pittman be a factor in Joe Moorhead’s offense.

Oregon holds a slim 21-13 halftime lead over the Bulldogs.

Four Ducks are on the Polynesian Player of the Year watch list

Popo Aumavae, Malaesala Aumavae-Laulu, Mase Funa, and Noah Sewell are all on the watch list for the 2021 Polynesian Player of the Year.

Marcus Mariota and Penei Sewell may have to move over.

Four Oregon football players, Popo Aumavae, Malaesala Aumavae-Laulu, Mase Funa, and Noah Sewell have been named to the preseason watch list for the 2021 Polynesian College Football Player of the Year Award, the Polynesian Football Hall of Fame announced on Thursday.

The 2021 list is composed of 63 players from 31 different FBS schools. Oregon is one of six schools with at least four players on the watch list.

Oregon has a rich history with the Polynesian College Football Player of the Year Award. Mariota, who also won the Heisman Trophy, was the inaugural recipient in 2014. Offensive lineman Penei Sewell took home the honor in 2019. Oregon is the only program to have had multiple players win the award as the Ducks are looking to make it three.

Five finalists will be unveiled on Nov. 30 with the winner being announced Dec. 14. The presentation of the award will be held during the Polynesian Football Hall of Fame Enshrinement Week Celebration Dinner Jan. 21, 2022 and they will also be recognized at halftime of the Polynesian Bowl the very next day.

Among the four Ducks named, it’s likely Noah Sewell has the best chance to claim the award. The super freshman linebacker was the 2020 Coaches Pac-12 Freshman Defensive Player of the Year and was one of two true freshmen and the only among the Power 5 conferences to lead his team in tackles (45) in 2020.

The other three Ducks, Aumavae, Aumavae-Laulu, and Funa will all play major roles in defensive coordinator Tim DeRuyter’s defense and are all expected to have great seasons.

Noah Sewell keeps setting the bar higher with all expectations already met or passed at Oregon

The reigning Pac-12 Freshman DPOY has set the bar for success even higher this season, and by all accounts, he’s exceeding expectations.

For an Oregon Ducks fan base that was deprived of the talents of Justin Flowe a year ago due to a season-ending knee injury, it’s understandable that the former 5-star recruit has stolen much of the show so far this fall.

However, we should not let that detract from his running mate in the middle of the defense, Noah Sewell.

A former 5-star linebacker himself, Sewell put on a show in his freshman year with the Ducks, racking up 48 total tackles with two sacks in seven games, and earning the Pac-12 Freshman Defensive Player of the Year award.

A year later, after finally enjoying a semi-regular offseason that has allowed ample time for development, the bar is being set even higher for Sewell, as he projects to be part of a two-headed monster in the middle of the defense next to Flowe.

According to defensive coordinator Tim DeRuyter, there is a reason for all of the hype that he is getting.

“I think Noah is practicing as good as anybody on our defense right now,” DeRuyter said after practice on Wednesday. “Every time we turn that tape on — whether it’s guys making strip attempts to take the ball away; whether it’s guys pursuing the football; whether it’s guys finishing a tackle — he’s almost always on the example tape.”

At 6-foot-3, 250-pounds, Sewell is a monster in the middle, serving as one of the more dominant run-stoppers that the Ducks have seen in quite some time. As the younger brother of Penei, who was drafted by the Detroit Lions with the 7th overall pick in 2021, there were high expectations coming into Oregon, and Noah has met or exceeded nearly all of them.

“I think it’s just a really nice testament to him and Coach Wilson getting him to that point,” DeRuyter said. “But the intensity with which he practices at really sets a high standard for everybody else and sets that bat where everybody has to go play at his level.”

While Flowe has been the media darling this fall thanks to the violence and speed that he plays with, it’s easy to let someone like Sewell fly under the radar. That will be the last thing that opposing offenses want to do this coming year, though.

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With 3 of the highest recruits in Ducks’ history on the team, Tim DeRuyter’s scheme is poised for success

Kayvon Thibodeaux, Justin Flowe, and Noah Sewell are 3 of the 5-highest recruits in Oregon history, all with a chance to shine in Tim DeRuyter’s defensive scheme.

One of the most exciting things about this upcoming season for the Ducks is the thought of the unmatched talent that they will have on the defensive side of the ball.

Not only can we expect big things from freshman linebacker Justin Flowe, but there are also two game-changers lining up alongside him in both DE Kayvon Thibodeaux and LB Noah Sewell.

As a trio, they are three of the top five overall recruits in Oregon history, respectively. It’s exhilarating to imagine the type of destruction that they can bring on the defensive line.

“I’m really excited about that, and I feel that me and Noah are going to always bring it, every game that we have, every rep, and everything,” Flowe said on Tuesday. “That’s how we feel.”

One of the major benefits that the Ducks have this year as well is working under new defensive coordinator Tim DeRuyter. Though it was tough to lose Andy Avalos in the offseason after he took the head coaching job at Boise State, his alma mater, Oregon isn’t skipping a beat with DeRuyter, who most recently transformed the Cal Bears defense.

“His system just ties the back-end and the front seven together very well, which is something that we really need,” said coach Mario Cristobal. “His linebackers have been very productive, and our linebackers here have been really productive.”

“I feel like we’re getting really into the playbook, so I feel like we’re cutting it more loose now,” Flowe said. “People are playing more free, and I like the way it’s going. With the defense and how Deruyter is calling his plays and everything, everything is going really good.”

When all of the players are in shells, and there is no taking anyone to the ground, it is tough to tell just how dominant a defense really is. They are playing with one hand tied behind their backs in order to keep everyone healthy.

Once Week 1 rolls around against Fresno State, though, it might be jaw-dropping to see just what this unit is capable of.

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