By Andrew Greif, The Oregonian/OregonLive

EUGENE — When Mike Bellotti, Chip Kelly and Mark Helfrich became Oregon’s football coach, they inherited a program in ascent.

Each took over a team that had finished no worse than 11th in the AP poll. And each was expected to keep it rolling.

But where his predecessors’ promotions were a passing of the proverbial torch, Willie Taggart might as well have been handed a shovel.

“The other changes were the result of success,” Bellotti said. “This change was the result of failure.

“When you’re taking over a program that has hit, I won’t say rock bottom, but certainly one of the lower points in the last 25-30 years, then there’s a little bit of flexibility. You feel like you’ve got upward mobility. There’s an expectation to get better, but there’s also an expectation it may take some time.”

How much time it could take for Taggart to dig out of the hole left by UO's worst record in a quarter century is a central question as the Ducks march toward the first game of Taggart’s tenure, Sept. 2 against Southern Utah.

Read more: Justin Herbert has come out of his shell to become the face of the program

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Befitting a team in transition, many predictions for Oregon this fall are tempered, expecting that Washington, Washington State and Stanford will fight for the top of the Pac-12 North. The Ducks were picked fourth in the division by a poll of conference media, and for the first time since 2007, are expected to begin the season unranked in both the AP and coaches’ preseason Top 25 polls.

With a favorable schedule that misses South favorite USC, and includes matchups against four programs in various states of repair themselves — Arizona State, Cal, Arizona, and Oregon State — returning to the postseason is a target that's more than fair, several former coaches and conference experts said.

Bellotti's estimate? Between six-to-eight victories.

“I’d be surprised if they weren’t a six- or seven-win team,” said Rod Gilmore, a former Stanford starting defensive back who’s analyzed college football for ESPN since 1996.

Read more: Oregon's longest preseason camp ever is a good thing for a program in transition

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Yet because Taggart and Co. assembled a 2018 recruiting class that is rated so highly, so quickly, it’s also created a question of whether that mojo might translate on the field for UO sooner than later.

One Las Vegas betting house put UO’s over-under for wins at eight, double last season’s total. Though UO fell outside the Top 25 in the preseason coaches poll, it nonetheless received numerous votes. And an unnamed media voter even picked Oregon to win the conference.

“I think it could be, for lack of a better word, a quick fix at Oregon, I really do,” said Nick Aliotti, UO’s former defensive coordinator who since 2014 has worked as a Pac-12 Networks analyst. “They're not starting from scratch. It’s not like Oregon in 1978 when I first got there. We were awful. They’re not awful, They had an awful season, but they’re not awful. Sometimes when you change what’s between the ears, things can really get going for you right away.”

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Sean Meagher/The Oregonian

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CONFIDENCE IN TAGGART

After nearly 50 years in college coaching, including head coaching gigs at Hawaii and Arizona, Dick Tomey was enjoying time off in 2014 when South Florida athletic director Mark Harlan called with an invitation.

During Tomey's three-day visit to Tampa that September to speak with USF's coaches, he became especially close with a football coach coming off a 2-10 first season. A few months later, after the Bulls finished 4-8 in Taggart’s second season, Harlan asked Tomey whether he’d join the USF staff in an advisory role.

Tomey accepted. In 2015, as Tomey and Taggart spoke weekly, USF pulled out of a 1-3 start to finish 8-5 and reach a bowl for the first time since 2010. Tomey, already a self-described optimist, said he became sold on Taggart’s personality and how it complements his role as a recruiter, play caller and program-builder.

“The area where he excels is in getting the most out of people and bringing people together,” Tomey said. “I think the coaches that do the best job are the ones that are great connectors with people. I think Willie is exceptional in that regard.

“I’m optimistic about what Oregon can do.”

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Tomey isn’t alone in pinning his optimism for 2017 on Taggart — and the fact that at UO, the coach now has more resources at his disposal than ever.

"Oregon is the hottest quote-unquote potential brand in the conference in terms of recruiting and notoriety, so I don’t think it’s going to be long,” said Yogi Roth, a former USC coach under Pete Carroll who is now a Pac-12 Networks analyst. "I just think it’s step two of a rebuild. Spring is one, camp is two and here comes the season."

Though Oregon's Xs and Os and depth were major factors in 2016's breakdown — "I don’t know that there’s anything that they did competently on defense," Gilmore said — Taggart has paid as much attention on fixing behind-the-scenes issues since his hiring. It's not just about identifying the best 11 players, he's said, but building trust between them.

