Game Preview: No. 6 Oregon Heads to the Desert to Face Arizona State

The Ducks face former offensive coordinator Kenny Dillingham for the first time as a head coach.

The No. 6 Oregon Ducks (9-1, 6-1 Pac-12) will have to exercise their college football playoff demons in the desert against the Arizona State Sun Devils (3-7, 2-5 Pac-12) this Saturday at 1 p.m. PT on FOX.

The last time Oregon came into Tempe with playoff hopes was in 2019, when the Sun Devils, led by now LSU Heisman candidate Jayden Daniels, upset No. 5 Oregon which was led by Los Angeles Chargers quarterback Justin Herbert, 31-28.

Just like in 2019, the Ducks are playing Arizona State in their last road game of the season with nine wins and with college football playoff hopes. But this go around is different from the 2019 season.

Oregon is coming off a dominant 36-27 win over USC and last year's Heisman Caleb Williams. Bo Nix’s third Pac-12 Offensive Player of the Week performance, throwing for 412 yards and 4 touchdowns, made him the new betting favorite to win the Heisman.

“Bo's earned that attention,” Oregon head coach Dan Lanning said. “He's been a leap for us since the moment he got here, he's obviously a really dynamic and special player.”

A big part of Nix’s development and revival as one of the best quarterbacks in college football has been Arizona State’s head coach Kenny Dillingham. Dillingham recruited Nix to Auburn and was his quarterbacks coach when he was the SEC Freshman of the Year in 2019.

“He moved to Oregon because of our relationship,” Dillingham said. “That’s how good of a relationship that we have. He trusted me, his family trusted me … when nobody thought he could throw.”

Nix threw for 3,593 yards, 29 touchdowns and completed 71.9% of his passes with Dillingham as his offensive coordinator last year. And he attributes Dillingham to the success he’s been having this season, as Nix has already thrown for 29 touchdowns, while completing passes at a six percent higher rate than last season and can even surpass last year's total yards if he has another 400-plus passing game.

“That was huge,” Nix said. “It allowed me to play free and how we’ve operated this year and I think its helped us a lot this year and I think just getting into the right plays. Our system right now has been as good as I’ve ever been a part of and Coach [Will] Stein does a good job of putting us in situations with great answers.”

Oregon enters Saturday's contest as the best-scoring offense in the country averaging 46.3 points per game and the second-best total offense averaging 540 yards per game. While Oregon’s defense is ranked 18th in the country in total defense, allowing 309.4 yards per game.

Arizona State is coming off their second Pac-12 win of the season beating UCLA 17-7. The Sun Devils put up 250 total yards and controlled the clock for almost 37 minutes, running plays that they haven’t all season against the Bruins.

“Kenny's similar to me,” Lanning said. “When you have different personnel, you try to figure out how you can utilize them the most and try to create something that your opponent hasn't prepared for. Obviously, he was able to put some things on film that other teams haven't prepared for. And I expect him to give us some of that, too. It's going to be about us being able to in-game adjust, have a great plan for what he goes out there to execute.”

The Ducks will look to win their tenth game of the season and continue their quest to a college football playoff birth.

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