Autzen stadium in Eugene has become one of the most respected home venues in college football. Oregon has a loud and boisterous home crowd, and has become a difficult place for visiting teams to play.

Autzen stadium underwent a $90 million facelift ten years ago, with 12,000 seats and 32 luxury boxes added. The new addition brought the stadium capacity all the way up to …. 54,000.

That’s right. With all of the Nike money invested in the University of Oregon athletics, Autzen Stadium has a grand total of 387 more seats than Colorado’s Folsom Field.

Which gives some perspective as to how far the University of Oregon has come in the past decade or so. The Ducks are now a perennial ten-win team, and have been in the national championship conversation for most of the 21st century. Colorado is seven seasons removed from its last winning campaign, and hasn’t been ranked since 2007.

But it wasn’t always this way ….