Perhaps the biggest question the Oregon Ducks must answer in fall camp is along the offensive line. The story is fairly familiar. Oregon plugged holes last season with the transfer portal, but those guys are off to the NFL. Now, the Ducks have to replace three starters ahead of a high-expectation season.
The one big difference: the Ducks only added one lineman through the transfer portal. Senior right tackle Michael Bennett III is making the trip across the country from Yale to join the Big Ten contenders, where he will see a massive bump in competition. Fortunately, he appears ready for the task.
“A lot of excitement for me, honestly," Bennet said about joining the Ducks. "I heard rumblings of, ‘You might be at this level,’ or ‘you might end
up here,’ but when it all came together, you kind of realized that the work you put in — in my case, I wasn’t making any money. I wasn’t on scholarship. The work you put in paid off. That’s a really good feeling, knowing that you put your family in a better position right away, and you can put yourself in a position to go have a long career in the league."
Bennett, however, is only one body in a room that needs thrice as much help. And although the senior tackle has plenty of game experience, playing at Oregon is a whole different ball game. The Ducks are depending on their young depth to come through this season, putting years of development to the test and being tossed into the fire.
Dan Lanning mentioned a potential rotation for the Ducks up front involving as many as eight players, which did cause a stir. That could mean the Ducks would have to get creative in how they deploy different linemen, but they have found a way to do so in the past, often using more than five linemen at a time in short-yardage situations.
"It's a really hard position to go make an impact quick," Lanning said. "If you look back even to Josh Conerly, he played some as a freshman, but he played tight end at times. He'd be our sixth field lineman. He'd rotate in. I think that this year could look a lot like this, where you have six, seven, eight guys even that are rotating in as players, and their roles grow throughout the season based on how they do in their roles. But we had a lot of confidence in the guys that we had in that room that we didn't need to reach as long as we continue to develop that talent."
Offensive line coach A'lique Terry has continued to stack talented offensive line recruits in recent years, but this will be the season all of his work needs to come to fruition. Fox Crader redshirted as a freshman and impressed in extended action down the stretch last season at left tackle, where he will likely enter the fold this season.
"Fox probably is a top three smartest guy in our room, hands down," Terry said of Crader in the spring. "So I think it just forced him to even hone in even more on the detail. He writes down every play. If you see his notebook, he's got one of the most detailed notebooks I've ever seen. ... I think he realized his process was working, and only allowed him to double down in this process."
Freshmen Immanuel Iheanacho and Tommy Tofi, who had an outstanding spring, also figure to be part of that rotation at guard or tackle, having the versatility to play both. No matter how the Ducks shake out the rotation, the first few games of the season should help the team close in on a solid five to move forward with, ideally before conference play.
The lack of transfers is a vote of confidence from Lanning in Terry as a coach to get his unit ready to go. Veteran center Iapani 'Poncho' Laloulu, one of the few returning starters up front, wasn't surprised by the lack of portal moves and is ready to see what the young guys are capable of this season.
“When you’ve got pressure in your life, that means that everybody’s looking," Laloulu said. "And that’s good because that’s where adversity happens, and you’ve got to see growth happening in adversity. Growth doesn’t happen when you’re comfortable. When you stay comfortable, nothing’s going to happen. You’ve got to learn how to grow in uncomfortable situations, and I love how coach Lanning puts us in a situation every single day in practice."
Bennett could find himself in a fierce competition at right tackle in fall camp, with both Tofi and Iheanacho vying for the same spot. It could be a situation where the senior and the freshman duo both have to prove they have what it takes in the big, physical and nasty Big Ten trenches.
“It’s a competitive group of guys," Bennett said. "We’re all pushing each other. Poncho is a great leader, great center. There’s a bunch of older guys who have got a little taste or some time under their belt, and young guys who are growing, but they’ve got a lot of potential, a lot of talent. I think the most exciting bit is they are all guys who love football. I think that’s the strong suit. … That’s not out of necessity; that’s because guys would be deserving. When you have guys who deserve it, you want them all to develop. Because come December and January, it’s a war of attrition.”
The Ducks will certainly have more depth on the offensive line than a year ago. Still, it can take time for a new group of offensive linemen to feel each other out and figure out how they like to play.
For Laloulu, there is no time to waste. When the Ducks hit the field on Wednesday, the season begins, and the hunt for the right combination up front is kicked into high gear.
“I’m really excited to go into fall camp," Laloulu said. "I’m ready to see who’s ready to step up to the plate … We had three guys leave, so now we’re ready to see the younger guys, all the guys that have been developing since Lanning’s been here, who’s going to step up to that plate.”
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This article originally appeared on Ducks Wire: Laloulu, Bennett open up on development, rotation along Oregon offensive line
