Cristobal Sets New Course For Ducks
02/08/18 | Football, @GoDucksMoseley
New UO football coach Mario Cristobal finished off a highly regarded recruiting class Wednesday, which will benefit from his new player development program.
The printer inside Oregon football's War Room on Wednesday morning barely had gotten warmed up when new strength and conditioning coach Aaron Feld – yes, the guy with the mustache – had to make his exit.
New UO head coach Mario Cristobal and his staff sat around a long, black table deep inside the Hatfield-Dowlin Complex, awaiting letters of intent from the newest batch of Oregon's recruits. Feld joined them initially, but around 6:15 a.m., he headed out toward the complex's weight room.
The coaching staff could keep working on the future of Oregon football. But, Feld bellowed, "I'm gonna go train the team we have!"
With that, two essential elements of the program Cristobal is building were set in motion. On one hand, he's looking to continue raising the profile of Oregon in recruiting, to the point the Ducks are competing for top-five classes nationally. And to that end, he's tasked Feld with implementing a strength program modeled after Alabama, where Cristobal and Feld previously worked together.
Recruit elite athletes. Train them at an elite level. Employ them in cutting edge schemes. All in the name of getting Oregon back to the levels of the not-so-distant past, when the Ducks were competing for championships on a national stage.
Wednesday was primarily about the first step in that process, with apologies to the workouts Feld put Oregon's veterans through over the course of the morning. Though the new December signing period made Wednesday's events a little less chaotic, they were no less significant to Oregon's future.
"Recruiting is the lifeline of any program," Cristobal said Wednesday afternoon, at a press conference to announce the class. "It's the lifeline. If you can't get the guys, it's not gonna look like you want it to look."
Back in December, the Ducks announced the first 15 players of the class, six of whom already are on campus, including quarterback Tyler Shough, two running backs and three defensive backs. The group was notably light on pass receivers, which was addressed in Wednesday's nine additions, including three wideouts and a tight end.
Among the receivers was four-star prospect Jalen Hall, rated the No. 9 wideout in the country by ESPN. He was generally considered the top-rated recruit in the class, until the afternoon commitment from offensive lineman Penei Sewell, a U.S. Army All-American who signed with Oregon over Alabama and USC.
"These are the battles you have to win to make the next step as a program," Cristobal said.
Competing for recruits of that level does not lack for tension. Wednesday featured more drama than recent signing days past for the Ducks, as they awaited decisions by several top players around the country. Cristobal and his assistants rarely were in one spot for long, preferring to pace the halls of the Hatfield-Dowlin complex and settle into quiet nooks as they worked their phones.
The days just prior to and following signing day allow for unlimited contact between coaches and recruits, and the UO staff used that to maximum effect. While awaiting word from seniors who could sign Wednesday, they also turned their attention full-bore to the 2019 class.
"Let's try to get 50 to 60 of those guys on the phone today," Cristobal announced to the War Room around 6:45 a.m., setting off a mad scramble by the rest of the staff.
As the coaches awaited letters of intent from seniors over the next few hours, they filled the time with video conference calls to juniors. The grind never stops, they say, and Cristobal's staff embodied that Wednesday by blasting out contact to 2019 recruits before the ink was dry on the 2018 class.
Just after 7 a.m., when letters from West Coast recruits could arrive, the Ducks received the signature of another four-star receiver, Isaah Crocker. As he has done for several years, Nike co-founder Phil Knight was in Eugene for signing day, and had the honor of adding Crocker to the "big board" in Oregon's War Room.
Moments later, Cristobal was talking with Crocker via FaceTime. "Your papers are in," the coach said. "Now make sure you're staying in shape, because we're gonna go fast!"
Indeed, Cristobal has no plans to disrupt Oregon's offensive identity, which has made the Ducks one of college football's most explosive teams over the last decade. Not with the stable of talent Oregon returns for 2018, headlined by Heisman Trophy candidate Justin Herbert at quarterback. And not after the addition of Hall, Crocker, receiver J.J. Tucker and tight end Spencer Webb, who drew comparisons to NFL All-Pro Travis Kelce from the UO staff.
"This is a conference of great quarterback play, and a lot of really big, playmaking wide receivers," Cristobal said. "And we had to get ourselves a couple of those."
At his press conference, Cristobal made note of the changes made while he was at Alabama, from a powerful pro-style attack to an offense that employed tempo and spread the field. He also noted the background of UO offensive coordinator Marcus Arroyo, who came to Eugene from Oklahoma State's wide-open attack. All will factor into Oregon's attack this fall, and beyond.
But there's no doubt Cristobal wants the Ducks to command more respect for their physicality, as well. After signing three offensive linemen in December, including in-state mauler Dawson Jaramillo, 340-pound Steven Jones and 330-pound Christopher Randazzo, the Ducks on Wednesday added 342-pound Justin Johnson and the 349-pound Sewell, who invoked a jubilant response from Cristobal as the staff watched a live stream of his announcement from the War Room early Wednesday afternoon.
"What we see every single year is, games are won and lost at the line of scrimmage," Cristobal said. "They are. … We're gonna invest heavily in the offensive and defensive lines, because it makes everything else go."
Defensively, the Ducks in December signed lineman Andrew Faoliu, younger brother of sophomore Austin Faoliu, and JC transfer Sione Vea Kava. On Wednesday, they announced the addition of another transfer, DJ Johnson, a former four-star recruit and Under Armour All-American who played at Miami (Fla.) as a true freshman last fall.
They also added to the front seven with linebacker Andrew Johnson Jr., who along with December signees M.J. Cunningham and Adrian Jackson provides what Cristobal termed "big speed" in the middle of the defense. When they arrive at Oregon, the new strength coach Feld and his staff will be tasked with making them even bigger, and even speedier.
"I think it's the perfect combination," Cristobal said. "We want to be what Oregon has always been – explosive, fast. The aspect we have added starts with the offseason; that Alabama strength and conditioning program has been brought over, formatted, and it's in full swing."
By late in the day Wednesday, Oregon's recruiting class was ranked No. 15 nationally by Rivals, No. 16 by 247Sports and No. 17 by ESPN. All of those were three or four notches above where the Ducks' class of 2017 had been ranked. Cristobal made it clear he wants to keep "chipping away" at the national rankings, until the Ducks are being considered for top-five classes.
The UO brand remains "extremely powerful," Cristobal said, including in his native Southeast. To capitalize on his own strengths as an evaluator, he's tasking his assistants during the upcoming spring evaluation period with filming all their recruits, so Cristobal himself can see "how they tie their shoes, how they bend over to stretch – I can see it all." And for future classes the UO staff will take a four-pronged approach with each recruit, involving Cristobal himself, the player's future coordinator, his position coach and an area scout. That way, in the event of future coaching changes, the Ducks experience less upheaval in recruiting.
All of that is with the aim of attracting more players like Sewell, one of the crown jewels of the class announced Wednesday.
"It's a great example of the type of battles that Oregon is capable of winning," Cristobal asserted Wednesday afternoon, after being informed that Sewell's letter had been cleared through the Ducks' compliance office, freeing up the coach to talk about him at the press conference. "He's an ultimate difference maker."
Cristobal has the chance to be that for Oregon, too, by employing new strategies in both recruiting and offseason conditioning that were on display Wednesday.
