Civil War: A brief history of the Oregon vs. Oregon State rivalry

With Oregon and Oregon State’s last Civil War (even though it’s no longer called that way) meeting as members of the same athletic conference being around the corner, I thought this would be a great time to have a recap of this historic rivalry before the Ducks and Beavers go in different directions in terms of conference affiliations.

This last conference meeting is not only special because of the Ducks’ move to the Big Ten meaning potential future meetings will be played as non-conference games, but also because of the conference standings implications, Oregon will go to the Pac-12 championship game with a win, while a loss will heavily hurt their chances, and, if Arizona beats Arizona State on top of the aforementioned scenario, then the Ducks won’t be going to Las Vegas.

The Civil War is considered to be a great matchup most of the time, with many games of the series hurting the loser’s chances at many things like a Rose Bowl appearance, to others leading to crazy off-field scenarios, obviously coming from the bad blood that the schools have had over the decades (even if the rivalry’s intensity is often disputed by the Ducks’ fanbase, as some consider the Washington Huskies to be a much more bitter and formidable rival)

For this special occasion, I’ve decided to choose some fun and historical facts about the rivalry itself, from its origins, a historic game that wasn’t pretty at all, incredible stats that many people overlooked, and the rivalry’s once official but lost trophy that eventually got rediscovered.

The Origins

Much like other well-known rivalries like the Deep South’s Oldest Rivalry between the Georgia Bulldogs and the Auburn Tigers, the Civil War between Oregon and Oregon State began way back during the final years of the 19th century, with the first matchup taking place on November 19th, 1894, with the-then Oregon Agricultural College Aggies (with the university being actually older than the University of Oregon by 4 years) beating the-then Oregon Webfoots by a score of 16-0 in Corvallis, the next meeting happened in Eugene, with the Webfoots beating the Aggies by a much more lopsided-score of 44-0.

Oregon and Oregon State have since changed their nicknames to Ducks and Beavers.