CBS SportsLine wire reports
Sept. 26, 1998
EUGENE, Ore. -- Putting Reuben Droughns back into the lineup is like adding booster engines to Oregon's high-powered offense.
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Droughns, coming back from a foot injury that sidelined him for most of the last two games, rushed for 214 yards and three touchdowns and Akili Smith threw for four first-half touchdowns as No. 20 Oregon put on another impressive offensive display to beat Stanford 63-28.
Droughns ran for second-half touchdowns of 1, 67 and 40 yards and became the first player in Oregon history to rush for 200 yards twice in a season. The junior transfer ran for 202 yards and scored three TDs in a season-opening 48-14 victory over Michigan State. He sprained his right ankle in the second quarter against UTEP the following week and sat out last week's 58-3 victory over San Jose State.
"I WOULD SAY I'M ABOUT 90 percent right now," said Droughns, who had just 34 yards on seven carries at halftime. "At the beginning, it was kind of hard for me to get the cuts and run hard. The coaches and teammates started telling me, `Just run."'
Oregon (4-0, 1-0 Pac-10) piled up 664 yards in offense, three shy of the school record set against BYU in 1989. Oregon scored its most points ever in a Pac-10 game and the most overall since a 97-0 defeat of Willamette in 1916. It was the most points given up by the Cardinal (1-3, 0-2) since a 72-0 loss at UCLA in 1954.
In a typically wild game, the teams combined for 1,056 total yards, one year after combining for 1,108 yards in a 58-49 Stanford victory. In the past six games between the schools, they have averaged 74.3 points and 951 combined yards.
The Ducks had lost their last three to the Cardinal and six of seven, but Smith and Oregon's receivers were too much this time.
Smith completed 18-of-29 passes for 357 yards, 313 in the first half. He also threw four first-half TDs against Michigan State.
DAMON GRIFFIN CAUGHT FIVE passes for 118 yards and two touchdowns. Jed Weaver added five receptions for 84 yards and a TD.
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Flanker Tony Hartley crosses the goal line
for one of Oregon's many touchdowns Saturday.
(AP)
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Oregon led 42-21 at the half, but committed turnovers on its first two possessions of the third quarter. Stanford couldn't capitalize, and Droughns put the game away with a 1-yard dive over the goal line to put the Ducks ahead 49-21 with 3:21 left in the quarter.
"We had a great deal of respect for him," Stanford coach Tyrone Willingham said. "We don't feel like, even with his skill and ability, that we executed as well as we should have."
Even when Stanford woke up and outscored the Ducks 21-14 during a head-spinning 7:46 stretch of the second quarter, Oregon answered.
Stanford cut it to 35-21 on a 10-yard pass from Todd Husak to Dave Davis with 1:33 left in the first half. It was set up by a blocked punt by Emory Brock. It was the first blocked punt of senior Josh Bidwell's career after 189 successful kicks.
Oregon struck back in just five plays and 47 seconds, as Smith hit Weaver over the middle for a 29-yard TD just before the half.
"I went out today and executed a great game plan," Smith said. ``We had a lot of time. We had some wide-open receivers on the field, and I hit them in the chest."
OREGON, AVERAGING 50.5 POINTS per game, is off to a 4-0 start for the first time since 1988 and only the third time since 1964.
"We had to put a lot of points on the board, and we did that," Oregon coach Mike Bellotti said. "I thought our defense went to sleep in the second quarter, but I was pleased, and I challenged them at halftime to come out and play the next half."
The Cardinal was without star receiver and kick returner Troy Walters, who missed his second consecutive game with a sprained right ankle. In his absence, DeRonnie Pitts caught 10 passes for 158 yards and a TD.
Husak was 16-of-34 for 211 yards and two touchdowns.
Smith threw his first TD pass just 1:20 into the game to Griffin, who beat freshman cornerback Brian Taylor badly and ran for a 37-yard touchdown. Taylor had replaced sophomore Ruben Carter at the position in the second half of Stanford's 37-34 victory over North Carolina last weekend.
On the kickoff, Stanford's Coy Wire bobbled the ball and took a vicious hit from Michael Fletcher, jarring the ball loose. Dietrich Moore jumped on it at the Cardinal 14, and three plays later Derien Latimer scored from a yard out.
Griffin later outran Taylor again for a 34-yard gain that set up Smith's 13-yard TD pass to Tony Hartley. Finally, Griffin turned in the play of the game in the second quarter when he bobbled a pass, which Taylor tipped back to Griffin, who shook three tacklers and dove across the goal line for a 35-yard score to make it 35-7.