Oregon football stock report: Who rose, fell after UCLA loss

After a monumental emotional win over the USC Trojans a couple of weeks ago, it appeared that the arrow was pointing up for the Oregon Ducks. While there was still a lot to clean up and improve upon, Dan Lanning’s team looked to be getting things together, and confidence that a playoff run lay ahead was abundant.

Just a couple of weeks later, and that confidence has dissipated.

Oregon’s 17-15 loss to the UCLA Bruins on Saturday afternoon was, in a word, revealing. It showed the lack of coaching that this team is receiving, and the lack of discipline that the roster has. It also shows how far the Ducks need to go, and how much needs to improve, in order to make a postseason run even semi-possible, which at the moment, feels unlikely.

After every game of the season, we like to go back and take stock of what happened, looking at which players improved the perception around them the most, and which guys have something more to work on going forward. After Saturday’s abject disaster, there are a lot of negatives to focus on, but we would be doing a disservice to the team — particularly on the defensive side of the ball — if we didn’t give flowers where they are deserved.

Here’s a look at some of the top players from the game, and who needs to improve more going forward:

Stock Down: Dylan Raiola

After the highs of a win over USC, Dylan Raiola experienced the lows of a brutal loss to UCLA on Saturday. To call that a brutal loss might be underselling it a bit, though. Raiola, as a player, was objectively awful in this game. As a person, I gained a lot of respect for him after the game when he stood up and answers for his shortcomings in front of the media, which is not something he had to do. But as a quarterback, he failed worse than anyone could have imagined. Raiola completed 6-of-19 passes for 43 yards, no touchdowns, two interceptions, and a fumble. He ended up getting benched at the end of the third quarter after putting together what is statistically the single worst QB performance we’ve seen in college football over the last two years.

Because of this, there are real questions for the Ducks going forward. It’s unclear if Dante Moore will be ready to return this week vs. Nebraska, but if he isn’t available, do you try Raiola out again and hope for the best, or do you throw Brock Thomas out there and give the former walk-on his first career start?

I’m not sure either answer will instill much confidence.

Stock Down: Drew Mehringer

We’re through five games of the season, and I think it’s safe to say that the Oregon fan base is ready to pull the plug on the Drew Mehringer experiment. As a successor to Will Stein, Mehringer’s offense has failed to live up to expectations in just about every facet you can imagine. So far, Oregon has the No. 46 scoring offense in the nation (30.3 points per game) and the No. 114 rushing offense in the nation (105.0 yards per game). The offensive line is in shambles, the play-calling is stale, and the unit as a whole looks discombobulated.

It’s unclear how much longer Mehringer will hold onto his play-calling duties at this point. After Saturday’s loss, Lanning admitted that everything on the offense will be evaluated over the coming days, including Mehringer’s role on the headset. The entirety of the Ducks’ offensive struggles does not fall on the shoulders of Mehringer, but as the offensive coordinator, he is the first guy in line to fall on the sword, and he might be asked to do so this week.

Stock Up: Defensive Line

This game wasn’t all negatives for the Ducks. All in all, the defensive side of the ball played incredibly well, and it started up front with the defensive line. UCLA brought the No. 4 rushing attack in the nation to Autzen on Saturday, and for the most part, the Ducks bottled it up. The Bruins ended with just 140 total rushing yards, while Oregon’s defensive line wrecked shop in the passing game and got after UCLA quarterback Nico Iamaleava early and often. The Ducks had a pair of sacks to go along with seven tackles for loss. A’Mauri Washington, Matayo Uiagalelei, and Teitum Tuioti all played as well as we’ve seen all year long, and this unit looked like what many people projected ahead of the season. In a day full of negatives, this was a nice silver lining.

Stock Down: Offensive Line

The offensive line was one of the biggest questions on this team going into the year, and it’s hard, after five games, to say that it’s not the main reason for the majority of struggles so far. The Ducks’ offense has been completely inept in the running game so far, averaging just over 100 yards per game, and a lot of that is because of a lack of rushing lanes for Jordon Davison and Dierre Hill. There are missed assignments, missed blocks, and blown reads all over the place, and the performance against UCLA was undoubtedly the worst we’ve seen yet this year. Starting left tackle Ziyare Addison eventually got benched, leading to Fox Crader moving to LT, and Gernorris Wilson going to RT. Oregon also rotated in Tommy Tofi at guard, but that ended up being a disaster as well. An offense can usually only be as good as its offensive line, and so far, both things have been horrible in Eugene.

Stock Up: Chris Hampton

There were a lot of questions about the hiring of Chris Hampton as defensive coordinator early on this year, with the Ducks’ defense far subverting preseason expectations. However, over the last few games, that side of the ball has really started to pick things up and perform as we expected, with their best game of the season coming on Saturday against a good UCLA offense. Oregon’s defense forced three turnovers, got a pair of goal-line stands, held UCLA to just 4-of-16 on third down, and largely gave the Ducks a chance to win this game on a day when they had no business even being in the conversation. Who knows how much it will end up mattering down the line, so long as Oregon’s offense continues to struggle, but the defense is starting to look very good, and I think Hampton deserves credit for that.

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This article originally appeared on Ducks Wire: Oregon football stock report: Who rose, fell after UCLA loss