Oregon Football: How Far Do the Ducks Drop in BCS Rankings After Loss to USC?

The jam-packed, sellout Oregon crowd filled with silence after Alejandro Maldonado put up what could have been the game-tying field goal to send Oregon's chances at a BCS Championship bid into overtime.

But it's always "what could have been" that never actually was.

Maldonado missed a 37-yard FG with time expiring in the fourth quarter, and the USC Trojans pulled a huge road upset over Oregon, Saturday night.

A game with huge BCS implications, USC knocked the Ducks completely out of contention for a rematch with No. 1 LSU in the BCS Championship Game.

But exactly how far will the Ducks fall?

While USC is unranked in the BCS poll, they're ranked 18th in the AP Top 25. And with upsets of No. 2 Oklahoma State to an unranked Iowa State, No. 5 Oklahoma to a Robert Griffin III-led No. 22 Baylor, and No. 7 Clemson to unranked NC State, everything behind LSU will be up for grabs.

Many times, how far a team drops depends on the severity of the loss. The Ducks showed exactly what they were made of, resurging from a 38-14 deficit to cut it down to three points. When LaMichael James didn't show up, Kenjon Barner did. And when everyone thought Oregon was down and out, freshman De'Anthony Thomas took a 96-yard kick return to the house to give his Ducks a desperately needed spark.

The Ducks forced turnovers when needed, turning a John Boyett interception into eight points, and a Matt Barkley botched hand-off into what could have been the game-tying field goal.

Once again, what could have been.

But a loss is a loss, and the question "How far will the Duck fall?" arises once again.

For starters, they can't be a Top 10 team anymore. Sorry to burst your bubble, but a loss to a dominant unranked team will kill the ranking of any Top Five team. 

So granted that Case Keenum and the Houston Cougars move up in the BCS standings as the only undefeated team remaining not named LSU, Oregon is likely to drop down to anywhere between No. 8 and 12. If the whole Reggie Bush scandal hadn't been unveiled, USC would be ranked in the Top 20, and the Ducks probably would only have dropped to possibly 15 or 16.

But as of now, the Oregon Ducks are in a fight for their life to host the Pac-12 championship game. If they can get past their in-state rival, the Oregon State Beavers, in the Civil War next week, they'll clinch home-field advantage for the championship game.

You heard it here first. Oregon Ducks will fall to No. 9 after loss to USC.

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