EUGENE -- Though he admits allowing seven sacks against Washington State was "embarrassing" for Oregon's offensive line, starting left guard Hamani Stevens still contends the unit is ready for a bounce-back game.

Whether Stevens's prediction is prescient or premature will be decided Thursday night at 7:30 p.m. when

at Autzen Stadium on an ESPN broadcast.

"I think the offensive line got underrated," Stevens said. "After that Washington State game with a lot of people getting beat up, maybe they're kind of sleeping on us with Jake Fisher going down and Andre getting hurt and a lot of other injuries."

Injuries have sidelined starting tackles Tyler Johnstone, Fisher and Andre Yruretagoyena this season, and reserves Elijah George and Haniteli Lousi also have missed games due to undisclosed injuries.

George and Yruretagoyena -- who is on crutches, with a cast -- still remain in street clothes this week. Johnstone is out for the season after reinjuring the ACL he tore in last December's Alamo Bowl.

Signs of hope include Fisher and Lousi dressing for practice during Oregon's bye week following the 38-31 win at Washington State. Fisher is listed as a possible starter at left tackle this week with freshman Tyrell Crosby, while Lousi is listed as Stevens' backup at guard.

No Duck has rushed for 100 yards in the team's first four games, the first time that's happened at Oregon since 2005. Oregon's rushing offense is averaging 48 fewer than last season, at 225 yards per game.

One of head coach Mark Helfrich's critiques after Washington State was that the mistakes were made as often by veterans' breakdowns -- Stevens, a senior, allowed a sack -- as errors by the young replacements.

Despite those grim metrics, the flip side is that Oregon's 5.7 yards per carry average is 19th best nationally.

"They think the offensive line can't bounce back and be as productive as we were, but I think we have the capability and ability to be that high-producing offense and give it all our best," Stevens said.

For Stevens, encouragement came in the form of Oregon's bye week practices where he said the line made "strides and great improvements" behind closed doors.

"We've just been practicing our tails off," he said. "It was embarrassing for us to give up that many sacks in the Washington State game and we took that with a grain of salt and we have to work on it. We worked on it, and worked on it in the bye week."

-- Andrew Greif |