Ugh the dread is starting to set in. Feeling nervous about Fri. Coping tips?

I’m super duper looking forward to the whole experience of going to the game, vegas, getting in some R&R while there, checking out the new stadium. 

I am thinking of an emotional hedge bet where I bet on Oregon to win. If we win I won’t care about the financial loss and if we lose I have a consolation prize.

In the end, it is entertainment that we have little to no control over (except for the cheering). Would love to finally have a Pac12 Championship in football and go to the Rose bowl. Went to the Fiesta, stayed home for the Sugar. I’ll try not to make that mistake again.

In 2019 multiple factors directly killed our success. First, Julian Blackmon goes down with an injury. That dramatically affected our defensive schemes. Second. Oregon blew through our offensive line, who really never dominated their good defensive line opponents earlier in the year (USC to be specific). This year we obviously hope we don’t have a serious injury like Blackmon, but our O-line is now much better. We stunk at the start of the year but we’ve been getting better as the year progressed. We faced a very talented Duck D-line with a slightly hobbled potentially #1 draft pick. We now have 3 tight ends that serve as immediate weapons for our offense but can also quickly scheme to chip, slow down the Ducks’ great line. If Thomas gets going they have to respect his presence and they’ll be less likely to blitz the crap out of us like they did in 2019. Bottom line: we’re dramatically more capable on the offensive side now, our D has a top 10 player that’s tough to contain and we’re going in with a mission: revenge for 2019 and LLTJAL. Book it. We’re winning…

I rewatched the first half of the game two weeks ago. I went through Oregon’s roster and looked at the injury list. I also looked at the box score from the game two years ago which doesn’t look as bad after seeing the missed fourth down conversions and the Blackmon injury.

I will say that the 38-7 score is a little misleading. That was a 14-0 game with two minutes left and the late TD and ridiculous decision to punt to Covey sealed the deal. I think Utah wins if they avoid multiple turnovers and special teams blunders this week.

my coping tip is that the point of all this, which we all forget (myself included) is to enjoy this. Have fun. Take it all in. If you cant enjoy the proccess of winning then what are we doing here. You can be sad about the loss if that happens, but until then, enjoy the ride.