EUGENE, Ore. — When wide receiver Malik Benson transferred to Oregon in January, Dante Moore, the team’s projected starter at quarterback, drove him around town.

They went to different stores so Benson could pick up items for his new home. They attended church together and visited several spots to eat. But what struck Benson was the playlist in Moore’s car.

“I’m like, ‘Man, this is the music my mom would listen to when we had to get up and clean the house,'” Benson said. “It was early 2000s R&B. He’s an old head, for sure.”

Much of Moore’s soundtrack stretches back well beyond his birth date. He’ll play everything from Al Green to The O’Jays to New Edition to Lauryn Hill.

“He’s an old soul,” Otha Moore, Dante’s father, said of his youngest son.

Dante Moore, who started college at 17 and turned 20 in May, doesn’t dispute the designation. He had to grow up fast for different reasons, including being one of the best quarterbacks in the country before he entered high school. Maturity came easier to him than most.

Among the many old-school things about him is how he ended up at Oregon, and what happened back in 2024. Moore essentially took a gap year after transferring from UCLA to Oregon, fully knowing the Ducks had already added one of college football’s most prolific and accomplished quarterbacks in Dillon Gabriel.

Moore spent most of last season watching, waiting and learning. For decades, transfers were forced to sit out a year, but since those rules changed several years ago, it hardly ever happens. The allure of immediate playing time has top players, especially quarterbacks, hopscotching the country in search of a starting job.

So why did Moore, the nation’s No. 2 overall recruit, who had always started and immediately became a starter at UCLA, take the throwback route?

“I could have gone to multiple places, any place in the country, to be honest,” said Moore, who will lead Oregon against No. 12 seed James Madison on Saturday night in a first-round College Football Playoff game. “I just felt like I needed to sit back and get myself together.”

THE FIRST THING to know about Moore’s gap year at Oregon is that he was always in line to play there. Things just took a bit longer than expected.

He started out as an unlikely Duck. Moore grew up in Detroit, with parents on either side of the Michigan–Ohio State rivalry. Otha is a Detroit native and still has an allegiance to Michigan; Moore’s mother, Jera Bohlen-Moore, is an Ohioan, from a family of Buckeyes.

“It was like a battle in the living room,” Dante said.

Dante said he initially was an Ohio State fan — he loved former Buckeyes quarterback Braxton Miller — and considered playing for major programs near home, especially Notre Dame. But in July 2022, he announced on “SportsCenter” that he would be attending Oregon. He and his family had bonded with new Ducks coach Dan Lanning.

“Our relationship was amazing,” Moore said. “He’d come out [to Detroit] a lot. We used to go on walks. I would show him around. I remember our Christmas lighting, everybody kept posting us being at the Christmas tree. We were always kicking it with each other.”

Moore also had a strong connection to Ducks offensive coordinator Kenny Dillingham. But in late November 2022, Dillingham landed the head coaching job at Arizona State, his alma mater. Oregon acted quickly in finding a replacement and hired Will Stein from UTSA.

Lanning immediately dispatched Stein to Detroit on a red-eye flight to meet Moore and his family. Stein’s wife is from Michigan, and he and Moore had a nice initial vibe. But things felt rushed. Moore said if he knew then what he does now about Stein, he would have remained with Oregon.

Stein was a promising young playcaller but had never held an on-field role for a power-conference school.

“It was something that we had our heart stuck on from the beginning,” Otha Moore said. “And that last-minute coaching change kind of threw a wrench in the fan and we kind of jumped to conclusions a little bit fast.”

Other teams remained in pursuit of Moore, a top-3 recruit in the 2022 class. Among them: UCLA, which was coached by Chip Kelly, the offensive guru who had molded top quarterbacks and whose scheme and philosophy first gained national attention at, of all places, Oregon. UCLA also offered an immediate path to a starting job.

“It was Chip Kelly vs. Will Stein,” Stein explained. “My name now probably carries a little bit more weight in the quarterback world than it did then.”

Moore signed with UCLA several days later. Lanning had seen communication wane leading up to signing day, and Moore had visited UCLA’s campus.

His decision didn’t come as a surprise. Lanning shot Moore a text: “Love you, man. Wish you nothing but the best.”

