Us Oregon fans needed today's 45-6 victory over outmatched Liberty University in the Fiesta Bowl after two narrow losses to Washington prevented the Ducks from winning the Pac-12 championship and having a chance to make the four-team national championship playoff.
I was confident that Oregon would defeat Liberty, notwithstanding the fervent prayers that folks at this deeply conservative Christian school must have been directing at the Big Guy Upstairs to aid them in staging an upset victory over the team from dissolute Eugene.
Didn't happen. The only religious mention I heard at the Fiesta Bowl was when Oregon quarterback Bo Nix said "God is good" in the course of thanking the Lord in post-game comments for what he and his team had been able to accomplish.
Those were gracious comments by Nix. He didn't grandstand. He didn't rub the loss in Liberty's face. He simply spoke about how grateful he was to have been able to play football at Oregon with his teammates. Nix is a class act.
This is Nix raising the trophy for the most valuable offensive player in this year's Fiesta Bowl with his coach, Dan Lanning, smiling by his side.
After Liberty scored first, Oregon dominated the rest of the game. By the fourth quarter, with the outcome obvious, the announcers drummed up some drama by talking about what Nix needed to do to break the NCAA record for the single season record of the percentage of passes completed. Which, he did.
Sports writer John Canzano said this in his substack column about the game.
A few of the Nix records got lots of attention.
For example:
• Marcus Mariota had the finest season by a quarterback at Oregon in 2014. Mariota threw 42 touchdown passes and had 4,454 passing yards. Both were school single-season records. By the end of Monday’s bowl game, Nix had 45 touchdown passes and 4,508 yards this season.
• Nix entered the game with a completion percentage of 77.2 percent. He trailed the NCAA record held by Alabama’s Mac Jones (77.4 percent) in 2020. Nix threw only seven incomplete passes on 35 attempts in Monday’s Fiesta Bowl. (I counted at least three drops by his receivers.) And Nix still finished the season at 77.44 percent, a new NCAA record.
The television broadcast referenced those records often, but I wonder if the more impressive feat was the fact that Monday’s game marked Nix’s 61st college start — the all-time NCAA record for a quarterback.
It was an emotional moment when Nix left the game, leaving a backup quarterback to finish the rout over Liberty. He was an immensely likable guy. Humble, personable, solid, dedicated. Nix could have passed up a bowl game as so many top players do, not wanting to risk an injury when the NFL beckons.
But Nix didn't do that, because that's the sort of guy he is. A selfless team player. He'll be missed. I wish him the best in what promises to be a exemplary professional career.
Washington beat Texas a few minutes ago. This means that Oregon's only losses this season were to a team that will now play for a national championship against Michigan. It's a great way for the Pac-12 era to end, with Oregon State and Washington State left as the Pac-2.
Oregon and Washington playing in the Big Ten will seem strange. This season, though, was a terrific way for the Pac-12 to take a final bow before the curtain falls. And Bo Nix was a big part of that.
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