It has been 41 days since the Washington Huskies have beaten the Oregon Ducks in basketball. Not quite the same ring to it as football but I won't be picky after that performance.

• Garrett Sim and his buddies in yellow unleashed a Tony Woods-sized can on the Washington Huskies last night, defeating the bad guys from that state up north 82-57. Oregon never trailed in the game and played great team ball. The Huskies looked completely out of sorts while the Ducks played one of their best games of the season.
• Expectations were high for last year's Oregon Baseball team. There was talk about winning the conference, playoffs and perhaps more in 2011 but the tone is a bit different going into the 2012 season. "Living in the moment" seems to be the motto this year. For those that followed the team last year, you know that hitting was a problem. To help address the situation, Jay Uhlman is back on the coaching staff. To get yourself caught up on all the latest news as we move towards the season opening game on February 17th, check out this great rundown.
• Speaking of baseball, junior left-hander Christian Jones is scheduled to undergo Tommy John surgery. I've heard the term a lot but I never knew what it entailed until I jumped on the Google Machine and hit the Wikipedias.
• If I said the name "Adam Hazel" to you, would you remember who I was talking about? What if I told you he was a quarterback? What if I said he was under 30? Give up? He was a walk-on who provided depth to Kellen Clemens and Dennis Dixon back in the day. He was hired as the St. Francis Sharks (high school) football coach in California. Congratulations to Adam!

Happy Friday everyone. Always good to be hanging on a Friday after a good Ducks win.

Football may be over, but basketball is entering the final stretch and baseball is on its way, so we have plenty of quack this morning.

• Oregon basketball hosts Washington tonight in what will be the start of a very difficult last few games for the Ducks. With four home games remaining, the Ducks need to get them all. Earlier this season, Dana Altman had "Own The Knight" shirts made, that have been abandoned after inconsistent home play. Enough with the gimmicks, the Ducks simply need to get it done against a very tough Washignton team.
• Bob Clark takes a look at the Huskies, and their future NBA players, sophomore Terrence Ross and freshman Tony Wroten. The Ducks are going to have quite the task in containing both.
• Oregon baseball at Hawaii next week, and KVAL has a preview of the team. The Ducks exceeded all expectations in 2010, but disappointed a bit last year. Despite the winning record, they finished 8th in the conference. They didn't handle the pressure well, and it showed. With Horton as coach, I'm hopeful they'll improve.
• Unfortunately, the Ducks already have a big obstacle in that road to improvement. Christian Jones, along with 2 other freshmen pitchers, are out for the season requiring Tommy John surgery. Tomorrow's probable pitcher, Alex Keudell, is getting over an arm injury of his own. Last year, the Ducks could rely and Tyler Anderson and Madison Boer. That luxury is now gone, and pitching depth is a real concern.
• Softball season is about to start as well, and the Ducks are looking to make it three straight Super Regional appearances, and they will be relying on ace Jessica Moore.
• Some alum track news. Galen Rupp is going for the US indoor two-mile record on Saturday. Also, Matthew Centrowitz is headlining the Wanamaker mile in New York City.
• Lastly, some 2013 recruiting news. Rivals has released their top 100, and Oregon's lone commit is the 9th ranked prospect and top RB in the 2013 class, Aloha's Thomas Tyner.

We're all hard up for all the quack we can get, so share anything else in the comments. GO DUCKS!

If you missed Tuesday Night Talks last night make sure to download it here. CougCenter's Jeff Nusser (who also hosts the Pac-12 podcast 18 and life), in the words of Dave, "knocked it out of the park."

