Dillon Gabriel to have similar input, autonomy as Bo Nix had in Oregon’s offense

Published Mar. 16, 2024, 6:26 p.m.
By James Crepea
EUGENE — Dillon Gabriel will have much of the same autonomy as Bo Nix did in running Oregon’s offense.
The 5-foot-11, 204-pound Gabriel completed 69.3% of his passes for 3,660 yards with 30 touchdowns and six interceptions and ran for 373 yards and 12 scores last season at Oklahoma. The top quarterback available via the transfer portal this winter, Gabriel will have a similar level of on-field command and control of UO’s offense in the fall as Nix had last season.
“We build our system around the quarterback, and give him that freedom at the line of scrimmage,” offensive coordinator Will Stein said after Oregon’s second spring practice on Saturday. “Dillon, Dante (Moore), Austin (Novosad), Brock (Thomas), Luke (Moga), Ryder Hayes, everybody is taught the exact same and with the exact same checks. And we anticipate that to remain consistent in this next season too.”
Gabriel has 49 career starts and should he start all 12 regular season games for the Ducks this season he’ll tie Nix’s career mark.
But that’s of note months from now. For the past week and remaining 13 spring practices Gabriel is still getting acclimated to Stein’s offense and building relationships with his new teammates.
“We don’t let him feel left out because he’s a new quarterback trying to take command of a new offense, and an offense where you bring back some vets,” left guard Marcus Harper II said. “We rally around him, understand this is inevitably your offense and day by day you can see him get more comfortable with it, more comfortable with us and how we like to, whether it’s changing protections or whatever it is, you can see he’s getting more comfortable with it.
“And he’s fast. He’s real fast. Obviously I played with Bo, so you get used to having quarterbacks scramble outside of the pocket. Big arm ability and happy to have him on our team. Players of that caliber don’t come around too often and when you’re able to get a guy like that, especially in the portal, it’s something you need to hang your hat on. ... You want to make that transition for him as smooth as. possible and we’ve done a great job from it and it’s transitioned onto the field as well. You’ve saw that in these first two practices.”
Prior to deciding to return for his senior season Nix spoke with Stein to get an understanding of his offense, strategy and how much control he’d still have in what was his fifth offense in as many college seasons. Stein is going through a similar process now with Gabriel, who has four 3,000-yard passing seasons with a 63.1% career completion percentage and 159.8 career efficiency rating, as well as Moore.
“These guys are exceptional football players and they’re extremely intelligent when it comes to the game,” Stein said. “Guys nowadays are so much further ahead than they were when even I played. I’m always looking to build scheme. Obviously, Dante played for a pretty good guy last year that we all now is a really good offensive coach. They might have stuff that I want to know that now I can learn. Same with Dillon with Jeff Lebby.
“I’m trying to improve myself. What’s the best thing that we can do for our offense? You’re going to see a lot of similar, but there is going to be some tweaks. We’ll build it around the quarterbacks and what they do well and kind of go from there.”