Oregon's Bo Nix continues to rewrite his story with big win vs. UCLA

By Bryan Fischer
FOX Sports College Football Writer

Bo Nix is finally writing the story he wanted to author for his college football career. 

Living up to the billing of a five-star recruit out of high school, putting up touchdowns for one of the nation’s most productive offenses, in the pole position for a conference title and in the thick of the College Football Playoff chase with a top-10 team.

Only for Nix, the son of Auburn legend Patrick Nix, it was a scene that was always supposed to take place on the Plains. The scion quarterbacking the program he grew up rooting for right down the road was just the kind of stuff that winds up getting written into a Hollywood script.

As many college students often discover at that stage of life, however, things rarely follow along with the screenplay. Sometimes you have to do a rewrite.

Nix may have crossed Auburn out of the picture and changed the locale for his second act, but the signal-caller seems firmly back where he thought he would be for his senior season after leading No. 10 Oregon to a thrilling 45-30 victory over No. 9 UCLA on Saturday afternoon.

The veteran may well have earned an invitation to New York for the Heisman ceremony in the process, looking masterful amid the light rain and raucous sellout crowd at Autzen Stadium. 

"I don’t think anyone can sit here and watch football right now and watch our quarterback play and not tell me he’s an elite quarterback," said Lanning. "This guy’s playing at an extremely high level and he makes great decisions for our team. He’s an elite competitor, an elite leader, he has phenomenal character, he’s throwing the ball really well and making great decisions."

Nix missed on just six passes while throwing for 283 yards and five touchdowns. He didn’t take a sack either and scrambled (51 yards rushing) for a number of key conversions in the second half of a game in which both sides moved the ball with ease almost from start to finish. 

In fact, the only stop of the game beyond the clock hitting zeros came on Bryan Addison's interception of Bruins QB Dorian Thompson-Robinson in the end zone with 7:46 left in the game. Still, the defense-optional affair didn’t take away at all from what Nix managed to do with a precision passing game and a host of stellar play calls from his offensive coordinator Kenny Dillingham.

Nix’s best throw of the outing came early in a tone-setting second quarter for the home side, dropping in a beautiful teardrop 49 yards down the hash marks right into the arms of Troy Franklin for a touchdown. Head coach Dan Lanning opted for an onside kick immediately afterward that kicker Andrew Boyle sneakily recovered and eventually led to a Jordan James score eight plays later.

The momentum change for Oregon, amid both sides marching up and down the field like a Pac-Man game, proved to be all that was needed in the Pac-12’s marquee contest of the season so far. 

Bucky Irving chipped in with 107 yards rushing for the Ducks, and fellow sophomore Noah Whittington added 73 more, but it was a performance centered around the quarterback who made the cross-country move to Eugene and looks to be fully taking advantage of the fresh start. 

Nix notably converted a pair of fourth-and-1s in his own territory using his big frame and sprightly wheels, but the way he always seemed to have an answer when dropping back was the biggest eye-opener for someone who always seemed to take observers on a ride with each pass. Outside a forgettable opener against old rival Georgia, the signal-caller has thrown for 17 touchdowns against just one interception (adding eight more on the ground) in his last six games.

As good as things were for the transfer QB however, his heroics put a damper on a different comeback, as ex-Oregon/current UCLA head coach Chip Kelly lost again at the place he turned into the center of the college football world nearly a decade ago. The Bruins still haven’t won at Autzen since 2004, but had high hopes of changing that coming in with the second-longest winning streak in the country before Saturday.

Thompson-Robinson tried his best to make things interesting, throwing for 262 yards and a pair of scores to go along with that one pick. Tailback Zach Charbonnet netted 151 yards and a touchdown as the team’s offense did pretty much all it could while their defense allowed a season-high 545 yards.

"We didn’t get stops with our defense when we needed to get stops," said Kelly. "That’s a good team that played really well today. We didn’t get the stops when we needed to."

UCLA could still see Oregon again in the Pac-12 Championship Game in December, but the Bruins' margin is thin if they want to finally realize the promises Kelly set out when he was hired in Westwood.

For Lanning, things may already be ahead of schedule. His team remains perfect in conference play and takes the mantle as the team to beat out West. Dillingham in particular should hear his name heat up on the coaching carousel given how he’s developed Nix and has his team leading the Pac-12 in most offensive categories.

The Ducks will now head into a closing stretch against opponents with a combined record of 19-14. They host two of their toughest tests against Washington and Utah in back-to-back weeks in mid-November, but the victory over the Bruins afforded them some potential wiggle room to at least make it to Las Vegas the following month.

"Our players have a growth mindset. They know every single week that there’s an opportunity to get better. Just because we won this game, doesn’t mean we’re not looking for an opportunity to improve," remarked Lanning. "People know that I’m going to say we’ll have to go to the doctor, and we’ll figure out what we can get better at and go take our medicine and improve. Our team has done that week in and week out."

Still, sights around the program are aimed much higher, and it’s likely they will be right in the thick of the College Football Playoff race based on the way they’ve been playing. Two top-10 teams ranked ahead of them already lost, and for as bad as the final score was down in Atlanta for the opener, a loss to the No. 1 team in the country in Lanning’s debut may well be mitigated by the time the Selection Committee releases their rankings in two weeks.

Not many could have predicted that coming into the year or on the long trip back from that first loss. 

As we’ve come to see though, college football is all about changing narratives mixed in with a few wild endings — something Nix and the Ducks might have a few more things to say about as they rewrite the rest of their story in 2022.

Read more:

• ‘They’re buying in': This defense is why Ohio State hired Jim Knowles
• Three takeaways from Ohio State's win over Iowa
• Top plays from Week 8: Ohio State-Iowa, Clemson-Syracuse and more
• How UCLA, Oregon built themselves into Pac-12 contenders

Bryan Fischer is a college football writer for FOX Sports. He has been covering college athletics for nearly two decades at outlets such as NBC Sports, CBS Sports, Yahoo! Sports and NFL.com among others. Follow him on Twitter at @BryanDFischer.