Oregon Ducks

The Oregon Ducks refers to the sports teams of the University of Oregon, located in Eugene, Oregon, United States. The Oregon Ducks are part of the Pac-12 Conference in the Division 1 of the NCAA. With eighteen varsity teams, the Oregon Ducks are best known for their football team and Track and Field program, which has helped to make Eugene be known as "Track Town, USA". Oregon's main rivalries are with the Oregon State Beavers (the Civil War) and the Washington Huskies.

Nicknames and mascot history

Oregon teams were originally known as Webfoots, possibly as early as the 1890s. The Webfoots name originally applied to a group of fishermen from the coast of Massachusetts who had been heroes during the American Revolutionary War; their descendants had settled in Oregon's Willamette Valley in the 19th century and the name stayed with them. A naming contest in 1926 won by Oregonian sports editor L. H. Gregory made the Webfoots name official, and a subsequent student vote in 1932 affirmed the nickname, chosen over other suggested nicknames such as Pioneers, Trappers, Lumberjacks, Wolves, and Yellow Jackets.

University of California, Davis

The University of California, Davis (also referred to as UCD, UC Davis, or Davis), is a public research university and one of the 10 campuses of the University of California system. Located in Davis, California, just west of Sacramento, it encompasses 7,309 acres of land, making it the largest UC campus in terms of land ownership. UC Davis also has the third-largest enrollment in the UC System after UCLA and UC Berkeley.

The Carnegie Foundation classifies UC Davis as a comprehensive doctoral research university with a medical program, and very high research activity. The UC Davis faculty includes 23 members of the National Academy of Sciences, 25 members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 17 members of the American Law Institute, 14 members of the Institute of Medicine, and 14 members of the National Academy of Engineering. Among other honors, university faculty, alumni, and researchers have won the Nobel Peace Prize, Presidential Medal of Freedom, Pulitzer Prize, MacArthur Fellowship, National Medal of Science, Blue Planet Prize, and Presidential Early Career Award in Science and Engineering.

Oregon Ducks football

The Oregon Ducks football program is the intercollegiate American football team for the University of Oregon, located in the U.S. state of Oregon. The team competes at the NCAA Division I level in the FBS and is a member of the Pac-12 Conference (Pac-12). Known as the Ducks, the team was commonly called the Webfoots until the mid-1960s. The first football team was fielded in 1894. Oregon plays its home games at the 54,000 seat Autzen Stadium in Eugene; its main rivals are the Oregon State Beavers and the Washington Huskies. The Ducks and Beavers historically end each regular season with the Civil War rivalry game in late November.

History

Early history (1894–1912)

The football program began in 1894 and played its first game on March 24, 1894, defeating Albany College 44–3 under head coach Cal Young. Cal Young left after that first game and J.A. Church took over the coaching position in the fall for the rest of the season. Oregon finished the season with two additional losses and a tie, but went undefeated the following season, winning all four of its games under head coach Percy Benson. In 1899, the football team left the state for the first time, playing the California Golden Bears in Berkeley, California. Oregon's largest margin of victory came in 1910 when they defeated the University of Puget Sound 115–0.

Oregon

Oregon (ⁱ/ˈɔːrᵻɡən/ AWR-ə-gən) is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. Oregon is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean, on the north by Washington, on the south by California, on the east by Idaho, and on the southeast by Nevada. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary, and the Snake River delineates much of the eastern boundary. The parallel 42° north delineates the southern boundary with California and Nevada. It is one of only three states of the contiguous United States to have a coastline on the Pacific Ocean, and the proximity to the ocean heavily influences the state's mild winter climate, despite the latitude.

Oregon was inhabited by many indigenous tribes before Western traders, explorers, and settlers arrived. An autonomous government was formed in the Oregon Country in 1843, the Oregon Territory was created in 1848, and Oregon became the 33rd state on February 14, 1859. Today, at 98,000 square miles, Oregon is the ninth largest and, with a population of 4 million, 26th most populous U.S. state. The capital of Oregon is Salem, the second most populous of its cities, with 160,614 residents (2013 estimate). With 609,456 residents (2013 estimate), Portland is the largest city in Oregon and ranks 29th in the U.S. Its metro population of 2,314,554 (2013 estimate) is 24th. The Willamette Valley in western Oregon is the state's most densely populated area, home to eight of the ten most populous cities.

Football

Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word football is understood to refer to whichever form of football is the most popular in the regional context in which the word appears. Sports commonly called 'football' in certain places include: association football (known as soccer in some countries); gridiron football (specifically American football or Canadian football); Australian rules football; rugby football (either rugby league or rugby union); and Gaelic football. These different variations of football are known as football codes.

Various forms of football can be identified in history, often as popular peasant games. Contemporary codes of football can be traced back to the codification of these games at English public schools during the nineteenth century. The expanse of the British Empire allowed these rules of football to spread to areas of British influence outside of the directly controlled Empire, though by the end of the nineteenth century, distinct regional codes were already developing: Gaelic football, for example, deliberately incorporated the rules of local traditional football games in order to maintain their heritage. In 1888, The Football League was founded in England, becoming the first of many professional football competitions. During the twentieth century, several of the various kinds of football grew to become some of the most popular team sports in the world.