• Adam Jude takes a look back at the 2010 recruiting class, working on the belief that it will take a couple years to really be able to evaluate a class. 2010 was a great year for Oregon recruiting, picking up a lot of highly touted recruits. And this article just shows how much of a numbers game recruiting is. Touted prep stars Lache Seastrunk, Dontae Williams, and Nick Rowland never saw the field for a variety of reasons. But the class also has some stars. Josh Huff, Hronnis Grassu, and Terrance Mitchell all started this year for the Ducks, and we'll hopefully see Bryan Bennett's full potential this year.
• Speaking of Bennett, he and freshman Marcus Mariotta are gearing up to compete for the starting QB spot. But they aren't expecting any controversy, just constant striving to get better. Both have an immense amount of talent, and I'm really excited to see who gets the nod.
• David Paulson comes in 25th in Ted Miller's Pac-12 2011 countdown. Man, I'm gonna miss that guy.
• On to basketball, Dana Altman can't talk about the call that ended the game against Colorado, though he was asked about it in his weekly conference call. His comment: "Altman did note that in his 32 years of coaching he had never had a game decided in the final second by a free throw."
• As we near the end of the season, Oregon's main goal is to end up in the top four of the conference, as that will give them a bye in the Pac-12 tournament. Unfortunately, that's easier said than done. With five games left, three of those against the top teams in the conference.

Leave anything else in the comments. GO DUCKS!

So, is it time to start the countdown clock for the spring game? Here's your Tuesday fix:

• Former Oregon steeplchaser Geoff Hollister passed away on Monday at the age of 66. Hollister graduated from South Eugene before running for Bill Bowerman at Oregon and becoming Nike's third official employee. RIP.
• Ted Miller has been doing a series of "Top Performer" posts and yesterday featured LaMichael James' performance against the Bears. While Oregon fans may remember this game as the one in which James dislocated his elbow, James had a dominating performance with 239 yards on 30 carries through the first three-plus quarters.
• Miller also had a few other posts from yesterday. First, he offered his thoughts on the Larry Scott extension. Ted also has a post-signing day ranking of the conference, which appears to take into account player departures since January 10th and the latest recruiting class.
• In his weekly look around the conference, Bob Clark examines Arizona's resurgence. After sweeping the Bay Area schools, the Wildcats are tied with Oregon for fourth and only two games back of the conference lead. Oregon also slips to 6th in the weekly rankings.
• There's also a couple of new posts over at fishduck.com. In the latest fishduck minute, Charles has a video opener to this offseason's focus on defense. Jerod Young wonders about the magical abilities of Dana Altman.

Go Ducks!

Congrats to Spencer Paysinger! One year in the league, one Super Bowl ring (If you missed it, here's a piece from yesterday on him playing in the game). And with that, the football season is officially over, at least until the Spring Game on April 28th.

• Oregon dropped a tough one against Colorado on Saturday night. Oregon held a lead at halftime, but couldn't hang on at the end, as Colorado got a foul call as time expired during a tie game, and hit the first free throw for the victory. If you looked through our game thread, there were a lot of people, uhhh, questioning the refs.
• With the loss, Oregon drops to 7-4 in conference tied for fourth place with Arizona. The Ducks are still in competition for the top spot in the conference, but do not have easy games coming up. They host league-leading Washington on Thursday, and then go on the road to the bay area schools next week. There is little room for error for the Ducks if they want to make any kind of postseason tournament.
• Bill Connelly has an interesting article over at Football Study Hall today, on covariance rankings, which attempt to quantify how teams play against good and bad teams. You'll never guess which conference is awesome against the worst competition.
• Oregon did a great job recruiting on the defensive line this year, and according to Rivals brought in the 3rd ranked defensive end group in the country.
• Steve Maher at FishDuck has a piece on one of the unheralded recruits from that defensive end class, Cody Carriger. According to Chip Kelly, he might have been one of the top players in the country if he were from California, but he didn't get much attention living in Butte, Montana. And being from Butte, he's got so much grit, I'm surprised OSU didn't pursue him.
• Also on FishDuck, Brian Libby wonders about future Autzen expansion.
• Lastly, here's a report of LaMichael James at Gatorade's Sports Science Institute during Super Bowl Week.

Anyway, enough with the quack. What was your favorite commercial? Leave yours, or more quack, in the comments. GO DUCKS!