“I was pretty disappointed,” Lanning said. “You want to make sure you handle those relationships the right way, but in our mind, it wasn’t necessarily thinking, ‘Hey, we’re going to get another opportunity to coach this guy down the road.'”

OTHA MOORE RAISED Dante and his two older children mostly as a single dad. He worked as an engineer for Ford, but also held other jobs, including a landscaping business.

Dante has helped Otha since he was around 10 years old. One time, he didn’t know how to dump the debris bag on the mower without assistance. So he took the bag off and kept cutting.

“My dad’s like, ‘What are you doing? Figure it out. I’m not going to help you,'” Dante said. “So I’m sitting there, like, trying to put this bag into the thing. He showed me, with situations in life, sometimes you’ve got to find a way on your own.”

Dante entered one of those situations in 2023. He was on campus at UCLA, far from home, billed as the next big thing for Bruins football. But just after spring ball, his mother called with bad news: She had breast cancer. She would have surgery that November.

Things started off well for Moore on the field. He became UCLA’s starter by Week 2 and threw seven touchdown passes in his first three college games. But then he opened Pac-12 play against three consecutive top-15 opponents and completed just 51 of 112 pass attempts with six interceptions. He was benched after a Week 7 loss to Oregon State, and while he saw extensive action in the regular-season finale against Cal, he threw two interceptions in a 33-7 loss.

“A lot of hype, true freshman going in, hasn’t been since … a long time,” Moore said. “My first couple games are going amazing and then you hit that block. It’s like, ‘I’m not playing for the city of Detroit anymore. I’m playing for people that are UCLA fans across the whole world,’ so you get so much hate and trauma put onto you.”

Oregon’s coaches sensed that Moore could have a tough season.

“There’s a clear difference between UCLA and Oregon, at that point,” Stein said. “Everybody could see that.”

Moore prepared to enter the transfer portal. He huddled with his family and his agent, Brandon Grier, and assessed the landscape. They wanted a place where Moore would grow and also have the right players protecting him up front, catching his passes and sharing the backfield.

“Dante had aged in a way. When he was a freshman at UCLA, he could have still been a senior in high school,” Grier said. “That really allowed him to take a step back and look at [2024] as a reset year. Where he may have been rushing to be the guy, he wanted to step back and look at it from a big-picture standpoint.”

Moore soon focused on Oregon as his transfer destination. He already knew the coaches and would have the talent around him to guide his development.

But on Dec. 9, 2023, Gabriel, who had four 3,000-yard passing seasons as a starter at Oklahoma and UCF, and more than 14,000 passing yards at the FBS level, announced he would play his sixth and final season at Oregon. Gabriel would follow Bo Nix, another veteran transfer who became a record-setting quarterback for the Ducks.

“We got Dillon, and he was going to be our locked-in starter,” Stein said. “But then when Dante called and said, ‘Hey, I’m really interested in coming back and willing to sit and learn, just have a growth year,’ we took it and said: ‘How can we turn this opportunity down?'”

Just nine days later, Moore announced he would be joining the Ducks.

“The goal, at first, from high school, was he’ll learn from Bo Nix [at Oregon],” said Ty Spencer, who coached Moore at King High School in Detroit. “But it was just kind of the opposite. He tried it at UCLA, and he understood, ‘Hey, I’ve got a lot more to learn than I think, and I’m OK with humbling myself.'”

WHEN MOORE ARRIVED at Oregon in early 2024, the focus wasn’t on football right away. Otha Moore remembered Lanning, whose wife is a cancer survivor, asking about the family and specifically how Dante’s mother was doing with her treatment.

“From the time we first met them, from Will to Dan, they’ve never changed,” Otha Moore said. “They’ve been the same guys.”

Lanning sensed that the year at UCLA had weighed on Moore. Los Angeles is a media and entertainment hub and Moore, because of his recruiting accolades, found himself in the spotlight. At Oregon, he would share a quarterback room with an older, more accomplished player in Gabriel.

Moore also wouldn’t be the center of attention in Eugene.

