First Posted: 1/6/2015
Ohio State has never lost a game to its College Football Playoff national championship opponent Oregon in eight previous meetings.
The most recent time the two teams played was in the Rose Bowl after the 2009 season when OSU won 26-17.
That game was the last great un-vacated win of the Jim Tressel era and possibly the best game Terrelle Pryor ever played at quarterback for the Buckeyes. Pryor completed 23 of 37 passes for 266 yards and two touchdowns and rushed for 72 yards on 20 carries.
His 17-yard touchdown pass to DeVier Posey with 7:02 to play gave OSU some breathing room in what had been a very close game.
Oregon came into the game ranked No. 7 and Ohio State was No. 8.
Two of Ohio State’s wins in the series have launched the Buckeyes toward national championships in the polls.
In the 1957 season, an OSU team that included Dick LeBeau and Galen Cisco, beat Oregon 10-7 on a fourth-quarter field goal by Dick Sutherin to win a national title. OSU also claims a 1961 national title and it defeated Oregon 22-12 in a regular-season game that year.
Ohio State also had regular-season wins over Oregon in 1962, 1967, 1968, 1983 and 1987.
• The University of Oregon is located in Eugene. Its biggest rival, Oregon State, is in Corvallis, which is 47 miles away.
• Nike co-founder and chairman Phil Knight, an Oregon graduate, has donated more than $300 million to the university, including $68 million for a Football Performance Center.
• Ohio State’s 12 wins in a row since its loss to Virginia Tech is the longest active winning streak in major college football. Florida State had the longest streak at 29 games before its 59-20 loss to Oregon in the Rose Bowl.
• Ohio State is playing for its first national championship since 2002. Oregon has never won a national title.
• The closest Oregon got to a national title was in the 2010 season when it lost the BCS national championship game to Auburn 22-19 on a short field goal as time ran out.
• Thirteen current Oregon players were on the Ducks’ roster when it played Auburn in the BCS national championship game. Sixteen players were in AT&T Stadium when Oregon lost 40-27 to LSU in its season opener in 2011 in a match-up of preseason top five teams.
• Oregon coach Mark Helfrich, who played quarterback at Southern Oregon University, met his wife Megan, who was a student at Oregon, while he was visiting a friend there.
• Helfrich, who was Chip Kelly’s offensive coordinator, had Kelly’s endorsement after he left to take the Philadelphia Eagles job, but Oregon interviewed four other candidates before hiring Helfrich.
• Urban Meyer ranks sixth among college coaches in overall pay at just under $4.5 million this year, according to USA Today. Oregon’s Helfrich is 51st at $2 million a year.
