Three games into Oregon State head coach JaMarcus Shephard’s first season, the Beavers have one of the most productive passing attacks in the country.
Entering the Montana game last week, sophomore quarterback Braden Atkinson already led the nation in passing yards with 373 yards per game and freshman receiver Jesse Legree led in receiving yards with 376, averaging 188 yards per game. Then Atkinson threw for 333 yards and five touchdowns in a 52-17 rout of Montana. It’s the kind of performance that
confirms a stat line rather than padding one.
A year ago this would have sounded absurd. Oregon State’s 2025 passing offense ranked 66th nationally at 226 yards per game on the way to a 2-10 finish.
How Atkinson and Legree got here
The jump from the middle of the passing pack to the top is the product of a total teardown.
Shephard and offensive coordinator Mitch Dahlen rebuilt the skill positions almost entirely through the transfer portal and Atkinson was the headliner. Atkinson won Mercer’s starting job as a true freshman in 2025, took home the Jerry Rice Award as the top freshman in FCS football and set the school’s single-game passing record in a 62-0 win over Virginia Military Institute before entering the portal.
Dahlen, who coached quarterbacks at Alabama and Washington alongside Shephard, called their fit obvious. That evaluation has since played out on the field, so far.
Interestingly enough, looking back on the Texas Tech shootout before their Montana State face-off, Dahlen had shrugged off a notion that 400 passing yards against a top-15 team needed any more explanation than the players making it happen: “What do you want me to do? There’s a mix of the nation’s leading passer in Braden Atkinson and the nation’s leading receiver in Jesse Legree, so there’s a fine line between the two.”
Legree is the more improbable piece.
Legree arrived from St. Frances Academy in Baltimore at 5-foot-10 and 167 pounds, hardly a blue-chip name and is averaging 29 yards per catch; ninth best in the country and the top mark among any pass catcher with 10 or more catches.
In all, Shephard has leaned on distribution over stardom, an Air Raid instinct picked up under Mike Leach at Washington State. So far, 17 different Beavers had caught a pass or carried the ball, and against Montana, Atkinson spread five touchdowns to five different receivers; all five acquired this off-season.
The defense and the schedule that could undo it
Oregon State averaged 386 passing yards through its first three games, but before the Montana blowout game, the Beavers only averaged 22 points per game. It’s a gap that points to stalled drives rather than a lack of firepower.
The defense has been worse.
Opponents put up 34 points and 191.5 rushing yards per game against a Beavers unit also breaking in a new coordinator, Mike MacIntyre and a new 3-4 scheme. Texas Tech ran for 155 yards and beat Oregon State 35-24 the week before Montana came to town.
Oregon State has been here before. In 2013, Sean Mannion and Brandin Cooks had the Beavers tied for the nation’s top passing offense three weeks into the season at 439 yards per game. That team finished 7-6, a reminder that gaudy passing numbers haven’t historically translated into much more than a bowl trip in Corvallis.
Also, the soft part of the schedule is nearly gone.
UTEP comes next, then Pac-12 play opens at Colorado State on October 3rd before home dates with San Diego State and Washington State. That stretch will tell the real story.
Atkinson and Legree have proven they can put up numbers against overmatched defenses. Whether the passing game can outscore what the defense gives back and whether Oregon State starts turning yardage into touchdowns instead of settling for stalled drives, will decide if this is a top-10 offense with a bottom-40 record or a genuine surprise team by November.
