The Oregon Ducks refers to the sports teams of the University of Oregon, located in Eugene, Oregon. The Oregon Ducks are part of the Pacific-10 Conference in the Division 1-A of the NCAA. With fifteen varsity teams, the Oregon Ducks are best known for their football team and Track and Field program, which has helped to make Eugene be known as "Track Town, USA". [1] Oregon's main rivalries are with the Oregon State Beavers (the Civil War) and the Washington Huskies. [2]

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National championships

Through March 2009, Oregon has won 16 NCAA national championships: ^[3]

• Men's Basketball: 1939
• Men's Cross Country: 1971, 1973, 1974, 1977, 2007, 2008
• Women's Cross Country: 1983, 1987
• Men's Track & Field: 1962, 1964, 1965, 1970, 1984
• Women's Track & Field: 1985
• Men's Indoor Track & Field: 2009

Programs

Football

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The football program began in 1893 and played its first game on February 22, 1894, defeating Albany College 46-0. ^[4] The football team moved to its new home, Hayward Field in 1919 where it shared the facility with the track and field team until Autzen Stadium was completed in 1967. ^[5]

Winning its first Rose Bowl in 1917 against the University of Pennsylvania under head coach Hugo Bezdek, the Ducks have returned to the Rose Bowl three additional times in 1920, 1957, and 1994. ^[6] While in the Pacific Coast Conference, the Ducks won five conference co-championships in 1919, 1933, 1948, and 1957. The Pacific Coast Conference was disbanded in 1958 and the Ducks joined the Pacific 8 Conference, which later became the Pacific-10 Conference, where they won the conference championships twice (1994, 2001) and shared the championship once (2000). The Ducks have participated in one BCS Bowl game since the inception of the BCS in 1998, defeating the Colorado Buffaloes in the 2002 Fiesta Bowl.

After the 1994 season, former head coach Rich Brooks left the program and announced his then offensive coordinator Mike Bellotti to be the next head coach who became the winningest coach in program history with 116 wins. ^[7] Bellotti suffered only one losing season during his tenure and built a national reputation as an offensive powerhouse. Following in his predecessor’s footsteps, Bellotti announced in March 2009 that his offensive coordinator Chip Kelly would assume the role as head coach while he becomes the athletic director for the University.

Basketball

The Ducks men’s basketball team played its first season in 1902-1903 under head coach Charles Burden. ^[8] It was not until 1927 that the Ducks played their first game at Mac Court, defeating Willamette University 38-10.

Head coach Howard Hobson was hired in 1936 and took the basketball team nicknamed "The Tall Firs" to win the first NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship in 1939. The Tall Firs achieved a 29-5 record, capped by a 46-33 victory over Ohio State University in the championship game.

The Ducks would add only one more shared Pacific Coast Conference title to their two until winning the Pacific 10 Conference title in the 2001-2002 season under head coach Ernie Kent. The Ducks would also make an Elite Eight appearance in the NCAA Tournament that season along with the 2006-2007 season.

Track & Field

The University of Oregon Cross Country and Track & Field programs have a particularly long and storied history, earning Eugene the nickname Track Town, USA. After several years of struggling, Bill Hayward became the head coach in 1904 and provided solid direction for the program for 44 years, coaching Daniel Kelly and Ralph Hill to Olympic Silver Medals. ^[9] After Hayward's retirement in 1947, his trainee Bill Bowerman took over the head coaching position in 1949.

Bill Bowerman became a legendary coach, winning numerous NCAA team Championships at Oregon and coached many to All-American and Olympian status such as Steve Prefontaine. His talents were not limited to the track, as he also co-founded Nike, pressured the Amateur Athletic Union to improve its services, and brought the Olympic Trials and NCAA Championships to Hayward Field. ^[10]

Bill Bowerman retired in 1973 and his assistant coach, Bill Dellinger became the head coach who brought four NCAA Cross Country Championships and one NCAA Track & Field Championship. ^[11]

Steve Prefontaine, who ran at Oregon in the early 1970s, was a legend in his own right, setting 13 American records in seven separate events and only lost three races at Hayward Field during the span of his career. He won seven NCAA championships and today, the Prefontaine Classic is held every year at Hayward Field in his honor. ^[12]

The program has garnered numerous NCAA national titles across all the disciplines and as of 2009, holds all of Oregon's national championships except the 1939 championship in men's basketball.

Baseball

The Ducks baseball team first played in 1877, the year following the establishment of the university. In 1981, baseball was dropped due to budgetary concerns. Baseball would be reinstated 26 years later by interim athletic director Patrick Kilkenny and played its first game in 2009. ^[13] George Horton who led the Cal State Fullerton baseball team to an NCAA national championship was hired in 2007 to lead the reinstated Oregon Ducks baseball program. ^[14]

Venues

The Oregon Ducks football complex is located north of the main campus. The complex includes Autzen Stadium where the games are played, the Len Casanova Center where the locker rooms and training facilities are located, the indoor practice field called the Moshofsky Center, and the outdoor training field named Kilkenny Field. ^[15] These facilities are said to be among the best in the nation, ^[16] much of the price tag paid for by the prominent university boosters Phil Knight, Ed Moshofsky, and Patrick Kilkenny.

Also in the football complex is PK Park, the University of Oregon baseball stadium, completed in 2009 for the reemergence of the baseball program, located in the northeast corner of the parking lot.

The basketball teams along with other court-based sports play at McArthur Court, built in 1926. The construction of a new arena called Matt Court has begun on the northeast corner of campus to replace McArthur Court.