Another signing day come and gone, with all the promise in the world. I'm excited to see how it all shakes out on the field. Here's your quack:

• It what was a closer game than many expected, the Ducks got a 79-68 victory at Utah last night. Despite the 11-point victory, the Ducks had trouble with the Utes, and were down 49-41 at one point. Oregon started running a defensive press, and that helped the Ducks control the game down the stretch. Carlos Emory and Tony Woods had a big impact in the second half, after missing the first half due to disciplinary reasons. Woods' defensive presence helped the Oregon defense hold Utah to 32% shooting in the second half, after they shot 52% in the first half.
• One of my favorite posts from yesterday, Bob Clark had to ask people to stop sending home remedies to the athletic department to deal with Garrett Sims occasional cramping problems.
• The women's basketball team got a win last night, though they almost blew a big lead against Utah and had to hold on at the end to secure the 72-67 win.
• While this article was from yesterday, I didn't see a link to it, so here's Adam Jude's piece on the honesty of Chip Kelly's recruiting overcoming the rumors.
• Aaron Fentress has a piece on the realities of signing day, and how a lot of the players in any class will not pan out. Part of this is why I don't get too up or down on any single recruit. Recruiting is about getting as much potential as possible into your program. With every player that doesn't live up to the hype, there will be one that exceeds the hype, and I'm excited to see which players do that.
• Canzano has an article on Oshay Dunmore. It's a pretty bad article. But it's also on Dunmore, so I'm torn on this one.
• A couple good articles were out yesterday on Bralon Addison. First, he suffered a lot of grief for his last minute switch from Texas A&M. Also, here's a piece on how he and close friend Chance Allen have always wanted to play together.

Got anything else? Leave it below. And for the latest from ATQ, Like us on Facebook, or follow us on Twitter. GO DUCKS!

Did any of your Oregon State Beaver friends see their shadow today? If so, that means 6 more weeks of looking for more defensive back recruits.

• Yesterday marked the yearly ritual in college football where young men had to struggle with that awkward question we all have had to struggle with at one point in our lives... what the hell is a fax machine? Most people have discussed star rankings or how this school did compared to other schools. I prefer to look at it from another angle. This was a day when students across the country sign a piece of paper confirming a scholarship offer to attend a university. Celebrate as Duck Fans for our class, but celebrate the families of these kids that worked hard and raised them to reach for the stars and grab these opportunities. Here's Chip Kelly talking about the incoming recruiting class (video by the Register-Guard). If you prefer "Chip Notes", here's a text-based version of some of the highlights.
• While we might all get excited about new recruits, there are a ton of guys already putting in the work for another successful football season coming in the fall. The future is now with those guys, but sure. We can still talk more about the 2012 recruiting class as well.
• 2012 marks another big milestone that some people may not realize. Nike will become the official apparel and uniform supplier for the NFL and you know what that means. There's a certain school out there who's going to get mentioned every single time this fact gets brought up between now and then. Not much in this article except a photo of some nifty Philadelphia Eagles gloves.
• Friend of the Blog and Twitter Track Master Flash Ken Goe has some awesome updates from the land of running, jumping, running through tape, making footprints in sand, using a pole to jump over other poles, throwing sharp poles into the ground, and various other feats. In something that will even make JShufelt excited, "The Fan Festival will include something being billed as 'base came for beer fanatics'". Definitely worth the read to get caught up on the Olympic Trials and whether De'Anthony Thomas will be available for the track team.

And finally, if you follow @addictedtoquack on Twitter, you may have witnessed the birth of a new rival fan slam on our beloved Oregon Ducks. For all of you American Idol fans, here's Ben from Eugene, Oregon!

With signing day only a day away, this morning's quack is surprising light on recruiting news. The news yesterday was that Shaq Thompson has chosen washington over the Ducks. Here's the rest of your Tuesday fix:

• Rob Moseley checks in with LaMichael James, who is in southern California training and preparing for April's NFL draft. It sounds like James is still planning to enroll for spring quarter so he can earn his degree and take part in the summer commencement. Also, with his entrance into the twiitersphere, James has also been busy trying to market himself.
• Aaron Fentress has a feature on Oregon recruit Kyle Long, who went from a two-sport star in high school to playing baseball at Florida State where off-the-field issues led him back to playing football at a junior college. Long has one season of eligibility remaining, though he plans to petition the NCAA for a second.
• Bob Clark has a preview for both the Duck and Beaver baseball teams. It sounds like Coach Horton's biggest obstacle will be trying to replace some of the talent he lost to the pros. Oregon opens the season on February 17 in Hawaii.
• Finally, Charles has a new video up at fishduck.com. His latest post breaks down Oregon's dart play.

Go Ducks!