It’s a safe bet after a big win that a star athlete will offer thanks to a higher power.
So there on Saturday was Jackson Powers-Johnson, the Oregon Ducks center, declaring, “I’m gonna give all the credit to Bo.”
What, you were expecting someone else?
Who is bigger these days than Bo Nix? The man with the Johnny Unitas haircut who has played more college football than any other quarterback in history is turning into something like a god before our eyes.
It’s Bo’s world and the Ducks just keep winning in it.
His latest mighty act? Picking apart the Utah defense in Salt Lake City like few teams ever have. The Utes had won 29 of their previous 30 games at home.
Yeah, that didn’t matter to Bo.
“I want to say it again,” Oregon coach Dan Lanning said, “Bo Nix is the best quarterback in the nation. Just to be really clear. I don’t think there’s any doubt about it.”
The Ducks are going to have to start thinking bigger than billboards.
Statues? Shrines? Does Phil Knight have connections at the Department of the Interior?
Mount Rushmore may require some tweaking.
How do you properly honor the school’s next Heisman Trophy winner?
Yeah, I said it.
Bo is not just back in the race for that coveted bronze doorstop, he deserves to be the favorite.
Oregon Ducks quarterback Bo Nix is depicted on a vinyl billboard in downtown Dallas under the label “BoDacious” in this photo from September 2023. The billboard, which spans two separate walls along Live Oak Street, was installed in August.Zachary Bashour for The Oregonia
He has been the best player in college football. Full stop.
Hey, I like Michael Penix Jr., too.
But Bo hasn’t laid a stinker like Penix did last week against Arizona State.
J.J. McCarthy’s pretty good.
But does anyone trust that anything happening at Michigan is on the level?
Give me Nix taking the stage in New York in December and leaving with the hardware.
After Saturday’s 35-6 throttling of No. 13 Utah in Salt Lake City, Nix has thrown for 21 touchdowns and just one interception. He rolled up 248 yards through the air on Saturday and added a rushing touchdown, his third of the year.
Nix makes the extraordinary downright boring. Saturday’s game was a snooze, really.
Oregon’s defense kept the Utes out of the end zone and Tysheem Johnson had a pair of interceptions. But Nix is the engine of what is increasingly looking like the nation’s best offense.
“He’s my quarterback, so I’m going to ride with him to the end,” said Ducks receiver Traeshon Holden, who may need to replace the diamond-crusted “SHOWTIME” pendant he rocked Saturday with one that reads, “BO-TIME.”
Against the Utes, he completed 14 of his first 15 passes. The only incompletion came on an uncharacteristic drop by Troy Franklin streaking down the sideline for what would have been a sure touchdown.
That one was just to prove that nobody is actually perfect.
Nix doesn’t just put up gaudy numbers. He leads and delivers.
With 18 seconds left in the first quarter, he changed the play at the line of scrimmage after adjustments by Utah’s defense, scrambling around to the backfield to communicate with his offense as the play clock wound down.
What seemed like a near disaster was instead a remarkable moment of poise. He zipped a pass to Jordan James, who ran 18 yards for the touchdown that helped break the game open.
Bo knows no wrong.
So, go ahead, QB1, you have our attention. Tell us why you’re so great.
“I guess because I have the best team,” Nix said.
Sure, but you’re the man.
“I think we’ve just got a Heisman team,” Nix said.
That … is not a thing.
But Nix would not be deterred. Every effort to get him to take a bow resulted in more praise for his teammates. To hear him tell it, he’s the bum leg the Ducks are dragging along with them.
There are some players who make humility seem trite. Nix is not one of them. He strikes you as sincere. Mature. He is about the right things. I dare you not to like him.
Fan allegiances aside, it’s not possible.
Even as he brushes aside praise, Nix brims with confidence.
“He thinks he’s Goliath,” Lanning said.
It’s gonna take more than pebbles to topple this giant. Sorry, Auburn, he’s ours now.
Sometimes I imagine Bo going home to Alabama, bumping into folks from his previous life as an SEC punching bag and delivering Julia Roberts’ iconic line from “Pretty Woman.”
“Remember me? … Big mistake. Big. Huge.”
Nix has solidified Oregon as a contender of the highest order.
There are four games left on the Ducks’ schedule, plus a possible Pac-12 championship game. Oregon is the only team left that can beat Oregon. Don’t mess this up, College Football Playoff committee.
The Ducks are 7-1 with the first CFP rankings coming out this week. They should be 8-0. They came up three yards short of beating Washington on the road.
This team is good enough to be seen as a national title contender and it’s time we start recognizing it as such. Raise the expectations as high as they can go.
“To play for championships, it takes a little bit of luck, it takes a little bit of good fortune, it takes being healthy,” said Lanning.
Nix and the Ducks know how quickly things can turn.
But they are vastly better than they were a year ago, when a late-season injury to Nix knocked the Ducks out of the CFP hunt and delayed Bo’s Heisman moment. And Nix is better, too.
But he’s more than better. He’s the best.
He showed that again on Saturday.
— Bill Oram reported from Salt Lake City.
MORE FROM BILL ORAM
