Oregon tasted blood against Washington State, Dan Lanning told Ducks to ‘keep biting’

Oregon had just a 17-13 lead at the halftime break. The Ducks outscored Washington State 21-3 over the course of the next 22 minutes and change.

The Cougars got a late touchdown on the board to make the final score look a little more respectable 38-24. In reality, all the score did was help bettors who took the Cougs as a huge underdog. They weren’t in the game at any point in the fourth quarter.

Bucky Irving had 40-plus-yard touchdowns on back-to-back drives for the Ducks in the third quarter. Tez Johnson hauled in a 17-yard touchdown early in the fourth quarter to put the Ducks up by 22.

Cameron Ward put up yardage for Washington State, but Wazzu struggled to finish in the second half.

Oregon, which had just three points from its first three drives, scored touchdowns on five of its next six over the second, third, and fourth quarters.

Coach Dan Lanning credited the coaching staff with making the necessary in-game adjustments around halftime.

“They had good answers for some of the stuff that we came in wanting to attack and we were able to adapt and create some answers off of that,” Lanning said. “I thought our offensive staff did a good job creating some motions and some shifts that allowed us to have numbers in the run game.”

But, ultimately, it came down to a mindset. Oregon wanted to put the hammer down.

“At halftime, we just talked about if you can taste blood, don’t let go. Keep biting,” Lanning said. “I think our guys did that.”

The ninth-ranked Ducks moved to 6-1 on the year with the victory.

After a 36-33 loss to Washington last weekend, Oregon was looking for a major response. Safe to say it got what it was looking for.