4 takeaways from Oregon football’s dominant win over Hawaii

Saturday night at Autzen Stadium was a lot less tense for the No. 13 Oregon football team after a nailbiter against Texas Tech the week before in Lubbock.

The Ducks dominated the Hawaii Rainbow Warriors 55-10 in their final nonconference game before opening Pac-12 play this weekend against Colorado at home.

Here are four takeaways from the Ducks’ (3-0) second dominant win of the early season.

Oregon gets ground game cooking

After struggling to get the running game going early, and falling into a hole against Texas Tech, the Ducks made a concerted effort to get the ball to their tailbacks early, and it paid off.

Starter Bucky Irving had a team-high 12 carries for 61 yards, Noah Whittington racked up 80 yards on six carries with a score, and Jordan James added seven carries for 59 yards and two touchdowns in another strong showing for the sophomore.

“When you have guys that are good enough you want to make sure you continue to have roles for us,” Oregon coach Dan Lanning said. “I thought there were some great runs and I thought their were some runs that could’ve been better. Our guys ran with toughness the entire night.”

Establishing the run and amassing 210 yards on the ground was just what the doctor ordered for a Ducks squad that needed it after a lackluster performance on the road.

With Colorado on the horizon, where balance will likely be needed to get a win, Saturday’s showing was promising for Oregon.

Assessing the receiver room through Week 3

Through three weeks, the Oregon receiver room has had several receivers step up opposite Troy Franklin when the need has arisen. But lately, transfer Tez Johnson has made plays, including a four-catch, 77-yard, two-touchdown performance against the Rainbow Warriors (1-3).

“He’s had some really great performances and those performances show up more so in practice,” Lanning said. “I’m going to challenge him to go catch the punt return in the air to save us some yardage. I’m going to challenge him to hold on to the ball better and not put it in jeopardy … I’m really pleased with Tez and all those wideouts.”

Johnson has received the lion's share of opportunities at punt return, and already has more yards than the Ducks amassed all last season, despite some issues handling a couple of punts on the hop rather than cleanly in the air.

After Gary Bryant Jr. recorded a 100-yard game in his Oregon debut against Portland State, Johnson has had back-to-back good outings, and fellow transfer Traeshon Holden added two touchdowns and 63 yards himself against Hawaii Saturday night.

“He provides something different out there at receiver,” quarterback Bo Nix said. “We really have a lot of big explosive playmakers at receiver … all those guys do a really good job. When their number is called, they go out there and make a play.”

That kind of depth will be tested in future weeks, when the Ducks take on stronger competition, but the early showing by a revamped receiver room featuring three marquee transfers has been another promising development for the Ducks.

Pass defense tightens up

The Oregon secondary had a somewhat rough showing against the Red Raiders last weekend. While the Ducks came up with big plays when they needed to, they also allowed over 300 yards through the air and broke down several times.

Against a fairly potent passing attack in Hawaii, the Oregon secondary showed up and dominated early and throughout.

The Rainbow Warriors were held to 142 passing yards on 28-of-44 passing. For the second straight week, Khyree Jackson recorded a pick, and perhaps more importantly, the Ducks avoided pass interference penalties.

“We had bodies on bodies mostly tonight,” Lanning said. “I thought the best coverage at times can be a good rush, and I thought we had a good rush throughout the night. We have to be able to play the ball in the air and not have penalties. Really solid performance at times but we’re certainly looking for opportunities to be better.”

Again, the challenge rises against one of the top passing offenses in the country in Colorado, but the Ducks did exactly what was expected of them against Hawaii.

Season amps up as Oregon opens Pac-12 play against Colorado

Two blowouts and a road scare now behind them, the Oregon football team still has plenty to figure out as the gauntlet that will be the Pac-12 schedule begins this week against the surging Colorado Buffaloes.

The Ducks were able to address some of the issues they ran into against the only Power 5 opponent in their nonconference schedule in Texas Tech. In a come-from-behind victory against the Red Raiders in Week 2 the Ducks racked up 14 penalties and trimmed them down a tad to nine against Hawaii. Lanning was not happy about the pattern.

“I’m extremely disappointed in the penalties and how they hurt us there,” he said. “It’s something we coach really hard but we’re not coaching it well enough. That’s something we’re going to attack, we have to figure out how to become accountable as a program. We’re not going to be satisfied with that result. I think we were really close to playing a complete game, but that overshadowed it for me.”

Oregon was able to rack up points and stats in a hurry throughout its nonconference schedule, averaging 58 points and 549.3 yards per game over the three-game stretch.

With an increase in national attention likely, the Ducks will be tested in a major way in their conference opener as they face Deion Sanders' Colorado Buffaloes Saturday at Autzen Stadium.

“This is going to be an awesome atmosphere for the Oregon Ducks,” Lanning said. “This is going to be one of those marquee games that we’re really, really excited for. We know we’re going to get everyone’s best, which is exactly what we want.”

Alec Dietz covers University of Oregon football, women's basketball and baseball for The Register-Guard. You may reach him at adietz@registerguard.com, and you can follow him on Twitter @AlecDietz.

This article originally appeared on Register-Guard: 4 takeaways from Oregon football’s dominant win over Hawaii