Paul Finebaum defends Oregon, Dan Lanning after home loss against Indiana

ESPN’s Paul Finebaum doesn’t think Oregon was exposed by Indiana Saturday when they lost their first game of the year. In a matchup of the No. 3 Ducks and No. 7 Hoosiers, Oregon suffered a home defeat against, you guessed it, a for real Indiana squad.

Finebaum defended Dan Lanning and the Ducks despite the upset. The schedule sets up for success and Oregon could certainly get back to the Big Ten championship or at least grab an at-large bid to the College Football Playoff.

So as Finebaum put it, don’t panic Oregon fans! On any other day, the Ducks go home with a win and Indiana is left scratching their heads.

“I’m out on that (notion of them being exposed) because we saw a minute ago in the highlights that the game was tied,” Finebaum said on SportsCenter. “There were a lot of mistakes made, but … it’s hard to give Oregon a pass for losing a game like this at home, but I still think they have an outstanding quarterback. I think Dan Lanning remains one of the best coaches in the country, although I would advise him to leave his shirt on in the future. But ultimately, I think they can creep their way back into this.”

Lanning alluded to the game plan not being good enough when he spoke after the 30-20 loss. If he at least acknowledged that fact., perhaps Oregon can bounce back fast.

“I don’t think anybody in the organization did the best that they’re capable of today, myself included,” Lanning said postgame. “Starts with me. Again, I thought their plan was better and ours wasn’t. There’s some moments going back early in the game that I’m already saying ‘okay we handled this wrong and didn’t put our guys in position to have success.’ 

“But that’ll be something we can go improve. I thought our players played hard, but there’s a moment there when you’re not having success on offense, that you’re probably you’ll have some self doubt that’s going to set and it’s something we’ll have to attack and make sure that we have a great plan for in the future.”

Lanning and Oregon have to flush that one down quickly. It’s a long road trip this week, but a chance to get right against a struggling Rutgers team that’s lost three in a row in Big Ten play this year. But if the Ducks saw something this weekend, they can’t let their guard down against a rising or desperate team.