The pre-season No. 2-ranked Oregon Ducks are finding out the hard way that life at the top of college football comes with a big target on your back. After a 34-27 nail-biter where Boise State almost pulled off an upset at Autzen Stadium and a shocking Week 2 loss against Oklahoma State, the critics are starting to circle. Legendary former Alabama head coach Nick Saban didn’t hold back either when dissecting the Ducks’ early struggles during a recent appearance on The Pat McAfee Show.
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Saban, who has a history with Oregon head coach Dan Lanning from Lanning’s time as a graduate assistant in Tuscaloosa, pointed out that Oregon’s primary issue lies exactly where it shouldn’t: the defense.
“Well, I think the problem is you know Oregon hasn’t been able to play very well on defense, which is uncharacteristic for Dan Lanning and his teams, because he’s a defensive guy, they’ve always been good,” Saban observed.
When we look at the actual stats from the first two weeks, you can see exactly what Saban is talking about. Through two games, Oregon was allowing 33.0 points per game, ranking 123rd nationally in scoring defense. Opponents averaged 249.0 passing yards and 165.0 rushing yards per game against the Ducks, who ranked 111th nationally against the pass and 107th against the run. And you don’t let a team that had lost 21 straight games against FBS opponents put up 39 points and 554 yards against you.
On Oklahoma State’s first offensive play, quarterback Drew Mestemaker ripped off a 75-yard run that took the Cowboys from their own 22-yard line to the Oregon 3.
To make matters worse, Oregon had also allowed opponents to score on 91.67% of their red-zone opportunities, ranking 85th nationally in red-zone defense.
It wasn’t like this; Dan Lanning has historically fielded some of the most dominant defenses in modern college football history. Through his coordinator days at Georgia, his legendary 2021 team allowed just 10.2 points per game on their way to a national title.
After becoming Oregon’s head coach, Lanning’s defenses improved dramatically after his first season. The Ducks ranked 74th nationally in scoring defense in 2022, ninth in 2023, 16th in 2024, and 12th in 2025, with a top-15 unit last year that allowed 17.9 points per game.
But Saban pointed to the turnover among Oregon’s coordinators, and the accompanying roster changes, as a major challenge for the Ducks.
One of the inevitable realities of college football is that success invites other programs to raid your coaching staff. The Ducks had to replace both coordinator positions this offseason after Will Stein left for Kentucky and Tosh Lupoi took the head job at Cal. Saban compared coordinators to a head coach’s “second lieutenants,” noting that replacing them at the same time a roster is undergoing heavy turnover makes it incredibly difficult for the unit to find chemistry right off the bat.
“I think when you have continuity in your staff, it helps you be able to overcome those things, but it doesn’t look like Oregon sort of meshed together yet,” Saban said. He went on to add a blunt assessment of their initial outings, stating, “But right now, they haven’t played very good football the first two weeks.”
Pat McAfee asked how an elite program is supposed to navigate the minefield of hiring new coordinators without suffering a massive drop-off.
Saban laid out his core philosophy. For him, it all boils down to two non-negotiable pillars: culture and system. The goal is to bring in leaders who can command a room without feeling the need to completely reinvent a wheel that was already working.