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Despite his current struggles, the former Oregon coach was 3-0 against the Huskies.
Every coach has their tick in a press conference after things go wrong. Some get short. Some needle at the wording of questions. And in Mario Cristobal’s case, it was always that stare. The one that, as he listened to a question, implied, “I still remember all that MMA training, pal”
Saw it after Arizona State in 2019. Saw it after the Pac-12 championship game in 2021. And Miami reporters got to see it Saturday night, after the former Oregon coach blundered away a win against Georgia Tech by not having his team take a knee up 20-17 with 30 seconds left.
The Hurricanes ran. The Hurricanes fumbled. A few plays later, the unranked Yellow Jackets walked out of Hard Rock Stadium with a 23-20 win.
Oh right, also saw that stare after the Stanford game in 2018. You know, the one where Oregon was up late, should have kneeled and instead fumbled away a victory?
Yeah, it’s going to be a tough week for Cristobal, who up until that fourth quarter Saturday night had been collecting receipts all throughout Miami. He had flipped last year’s 5-7 debut into a 4-0 start to 2023 — with a top-10 recruiting class committed for 2024.
And now here on Monday, this is his world:
Woof.
This might be an odd choice to open up Washington/Oregon week here on The I-5 Corridor, but we’re getting to the point.
Because as it stands, Oregon fans seem pretty happy that Cristobal took $80 million to ditch Eugene and bring his questionable game management with him to Coral Gables.
After all, No. 8 Oregon is currently undefeated with a top-10 offense, top-10 defense, top-10 recruiting class and is even matching the level of play in the trenches that Cristobal’s Ducks claimed as their bread and butter.
Dan Lanning? The guy who humbled Deion spent his bye week doing national sit down interviews to get ready for one of the most important games in the history of the program. I don’t think that’s hyperbole, either.
It’s the first time in the 100-plus meetings between the two programs that they’re both ranked in the top 10. They’re both undefeated with Heisman-candidate quarterbacks and legitimate hopes of making the College Football Playoff. Not only would a win solidify the resume of one, but would be doing so at the sweet, sweet expense of the other.
This is as good as rivalry games get. And if it wasn’t for Mario, I don’t know if either of these two programs are at this point.
The Ducks are 3-3 in their last six meetings against the Huskies. Those three losses belong to Dan Lanning, Willie Taggart and Mark Helfrich. The three wins are Cristobal’s, who took an Oregon program that had been outscored by UW 108-24 in its previous two meetings and turned it into a Husky battering ram.
In 2018, No. 17 Oregon upset No. 7 Washington 30-27 at Autzen.
In 2019, No. 5 Oregon rallied from a 14-point second-half deficit to beat Washington in Seattle. And after not playing in 2020 because of COVID, the Ducks smacked the Huskies 26-16 at Husky Stadium in 2021. That was the game that saw the week begin with Jimmy Lake’s “academic prowess” comments and ended with Cristobal’s locker room celebration broadcast out through Instagram Live.
“Those fucking guys right there,” Cristobal roared, “they represent everything that’s wrong with football.
“So when you kick their ass, you let them know it.”
I loved how much he loved kicking Washington’s ass. Keep in mind, much of the 2010s saw both of these programs living in the faceless opponent era. Chris Petersen wouldn’t let players talk during Oregon week. Chip Kelly’s Ducks were just hoping to win the day. But Cristobal, the outsider, owned it. And I don’t think it should be undersold how important that attitude, and those wins, were for an Oregon program looking to find its footing coming out of the Helfrich/Taggart fiasco.
If Cristobal didn’t win at Oregon, had he not gone 8-0 against USC, UCLA and Washington, maybe the Ducks aren’t joining the three in the Big Ten next year.
And had he not so thoroughly outclassed Lake in 2021, maybe the former Washington coach doesn’t shove linebacker Ruperake Fuavai on the sideline, a push that ultimately led to his firing, Kalen DeBoer’s hiring, the transfer of Michael Penix Jr. and the installation of the best passing attack in the country.
The rest of the Pac-12, including Washington, was happy when Cristobal left.
And this week, I’m sure there are plenty around Oregon relieved its not their coach being clowned on by the national media this week for his game management. Or the one being criticized for his micromanagement of the entire program in general.
Yes, the Ducks are happy with Dan Lanning. He’s just got to kick the Huskies’ ass one of these days.
— Tyson Alger, The I-5 Corridor
