At Oregon, they want to beat football opponents on paper

EUGENE, Ore. — The school year doesn't officially open at the University of Oregon until Monday, Sept. 28, when more than 20,000 students trudge back onto campus for the first day of the fall quarter. For a select group of the student body, however, classes have already begun.

Every Thursday during the regular season, Oregon players file into meeting rooms and offices inside the football facility for the program's weekly version of the SATs: tests written by student interns, fact-checked by graduate assistants and administered to positional groupings by their respective assistant coach.

"It's clear at the end of that the things we're comfortable with, the things we're not comfortable with, and the two or three things that right now we don't have," said defensive coordinator Don Pellum. "Those are the things we want to try to hit, to try to get those guys to think about."

The tests feature multiple-choice questions, a fill-in-the-blank portion, even, in true SAT fashion, an essay section — all designed to gauge the Ducks' knowledge of their responsibilities and opponent-centered game plan. For coaches, the tests allow one last peek into the team's preparedness, giving the staff time to review areas of potential concern heading into Saturday.

If not unique across college football, the Ducks' use of these tests speak to the program's larger blueprint: Oregon's success is rooted in robotic perfection, in the speed of its mental and physical processes through pattern recognition and muscle memory, and in acting, not reacting, to remain one step quicker than the competition.

"Most of the guys understand the principle, that it's just getting them to do one more mental rep, one more time looking through their playbook," said graduate assistant Nate Costa, who proofs the questions before the tests are administered. "That's all it really is, and that's all it's designed to be."

Defensive players might be given an offensive formation and asked to name the opponent's tendency. Offensive players will be asked to draw their own formations and the potential defensive response; wide receivers, for example, will sketch out their list of route conversions in a specific down-and-distance situation against a potential alignment.

For some positional units — the offensive line, for example — the tests are split into two: one for the veterans that is focused more on the opponent, and another for the younger players, with more attention paid to a basic understanding of the Ducks' frenetic offense. The hardest questions are given to the quarterbacks. When given tests specific to the line, for example, Oregon quarterbacks will "blow through it like it's nothing," said offensive lineman Matt Pierson, who also is one of the Ducks' best test-takers.

"I don't really need to know if you truly know what you're doing, because if you don't know what you're doing, at that point it's too late," Costa said. "It's more to get them to go through a mental walkthrough, to process things one last time. That's why teachers at universities test, to find out the whole study program."

Fittingly, given Oregon's emphasis on speed, tempo and aggressiveness, the tests are given under time constraints and amid noise meant to imitate the on-field mental processes of a given Saturday. In defensive meetings, for example, players might be given 20 seconds to answer three questions — while sirens blare and hands bang on desks so forcefully that pencils bounce.

"When we're playing here, it's not a calm environment to play in or practice in," linebacker Rodney Hardrick said. "So it's not a calm environment to take a test in."

Said Pellum, "We push the tempo on the tests."

Nor are the tests entirely specific to plans, schemes and formations — or even football, really. Linemen may be asked to name the best movie they've seen recently, and why. Wide receivers coach Matt Lubick will ask his charges to name a state capitol. Offensive coordinator Scott Frost has been known to sprinkle into his tests a history question. One recent example: Can you name the last 10 Presidents?

Tests for the defense always include questions "geared more toward the man, the person, not just football," Pellum said. One question may ask players to name a teammate's hometown to show how much they know about each other. Another may ask for the name of a player's new girlfriend. Test-takers may be asked to comment on a saying or proverb.

"If you keep it kind of light and quick, they don't have to think about them a ton, and on the football field you think too much, you're dead," Costa said.

A similar mentality is in place at practice, where coaches won't stop drills to correct mistakes but wait until later, at film study, to point out the error. Because there's no time for even a moment's hesitation in pads, the Ducks do their thinking in advance of game day.

"Those tests kind of show what they know," Lubick said. "That's the purpose of it. It should give you confidence; if you ace that test, you know what you're doing, go play fast."

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