You can scratch another name off the list of College Football Playoff hopefuls. Arizona State upset No. 6 Oregon 31-28 in Sun Devil Stadium on Saturday night, handing the Ducks their second loss of the season and essentially eliminating them from College Football Playoff consideration. It wasn't a fluke, nor was it just "one of those things that happens" in college football. Arizona State won the game because Arizona State was the better team for nearly the entire game, withstanding a late fourth-quarter flurry from the Ducks.
The Sun Devils defense flustered the Oregon offense most of the night. Through three quarters, before the game got into mom and dad's liquor cabinet, Arizona State had held Oregon to only seven points and 268 yards of offense. Oregon quarterback Justin Herbert was 10-for-20 for 127 yards, while Arizona State's Jayden Daniels had already thrown for 298 yards. Then the fourth quarter started and things went off the rails.
Arizona State built a 24-7 lead in the fourth following a pair of Herbert interceptions, but just when the game looked to be over, Oregon woke up. The Ducks responded with two touchdowns of their own to cut the deficit to 24-21. Then, facing a third-and-16, Daniels hit Brandon Aiyuk down the sideline for an 80-yard touchdown. Oregon added another touchdown to make it 31-28, but by then it was too late.
The Ducks playoff hopes died in the desert Saturday night, and Arizona State clinched a bowl berth.
Daniels finished the night with 408 yards passing and three scores. Herbert threw for over 300 yards himself, but the two interceptions were the deciding factors in this game. They led to a deficit that was too large to overcome.
1. Oregon should never travel to the state of Arizona again: In 2013, Oregon was blown out at Arizona, 42-16. A couple of years later, in 2015, the Ducks barely managed to escape, 61-55 in triple-overtime. The Ducks haven't won a game in the state of Arizona since. In 2017, they lost to Arizona State, 37-35. Last season, they lost at Arizona, 44-15. Saturday night, they lost and watched their playoff hopes die in the process, and that's the biggest takeaway of all. With Oregon being at No. 6 in the CFP Rankings, it seemed to be in the best position to climb into the top four should Georgia fail to win the SEC, and Oregon win out, taking the conference from Utah. Ah, but the winning out and the winning the conference part is never as easy as it seems! The Ducks can still win the conference, and they can still get to the Rose Bowl. No Pac-12 team will ever turn up its nose at a trip to Pasadena, California. But it will be a disappointment, whether Oregon is willing to admit it or not.
2. Herbert is like nearly every college quarterback: Herbert has NFL potential, but he's also a college quarterback. Like almost every college quarterback, save for the rare anointed ones, he has his ups-and-downs. That's part of being young and playing the most demanding position in the sport. He made some beautiful throws in the fourth quarter that helped the Ducks get back in the game, but it was his earlier mistakes and inconsistencies that put Oregon in that undesirable position. Yes, Arizona State's offense exploded for 18 points and 151 yards in the fourth quarter, but before that, Oregon's defense had played well. It's not a coincidence that 11 of Arizona State's fourth-quarter points came off Herbert interceptions. And Herbert was lucky to finish with only two turnovers. Arizona State defenders left a couple out on the field. There are times when it seems overly simplistic to blame the quarterback for a team's loss or to give them credit for a win. But Saturday night? That was one of those Occam's Razor games where the simplest explanation was the right one.
3. This throw was amazing:
4. OK, seriously, Daniels has a chance to be very good: Like Herbert, he's going to have his ups-and-downs, but the ups might be transcendent. Daniels came to Arizona State as a four-star recruit, and the freshman has shown plenty of reasons why he was rated so highly. Saturday night's performance against Oregon was the high point so far. It's not just that Daniels threw for 408 yards with three touchdowns, it's that he did it against one of the best defenses in the Pac-12. This had to feel great for Daniels not just because of the win but because of how he played in his last chance to shine against one of the Pac-12's best. When Arizona State played Utah in mid-October, Daniels had the worst game of his young college career (one of the downs). He completed only 4-of-18 passes for 25 yards and an interception in an embarrassing performance. Saturday night should help erase those memories from his mind, and it should also serve notice to the rest of the Pac-12. This guy is going to be around for at least two more years, and if he's already capable of doing this, what might he be doing to teams by his junior season