Dan Lanning is used to games against top teams. And he’s used to winning them.
Lanning spent four seasons at the University of Georgia from 2018-2021 — three as defensive coordinator. In his last season in Athens, Georgia, the Bulldogs won their first national championship in 41 years.
Lanning then left for Oregon, replacing then-head coach Mario Cristobal, who left for the University of Miami. Across his first three seasons at the helm, Lanning guided his squad to a 35-6 record.
The Ducks went 12-0 in their first season in the Big Ten last year, winning the conference championship over Penn State and earning the No. 1 overall seed in the College Football Playoff.
Oregon currently sits at 5-0 in its second season in the Big Ten. The Ducks are coming off a marquee road victory over then-No. 2 Penn State on Sept. 27 in the Nittany Lions’ annual whiteout game at Beaver Stadium in University Park, Pennsylvania.
Now, Lanning’s squad returns home to Autzen Stadium to host No. 8 Indiana at 3:30 p.m. EDT Oct. 11.
Despite currently being on their first bye week of the season, Lanning said in a press conference Wednesday the Ducks aren’t “too far ahead right now” in preparation for Indiana.
Still, Lanning had some early observations on second-year head coach Curt Cignetti’s Hoosiers.
"They're obviously very well-coached,” Lanning said. “They've got a team that plays really hard.”
Indiana enters Autzen Stadium in Eugene, Oregon, coming off a “gut-check game” in a 20-15 win over Iowa on Sept. 27. Redshirt junior quarterback Fernando Mendoza found senior receiver Elijah Sarratt for a 49-yard game-winning touchdown late in the fourth quarter.
Through just five games — Mendoza has only played all four quarters twice — he’s already tied his career high for passing touchdowns in a season with 16. He's tossed just one interception, which came in the fourth quarter against the Hawkeyes.
The Miami native is familiar with the Lanning-led Ducks.
In November 2023, the University of California, Berkeley, traveled to Autzen Stadium to face Oregon. The Ducks handled the Golden Bears, notching a 63-19 victory. Mendoza went 18 for 34 for 177 yards passing with an interception.
But that was his first season as a starting quarterback at Cal — also when he was a redshirt freshman.
Now, two years later, Mendoza is a different player. He’s more seasoned. More accurate. More prolific.
And more well-known.
Mendoza has the sixth-best odds to win the Heisman Trophy at +1400, per FanDuel Sportsbook. He’s arguably the top quarterback in the upcoming NFL draft.
"He's a talented quarterback,” Lanning said. “We had some success that day (in 2023), but he also had some success as well. I think you've seen that. This is a guy who can play football at a high level.”
To be a great team, they need “good quarterback play,” Lanning said, which the Hoosiers have with Mendoza. So too do the Ducks with redshirt sophomore signal caller Dante Moore — the current favorite to win the Heisman.
Indiana averages the sixth-most yards and points per game (538.2 yards and 47.8 points) and allows the fifth-fewest yards and points per contest (221.4 and 9.6).
“They're a tough team to go operate against,” Lanning said. “They're doing some good things.”
In Cignetti’s maiden season in Bloomington, the Hoosiers held an unblemished record at home. However, they struggled in hostile road environments: at Ohio State and the University of Notre Dame.
Indiana handled one of the toughest Big Ten environments at Kinnick Stadium last weekend. The Hoosiers are now tasked with overcoming another at Autzen Stadium.
Since Lanning’s first season at Oregon in 2022, the Ducks are 22-1 on their home field. The lone loss came to Washington, which reached the national championship game, that same year. They have the longest active home winning streak in college football at 18.
“I expect our fans to be what they always are — unbelievably enthused, there from beginning to end,” Lanning said. “A thing about going into this conference and going around to games, you realize there's a lot of really hard environments to play in in this conference. I hope that Autzen is always the hardest.”
Follow reporters Dalton James (@DaltonMJames and jamesdm@iu.edu) and Conor Banks (@Conorbanks06 and conbanks@iu.edu) and columnist Quinn Richards (@Quinn_richa and qmrichar@iu.edu) for updates throughout the Indiana football season.
