Dan Lanning Gives His Early Thoughts on Facing James Madison: "Our players are excited to play this team"

Following an 11-1 regular season, the Oregon Ducks drew the No. 5 seed in Sunday’s College Football Playoff rankings. They’ll host a playoff game on Saturday December 20 in Eugene against the No. 12 James Madison Dukes. Head coach Dan Lanning met with reporters on Sunday to give his initial thoughts on the matchup.

Opening Statement: Obviously really excited about this opportunity to face James Madison in a playoff game here at Autzen stadium. I think our fans are going to be unbelievable. This’ll be a unique atmosphere that doesn’t exist in the last 20 years, and now you get the opportunity to experience it now. I know our players are excited to play this team. Just really getting started hopping in and evaluate these guys. Been able to watch them a little bit this afternoon. Obviously they got a really talented team, coach Chesney’s done a really good job with these guys. They’ve been really successful in several games, just looking through it this morning. I think they’ve had nine games where they’ve rushed for over 200 yards, and that’s a common component for them and their success. Played really good defense and really good special teams. So excited about the opportunity.”

On how Dante Moore has changed this season

Lanning: “I just think the majority of time. We started this season with a lot of guys, Dante being one of them, that experience had been limited, and we got to see a lot of action in practice, but now that experience is no longer limited. You’ve seen a guy win a game for us in overtime. You’ve seen a guy create two-minute drives that turned into success for our team. You see a guy that’s won over his teammates. So many people fighting for positions throughout the season. He’s a person that stepped up and has great maturity, a great disposition that I think has shown up for us throughout the season.”

On what he learned from extended down time before last year’s playoff

Lanning: “There’s some benefits to how this has played out, potentially this year, just with class wrapping up. A lot of those things have been a piece of this that our players are dealing with, finishing up classes, finals, giving them an opportunity to have a little bit of a reset. This past week for us was really more lifts and just an opportunity to attack the classroom and get a little bit of a break from us, which I think is a positive, and then able to reset in this next coming week into what it’ll look like moving forward. So certainly some lessons learned. I won’t share all those, but taken a little bit different approach to some of the things we attack this season.”

On Dakorien Moore attacking his rehab, his leadership during injury

Lanning: I think it starts with mindset. And, Dakorien like several of the other guys that have been in that position, realize that they have a job to do, as far as pushing themselves to be back in position where they can help his team. And they can still help this team even when they’re not out there on the field necessarily for us. So really proud of how he’s handled that, proud with several of those guys and how they’ve handled that situation.”

On preparing for a team he maybe hasn’t seen much of

Lanning: “Really no different than every other team that we prepare for. You’re usually so focused on the team that you’re currently playing that you’re not watching a lot of other college games throughout the season. So as the film gets uploaded on your system, you start breaking them down. You try to take an opportunity go back and watch those and that’s what we’ve already started the day. So process is really no different. Evaluate the film that you see, attack what you see, try to talk to some people that have maybe played common opponents, see what opinions they have on on that team, and break it down just like a normal week.”

On James Madison’s run game

Lanning: “That’s certainly one of the things we noticed this morning going back and watching the film evaluating them, that they run the ball really well. I think they’ve got a good system in place to make sure they’re running runs that create success. It’s going to be something we have to prepare ourselves to stop.”

On if he has a pitch to students to come to game given timing of holiday break

Lanning: “I don’t think I have to create a pitch. Our fans are going to show out for this game. There’s zero doubt in my mind that they’ll be there. If it’s not a student, it’ll be another working fan that’s in there, but they don’t want to miss the opportunity to see the one playoff game in Autzen stadium that hasn’t happened before. So I think we’ll have a lot of fans there ready to support it and ready to see that myself.”

On reports of Drew Mehringer and Chris Hampton as new coordinators, what would make them good candidates

Lanning: “Yeah, I’m not going to hop on that right now. Certainly appreciate—there’s going to be great opportunities for a lot of guys within our staff. But that’s not the focus of this talk.”

On potential of three cross-country trips in three weeks

Lanning: “Well if anybody’s prepared for it, it’s us. We’ve done it a lot, and I think we travel really well. We’ll try to keep the routine as simple as possible and as much like normal games that we’ve done in the past, but before we ever get to that point, we gotta take care of business here.”

On 5-star signees Jalen Lott and Kendre Harrison

Lanning: “Certainly want to focus on the playoff game, but we were able to add some elite players. And those are two guys that are certainly worthy of that discussion. You watch what they’ve done for their teams, what they were able to create with their high school teams. Kendre’s a guy I got to see in person, play. Set school records there for touchdowns. Obviously a huge target in the red area, but also a guy that can carry the ball. He does a lot of different stuff. And then same thing for Jalen. He’s a guy that got multiple touches. His speed, I think everyone recognized. His catch radius, his ability, it just shows up consistently on film. And certainly a guy that has a lot of versatility for his team. We’re hoping to carry that over here to Oregon.”