Bill Oram: The death of a rivalry, a lifelong Oregon-Oregon State observer’s lament

The NCAA banned the notorious “pyramid play” after Oregon State last tried it against Oregon.

Ninety years ago.

But if we’re gonna do this thing right, one last time, Jonathan Smith ought to dust off Lon Stiner’s playbook when the Ducks line up for their first extra point on Friday and employ a pair of stout tackles to hoist another player — I nominate 6-foot-5 outside linebacker John McCartan — up, up, up to block the PAT, just like the Beavers did at Multnomah Stadium in 1933.

What’s one unsportsmanlike penalty, some impish malfeasance, in the scope of a history that dates back to the second Cleveland administration?

I’m being silly, of course.

Or am I?

It is no less preposterous than the notion that we would be saying goodbye to this rivalry at all.

As it stands now, when the Ducks and Beavers exit Autzen Stadium on Friday, there is no guarantee of when, or if, the in-state rivals will face off again.

It is unthinkable that anyone involved, from university presidents to the Pop Warner kids playing catch in the tailgates, could tolerate going even one year without the game that has functioned as our state’s annual checkup.

To make sure our collective heart still beats.

There has been plenty of lip-service from both sides on that front. Oregon officials say they face more significant scheduling hurdles than Washington did in preserving the Apple Cup but are exploring their options to clear a spot for the Beavers in future years.

Scheduling the Bigfoot Ballgame shouldn’t feel like such a big feat. If it was a priority, it would be done. If Oregon viewed it as essential, it would have been a condition of realignment.

My sense is the Ducks are interested in continuing the rivalry, but not desperate to.

Perhaps they will deliver and the series will continue uninterrupted. But even then, Friday’s game marks a tragic dividing line in state history.

A longstanding, proud, essential rivalry now feels optional. It will be played when and if it suits one side, a diluted dynamic that diminishes one of our state’s cultural pillars. Like if the Columbia River only deigned to merge with the Willamette when it served its own purposes.

But tradition, as one of Woody Allen’s more memorable characters once said, is the illusion of permanence.

I guess it’s fitting that they waited until the 40th anniversary of the so-called “Toilet Bowl” to flush more than a century of history.

An 0-0 tie feels like a fitting metaphor these days. Nobody is winning.

So, yeah, how about one last pyramid play for the road? Anything to pay homage to a history that is being sold for a song.

Oregon State running back Deshaun Fenwick (#5) carries up the middle as the No. 21 Beavers hold off the No. 9 Oregon Ducks, 38-34, in a Pac-12 college football game at Reser Stadium in Corvallis, Oregon on Saturday, Nov. 26, 2022.Sean Meagher/The Oregonian

The stakes of the 127th meeting between Oregon and Oregon State are too high for gimmicks, I grant you. If Smith ceded half the distance to the goal on a PAT, Dan Lanning would run Bucky Irving down the middle for two.

The sixth-ranked Ducks, after all, have designs on a national championship. Every inch matters. And this team might just be good enough to deliver the state’s biggest sports moment since the ′77 Blazers.

With two more wins, Bo Nix will bring home the Ducks’ second Heisman Trophy in a decade, you can count on that.

No spoilers? Try telling that to the underdog Beavs.

As someone who grew up with this rivalry, in this rivalry, I’m grateful there is so much on this line in this final game. That, one last time, it matters.

But this is also so much more than a football game that I’m struggling with how to properly acknowledge the moment.

Is it too much to say that fans on both sides of this rivalry view it as a battle between right and wrong, decency and evil? I don’t think so. For my entire lifetime, and yours and those of your parents and your grandparents, this game has served as a sort of Farmer’s Almanac.

The result announced to fans of each side a good year or a bad one lay ahead.

So, no, I don’t believe there is any degree of mourning this week that could feel too mushy. Too sentimental.

The slow spiral and eventual death of the Pac-12 has driven a stake through the heart of not just a rivalry, but the personality of our state.

The Ducks’ decision to decamp for the Big Ten has sent Oregon State — the university, the athletic department, the brand — floating like space debris, completely unmoored. What it means for the school’s sporting future is unknown. What it means for Smith , and his long-term commitment to Corvallis with schools like Michigan State lurking, is even more urgent.

What is Oregon’s responsibility for that? Ask around and I’ll guess you’d find the answer runs right down the middle of the state, as much a central vein as the Cascades or Interstate 5.

We can debate how avoidable any of this was. And how much choice Oregon and Washington really had when presented with their set of options back in August.

The immutable fact is that after Friday, something that has helped defined us as Oregonians will be gone.

Since 1894 , the rivalry between universities, and the football game that best embodies it, has been foundational to our identity.

It’s been the base of our pyramid.

MORE FROM BILL ORAM