Everything Dan Lanning said after Oregon Ducks' disappointing 30-24 loss to Indiana

The Oregon Ducks entered Week 7 against the Indiana Hoosiers with plenty of hope. Through five games, they'd put a product on the field that was synonymous with the best teams in the country. Defending their Big Ten title and claiming a bye in the College Football Playoff for a second season seemed well within reach.

The Hoosiers spoiled all those hopes, as they came out of Autzen with a convincing 30-20 win in which the Ducks committed two costly turnovers, both quarterback Dante Moore interceptions. Indiana was clearly better on Saturday — in nearly every facet of the game.

While the loss likely knocks Oregon out of Big Ten championship contention, their goal of winning a national title remains on the table thanks to the expanded 12-team playoff. But in the moment, it's tough to see that far ahead.

The mood was glum in Autzen after the loss, yet head coach Dan Lanning, speaking in his postgame press conference, touched on the future as well as what needs to be cleaned up coming out of this week.

Here's everything he said after Oregon's loss to Indiana.

Opening Statement

Dan Lanning: Certainly disappointed in the result. But we didn't play well enough to go win that game and Indiana certainly did. A really well-coached team. They did a great job in this game. They had a great plan, they were able to create pressure throughout, we struggled on third down, struggled to protect the quarterback. Ultimately they were more prepared for us in this moment. I don't think there was any letdown from our players. Our crowd was outstanding. They created some penalties and some opportunities for us. But ultimately we shot ourselves in the foot and had several penalties ourselves, which has been a little uncharacteristic for us. Can't play behind the chains on offense. We had a hard time generating success. Anytime we did, we kind of hurt ourselves. But again, unbelievably prepared and great team, Coach Cignetti, their quarterback played well, their defense played really, really well and they did some things that will be good for us to attack and look for the future.

Still in Championship Hunt

Question: We saw last year what Ohio State did, losing two games in the regular-season and going on to win a championship. How much of that is what you're preaching to your team right now, that you still have a lot in front of you?

Lanning: Our players know that. They recognize what's in front of them. It's about improvement, it's about going on the attack. It's hard to go unscathed in college football, especially against a good team. They played a better game than us, they were better coached today. Our guys recognize every one of our goals is still in front of us with an opportunity to attack.

Indiana's Late Third-Down Success

Question: Once you're tied at 20, their go-ahead drive had three third-down conversions, one albeit on an offsides. What did you see on the third downs that led to their success on that drive?

Lanning: You try to have tighter matches. I thought their quarterback did a good job of getting from one to three and finding the open guy. One of them we slipped and fell down. I have to go back and see the offsides, that surprised me and it's not a reviewable play. I thought we were off the time. Something we said, we had to be clean on substitutions and we weren't. They were able to run the ball and control the clock. We didn't do a good job of having responsibility for the quarterback on a couple of those plays where we thought we did. That's something we will go back and evaluate.

Lack of Offensive Execution in Second Half

Question: You had just over 60 yards of offense in the second half. How would you explain that performance?

Lanning: Ultimately it means they made better adjustments in the second half than we did. We came out and got a stop defensively early on. But again, I think penalties really hurt us in the second half. Some negative plays we weren't able to create. I thought they had a really good plan. We have to have more in-game adjustments to be able to handle. They played well and we didn't play well enough. So no excuses from us, they deserve credit in this win.

Indiana Shutting Down Oregon's Rushing Attack

Question: With the rushing attack, what were they able to do in the second half to successfully shut that down?

Lanning: They had hats and a loaded box. You look even at the interception at the end, you're trying to throw an advantage RPO and you get a batted ball when they have a loaded box. They did a great job of creating that and turning that into an interception. Ultimately we have to go look at the film, look what they did and make sure we have proper answers in the future.

Brandon Finney's Pick-Six

Question: What'd you see from Brandon on the pick-six?

Lanning: We were in man-to-man coverage. He did a great job. That's one of the tougher routes to defend in man-to-man is the crossing route from the opposite side. He did a great job breaking on the ball,  we had good pressure up front. Great job finishing in the end zone and turning that into a touchdown for us.

Message to Dante Moore

Question: For a guy like Dante, who's had such a strong start to his career here at Oregon, what's your messaging to him and how can you grow from this game moving forward?

Lanning: Adversity is real. You're gonna face it at some point in your career. It's how you respond to it. We didn't have our fastball today. They did a great job. In this game, everyone wants to look at players and say 'This is the reason.' That was a team effort and that was a team loss. And their team played better than us. It wasn't Dante, it's the whole group - the coaching staff, the players. Ultimately Dante is going to look at this as an opportunity to learn from as well. We'll grow from it and get better.