Hayward Field was originally constructed for the football team in 1919 and in 1921, a track was installed to accommodate the track team. Today, it is the home of the Oregon Ducks track and field team. This storied venue has been the host of the NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships nine times and will host it again in 2010. The Olympic Trials have been hosted at this venue four times. ^[17]

Rivalries

The Oregon Ducks have an in-state rivalry with the Oregon State Beavers in which they play for the Platypus Trophy. The rivalry has been dubbed the Civil War and for the past nine years has been scored across nine different sports that the two universities share (baseball will be added when Oregon begins play during the 2008-2009 academic year). The series is currently tied 4-4-1. ^[18]

The Oregon Ducks and the Washington Huskies have enjoyed a border rivalry that some consider to be even more fierce than the respective teams’ in-state rivalries. The rivalry began to build steam in 1948, when the Ducks and the California Golden Bears tied for the conference win and the Huskies’ vote went to Cal which inked them in for a trip to the Rose Bowl. A few years later, there was a move to remove Oregon, Oregon State, and Washington State from the Pacific-10 Conference and the Huskies did not object. ^[19]

Relationship with Nike

Nike co-founder Phil Knight ran in the University of Oregon Track & Field program under the other Nike co-founder Bill Bowerman. Knight graduated from the University of Oregon in 1959 with a bachelor’s degree in accounting and went on to earn an M.B.A. at Stanford University. ^[20] Knight returned to Oregon and with Bowerman, also a University of Oregon alumnus, later founded Blue Ribbon Sports in 1964 which officially became Nike in 1978. In 1970, Bill Bowerman revolutionized the athletic shoe by pouring molten rubber into a waffle iron, creating a prototype rubber sole. University of Oregon distance runner Steve Prefontaine became the first major track athlete to wear Nike shoes and converted many of his peers to the Nike brand. ^[21]

Nike has maintained a close relationship with UO ever since, manufacturing all university logo clothing and uniforms for the football team, including research prototypes for high-tech "smart clothes", such as jerseys with cooling systems. Numerous University of Oregon graduates have also gone on to become executives, designers, and business partners of Nike such as Tinker Hatfield and Dan Wieden.

Phil Knight has personally donated significant amounts to the University for both academic and athletic aspirations, including significant amounts toward the Knight Library, the Knight Law Center, numerous endowed chairs, support for the track & field program, the Autzen Stadium expansion, and a $100 million donation to create the Oregon Athletics Legacy Fund. ^{[22] [23]}

Controversy surrounding Nike's labor practices precipitated protests in 2000 led by a group of students calling themselves the Human Rights Alliance. Protests included a 10 day tent city occupation of the lawns in front of Johnson Hall, the main administration building, demanding the university join the Worker Rights Consortium. ^[24]

University President Dave Frohnmayer signed a one year contract with the WRC, causing Phil Knight to withdraw a previous $30 million commitment toward the Autzen Stadium expansion project and no further donations toward the University. ^{[25] [26]} Nike, since 1998, had actively improved worker conditions abroad and strongly endorsed the Fair Labor Association, an association with similar aspirations of the WRC. ^[27] In a public statement, Phil Knight criticized the WRC for having unrealistic provisions and called it misguided while praising the FLA for being balanced in its approach. ^[28] The students disagreed, saying the FLA has conflicting interests, but President Dave Frohnmayer along with several others agreed with Knight in that the WRC provides unbalanced representation. ^{[29] [30]}

Citing a legal opinion from the University Counsel, President Frohnmayer in October 2000, released a statement saying that the University could not pay its membership dues for the WRC since the WRC was neither an incorporated entity nor had tax-exempt status and to do so was a violation of state law. The Oregon University System on February 16, 2001 enacted a mandate that all institutions within the OUS choose business partners from a politically neutral standpoint, barring all universities in Oregon from membership in the WRC and the FLA. ^[31] Following the dissolved relationship between the university and the WRC, Phil Knight reinstated the donation and increased the amount to over $50 million dollars. ^[32] Since then, activity on the subject died down and Frohnmayer believed that the leaders of the protest lost their foothold since they did not represent the majority of students on campus. ^[33]

See also

• Oregon Ducks football
• Oregon Ducks men's basketball
• Oregon Ducks baseball

References

1. Track Town, USA
2. ESPN College Football Nation
3. How many NCAA Division I championships has your school won?
4. Oregon Sports History Timeline
5. Makeover of Hayward Field gets favorable review
6. National Champs.net Oregon Football History Database
7. Mike Bellotti moves on to be UO athletic director and Chip Kelly will be the Ducks’ football coach
8. 2005 Oregon Ducks Media Guide
9. Athletics and the University of Oregon – Bill Hayward
10. Athletics and the University of Oregon – Bill Bowerman
11. Athletics and the University of Oregon – Bill Dellinger
12. Athletics and the University of Oregon – Leaders of the Long Distance Decades
13. Ducks resuscitating baseball after 26-year hiatus
14. Oregon strikes gold by hiring Horton as its baseball coach
15. Oregon Gridiron
16. Just Do It!
17. GoDucks.com About Hayward Field
18. Northwest Dodge Dealers Civil War Series
19. Nothing neighborly about Huskies vs. Ducks
20. Oregon Blue Book: Phil Knight
21. Nike Timeline
22. Knight contributions fact sheet
23. Knight’s $100 million gift to bankroll Oregon athletics fund
24. We’re not going to leave
25. Old issues, new strategies
26. Knight pulls all money
27. Nike backs worker rights through FLA, but not WRC
28. Statement from Nike founder and CEO Philip H. Knight regarding the University of Oregon
29. Great debate: WRC vs. FLA
30. Foreign Affairs; Knight Is Right
31. OUS policy won’t stop labor debate
32. Nike's Phil Knight resigns as CEO
33. WRC vanishes on campus, but still keeps growing