Jeffrey Bassa Talks New Technology, Idaho's Offense, Transfer Players

Oregon Football linebacker Jeffrey Bassa was one of three players available to media following Wednesday’s practice.

With the season opener against Idaho in just a few short days, the pressure is ramping up for players and coaches alike.

In the interview, Bassa discusses in-helmet communication, Idaho’s explosiveness, transfer players, and more.

Below are the most noteworthy questions and quotes from his interview as well as my thoughts at the end.

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On what integrating transfer players into Oregon’s defense has been like:

“Amazing. At first glance looking at it at the start of fall camp it’s like ‘wow we have all this firepower’, we have a good three-deep with guys who can play and do a lot of things for this defense.”

“It’s kind of surreal just seeing the firepower that we have.”

On how Oregon Football has avoided overlooking lower-level opponents in recent years:

“We just truly try to make it about us. It’s never about external factors or the other team.”

“We know that we have a great team and we know that we can only control what we can control. We go out there every game knowing we have to execute at our highest level.”

On how coach Dan Lanning‘s staff has been able to cultivate said mindset:

“Coming in with the same mentality and same energy every day. Just knowing that there’s always room for improvement in every aspect.”

“If we can improve every aspect every day, it gets to a point where we’re going to be unstoppable.”

On what he’s seen from Idaho Football in film study:

“They’re pretty explosive on offense. The team is coached very well on offense.”

“They like to take explosive shots. They pride themselves on a great running game as well so it’s a very explosive offense that we need to be prepared for.”

On adapting to college football’s new in-helmet communication rules:

“It’s been really great, kind of seeing what Tosh (Lupoi) sees from his aspect and from my aspect as well.”

“Having those tablets on the sideline is gonna be great as well.”

On how much Oregon’s defensive staff wants to use the in-helmet communication:

“Just a little bit. We do have some long-worded calls, if I hear one word in the call I know that this is the check to it or we want to check to this.”

“Can I tell my safety this? Or tell my defensive line to do this instead of this? Sometimes just being on the same page with my DC, we meet a lot, communicating back and forth about calls and what to expect.”

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I always enjoy Jeffrey Bassa’s interviews. For my money he’s one of the most well-spoken and engaging players on the team so it makes total sense that he’s the one who’s been trusted with having defensive coordinator Tosh Lupoi in his ear as well as making calls.

I think it’ll be interesting to see the extent to which the coaching staff wants to use this feature on both sides of the ball.

I suspect there will be an adjustment phase where both sides have to figure out the right balance between communication and over-communication.

The good thing is there are a couple of weeks where Oregon should have some margin for error before things get really serious.

I want to call attention to what Bassa said about tablets being on the sideline as well.

We routinely see NFL teams making full use of this ability to adjust during games and I suspect the better coaching staffs in college football will make this a real weapon too.

Players and staff have been talking about Idaho’s explosiveness all week so it’ll be interesting to see what containment looks like on their downfield passing attack as well as kick returns.

Most fans will remember the explosive first drive Portland State put together in last year’s season opener that spoiled what would otherwise have been an 81-0 win.

Something tells me Dan Lanning remembers too.