Read more: What Willie Taggart wants from the Oregon Ducks: 'We've got to learn to like each other'

How those efforts at laying a foundation translate to wins and losses immediately remains to be seen. Multiple players, however, say the team is more cohesive now than at this point last season. They point to Taggart's emphasis on team-building as a reason why. In one move aimed at busting position-specific cliques, small "player accountability groups" were formed to force players from across the roster to hold one another accountable in on- and off-field matters.

"I think what was broken was the attitude and the camaraderie and those kinds of things," said Aliotti, who like Tomey, Roth and Bellotti has watched Oregon practice in the preseason. "Willie and his staff seem to get that part of it, and they’re trying to fix that first, and then they’re going out to get guys to make them better.

“There is no ceiling where they’ll be 2-3 years down the road.”

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Sean Meagher | The Oregonian/OregonLive

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CONCERN OVER PERSONNEL

Of the many stunning moments from a 2016 season defined by its losses, one of the most shocking actually came in a victory: Oregon's 11-point rally in the final 22 minutes to beat No. 11 Utah for its only road win.

"As bad as they played at times, when you watched that game you thought, why couldn’t they beat anybody?" Bellotti said.

Of course, the Ducks' lack of depth and experience were critical factors then. And they remain so in 2017.

While it’s possible to rebuild team chemistry in eight months, it’s more difficult to add enough playmakers to patch UO’s holes.

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Though UO's starters at quarterback, receiver and defensive line could blossom into all-conference contributors, the depth is tenuous behind players like sophomore quarterback Justin Herbert, senior wideout Charles Nelson, freshman tackle Jordon Scott and senior tackle Scott Pagano. Playing true freshmen is nothing new at UO, but this season could feature a heavier influx than normal. Taggart hasn't committed to redshirting anyone yet, he said, adding that freshmen arrive "more developed" now than in the past.

Ask anyone about their outlook for UO's season, and the gaps in its depth chart are the most-discussed reasons for caution. UO is only a few injuries away from playing Ducks as green as their jerseys.

"I’m going to be real with you," Aliotti said. "The front on the defense is probably not as stout as where it needs to be. If you’re looking for chinks in the armor going in, there’s probably not enough big bodies at linebacker and D-line. Obviously, we all know the receiving corps is young. Those two pieces to me are things that we got to see how they develop."

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In his travels to preseason camps across the Pac-12 this month, Roth evaluates a team's readiness to compete by looking at the middle of its defense, from the tackles to the safeties. UO doesn’t have much NFL draft-eligible talent there yet, he said, but moving sophomore linebacker Troy Dye, last season's leading tackler, from outside linebacker to inside, was a boost. The move of Brenden Schooler, last season’s interception leader, to wideout was also a sign of its confidence in its remaining safeties. Scott and Austin Faoliu are a combined 622 pounds of freshmen along the line whose big-time potential also immediately caught Roth's attention.

The defense "will get better," Bellotti said, "because Jim Leavitt I think is a very good coach. I don't know that they have the quality of depth necessary to sustain or improve defensive performance over the course of a season. Certainly there will be ups and downs, but they will be better."

"There's nowhere to go," Taggart said, "but up."

Oregon's defense faced 80.9 plays per game last season and in each of the past five was on the field for at least 75. One way Taggart, who will call offensive plays, can limit that exposure is by relying on positions where UO is deepest — a six-deep running back corps and a more experienced offensive line. Oregon will again play uptempo, but Taggart plans to slow down when necessary. Preserving the defense will be especially essential during a five-game stretch beginning in October against Washington State, Stanford, UCLA, Utah and Washington.

The offense wasn’t immune to criticism last season, either, after its slow starts often had UO playing from behind.

Read more: Walk-on takes an odd route to UO's receiver competition

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"Willie is a better coach than people realize," Gilmore said. "Everybody talks about him recruiting, but he’s got pretty good instincts. If you watch him in games, he understands when to pounce, when a game might be getting away from him, and he’s not so dogmatic that he ignores his defense."

During 17 seasons as Oregon's defensive coordinator, Aliotti never much liked discussing expectations during the preseason. Three years into retirement, he still prefers not to predict records. Why? Because he still thinks like a coach.

Translation: Where outsiders can break down a season in terms of wins and losses, players and coaches are uber-confident out of necessity. They put on blinders that force themselves to imagine victories and nothing else. They wouldn't be competitors without that mindset, Aliotti said.

Several Ducks agreed. No need to look ahead to 2018 quite yet, they say.

“We think we have a great team with the guys we have right now,” right tackle Calvin Throckmorton said. “We have a great attitude toward this season and we think we have the right pieces to do well this year.”

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Andrew Greif

agreif@oregonian.com

@andrewgreif

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<a href="http://polldaddy.com/poll/9640688/">How many games will Oregon football win in the 2017 season?</a>