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Oregon Ducks head coach Dan Lanning had a long journey before he became a head coach.
Lanning's first job in college was as a graduate assistant in Pittsburgh in 2011. He then moved to Arizona State the following year as a graduate assistant.
The 38-year-old has since worked at Sam Houston State, Alabama, Memphis, Georgia and now Oregon. He's worked under Nick Saban and Kirby Smart, but when he was a graduate assistant under Todd Graham at Pitt and Arizona State, he had a legendary "a** chewing" moment, which he recalled.
"I've had a lot of them, Kirby Smart is a Grade-A professional in giving those, Todd Graham is the best ... Early as a coach, Todd Graham probably prepared me for a lot of future a**-chewing. Early as a coach, I was running the scout team as a GA, this time, you only had one GA on offense and one GA on defense," Lanning said to Bussin with the Boys.
"I was coaching all 11 on offense, after practice one day, Coach Graham goes, 'Man, I'm sorry, I apologize, we have the worst scout team in the nation and it's not your fault, it's my fault because I hired the guy, he is running the scout team, and points at me. He runs the scout team and he is the worst.' I had just been coaching high school ball the year before. Let's say the scout team got better, but it was a good humbling moment for me... I couldn't have been smaller in that moment." Lanning continued.
It was a funny story from Lanning, who used that as motivation to get better, which has helped land him the head coaching job at Oregon.
Dan Lanning's immediate success at Oregon
Dan Lanning was hired by the Oregon Ducks in December 2021 as he signed a six-year, $29.1 million contract with the Ducks.
Lanning had immediate success at Oregon, as in his first year with the program, the Ducks went 10-3. In his second year with the program, Oregon went 12-2 and played in the Pac-12 championship game but lost to Washington, which also dashed their playoff hopes.
After two successful seasons at Oregon, Lanning was rumored to be a candidate for the job opening at Alabama. However, Lanning remained with the Ducks and will look to lead Oregon to the college football playoffs.