Moore's In-Game Confidence

Question: Do you think that (Moore) had confidence through all four quarters?

Lanning: I think Dante has confidence. Again, I thought they had a better plan ultimately. There's some things we put on film that they did a good job of taking advantage of.  They had good rush all day. Our protection wasn't clean, we can get better in that area. But Dante is a confident player. He's a guy we have a lot of confidence in.

Moore's Health After Multiple Hits

Question: Dante got dinged on one of those sacks in the third quarter. Is he okay, and how much do you think that impacted him the rest of the game?

Lanning: I think Dante is okay. He's a tough kid. He took some hits today. We have to do a better job protecting our quarterback to avoid that.

Indiana's Scheme Defensively

Question: What were your thoughts on the offense, which was not productive in terms of yards?

Lanning: They had extra hats at the point of attack. In situations we had to throw for it, they did a great job defending the sticks. They were aggressive. Again, I think they're really well coached. They won the 50-50 balls, some of those were really close as far as connection and how tight they are in coverage. They did a good job being tight in coverage.  We were trying to take the top off a couple times and they did a good job being on top when we had those moments.

Bryce Boettcher's Leadership in Tough Moments

Question: What did you see from Bryce and some of your leaders today in a situation where you're chasing the game for parts of it?

Lanning: I think these guys play til the end. There were some moments we made some great plays and moments we didn't make the play that was necessary and we were supposed to make. Those will be opportunities to attack. Bryce always leads. He led all the way throughout the game, never wavered. Again, you let a team be in position like they were to have success and you don't create enough positive when you have the opportunity, then you're gonna end up coming on the short end of the stick.

Team's Mindset Compared to vs. Penn State

Question: Do you feel like, mentally, this team was in the same mindset as against Penn State?

Lanning: I don't think anyone in the organization did the best that they are capable of today, myself included. It starts today. Again, I thought their plan was better and ours wasn't. There's some moments going back early in the game that I'm already saying, 'Okay, we handled this wrong and didn't put our guys in position to have success.' But that will be something we can go improve. I thought our players played hard. But there's a moment there when you're not having success on offense that you're probably having some self-doubt that sets in. It's something we'll have to attack and make sure we have a great plan for in the future.

Questionable End to First Half

Question: What was the thinking on the third down run play? Was there hesitation? Did you consider going for it on fourth down?

Lanning: We wanted to take points there. That's a kick that Atticus has made a lot of times. We felt we had a really advantageous run look. We were just a cut away from making that into an explosive play. If it was tight, fourth-and-one or fourth-and-two it might have been a go. But ultimately we felt like taking the points there was the right thing to do. We just didn't make the kick.

Elijah Sarratt's Big Day vs. Corners

Question: What did you think of the matchup between (Sarratt) and your corners today?

Lanning: I felt like we were a little loose in coverage. We were soft at times. We gotta do a better job of playing catch when we're playing off. I think that's really a hard technique to play. They did a good job taking advantage of it. We didn't get enough work on it during the week to have success. He's a really good wideout. Mendoza threw the ball really, really well to him and was able to find it. Ultimately our rush didn't necessarily get home. They had some batted balls at the end, I think we had one in the game. We gotta get more batted balls and impact on the quarterback.

What Could Have Been Better

Question: What could you have done better in this game?

Lanning: Ultimately I don't think our plan was great. At times we played well defensively. We had some short fields but ultimately we didn't stop the run when it mattered most. We gotta have a better plan to stop the run there at the end of the game. Didn't do a good job contesting balls defensively. Third down we weren't good on offense and we gotta be able to avoid third down. We had some positive runs on certain schemes, and then there were some really negative runs. Can't take negatives against a team like this. Tempo, we didn't handle well. I thought they handled our tempo extremely well on offense excluding the early touchdown pass. But they had some good tempo answers for us that we didn't have great answers for what they were doing. Their pitches were better than our pitches. Ultimately that's something we can improve.

Jordon Davison's Workload

Question: Jordon Davison got his most run so far this year. What was it about him in this matchup that you liked?

Lanning: We felt like he had the hot hand at one point in the game. He was running really well, falling forward for yards, did a good job of getting positive yards. We were having some success with some of our duo plays and things like that that he runs really well.

Contact/Follow @Ducks_Wire on X (formerly Twitter) and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Oregon Ducks news, notes, and opinions.

This article originally appeared on Ducks Wire: Everything Dan Lanning said after Oregon Ducks' loss to Indiana