“It’s a little bit off the beaten path,” Lanning said. “It’s not necessarily right in the center of L.A. or New York or Houston. For the guys looking to sit courtside and be at a concert every night, this isn’t the place for them. But for a guy looking to focus, grow as a player and a person, this is the right place.”

The setting might have been ideal, but the role was unfamiliar. Moore had been a starting quarterback ever since he was 9, when he requested to play up on a youth team of 13-year-olds called the Southfield Falcons. Otha had told Dante that he wouldn’t play right away, and Dante was good with that. Although he ended up becoming a starter that season for the Southfield Falcons after an injury, Oregon would be different.

Dante knew Gabriel would only be there a year and saw benefits to being around him.

“It made me really want to come here even more, knowing that he was coming,” Moore said. “I would get to learn, see how a vet quarterback moves and takes control of the offense. And I got to see him every day.”

Stein said Moore never asked him about playing time. Moore received reps with the second-team offense in practice. He prepared as if he was the starter, even though the chances of supplanting Gabriel were slim.

“We never saw moments of disinterest or mind wandering in different spots,” Stein said. “Only one guy’s playing, so some [backups] kind of wait to prep like your starter until, ‘Oh my gosh, I might be it.’ He always [prepared].”

Stein knew about Moore’s arm and physical ability, and Moore would make throws in practice that “nobody else on our roster can make,” including Gabriel. But Moore’s mental approach toward understanding the game and growing his knowledge stood out to his coaches.

Moore’s “elite football IQ,” Stein said, showed up in him suggesting schematic concepts, different checks, protections or route stems that most underclassmen aren’t relaying. Moore didn’t shy away from asking challenging questions or showing leadership, even as QB2.

“I remember Dillon got hit at practice and Dante talked to the entire team about how we’ve got to protect our quarterback,” Lanning said.

Moore took a proactive mindset to his gap year. He reached out often to Cam Newton, the former Heisman Trophy winner and NFL MVP quarterback, whom Moore met through 7-on-7 football in high school. Newton, also an ESPN analyst, has mentored Moore and talked about playing at Florida in 2007 behind Tim Tebow, who that season became the first sophomore to win the Heisman.

Oregon surged to an undefeated regular season and a Big Ten championship, and Gabriel became a Heisman finalist while recording career highs in passing yards (3,857), passing touchdowns (30) and completion percentage (72.9). During games, Moore would conduct pre-snap reads and play the game out in his mind.

His 2024 season stats: 7 completions, 8 pass attempts, 49 yards, zero touchdowns or interceptions.

“There were many times I wanted to go out there and throw touchdown passes and things like that,” Moore said. “But it wasn’t my time yet.”

AS OREGON’S 2025 season opener against Montana State approached, Moore felt the nerves. He had not started for 687 days.

But he also trusted those around him at Oregon and what he had learned in the previous year and a half.

“I get my confidence now from my teammates,” he said. “It’s like, we all move together.”

A month into the season, he stood on the field at earsplitting Beaver Stadium, with No. 6 Oregon trailing No. 3 Penn State by a touchdown in overtime. Oregon faced fourth-and-1 from the Penn State 5-yard line, and Moore, not known for his mobility, converted on a designed quarterback draw. He found Jamari Johnson for the tying score moments later, then opened the second overtime with a 25-yard touchdown pass to Gary Bryant Jr. as Oregon went on to win 30-24.

Six weeks later, he once again was in a tough road environment at Iowa, where a cold steady rain fell all game. After leading almost the entire way, Oregon had fallen behind 16-15 with 1:51 left and Moore, who had just 65 passing yards to that point, had to rally the offense. On the final drive, he completed five passes, including a dart to Benson up the sideline for 24 yards, to set up the winning field goal.

“I never did a two-minute drive to win a game before,” Moore said. “It’s been a lot of experiences this year.”

Not all of them have been enjoyable. Moore finished with only 186 passing yards, a touchdown and two interceptions in Oregon’s only loss, a 30-20 home setback against Indiana. The IU game began a midseason stretch where Moore completed less than 62% of his passes in three of four games.

But he responded to average 283 passing yards on 77.5% completions in Oregon’s final three games, entering Saturday’s CFP first-round matchup against James Madison at Autzen Stadium. This season he has thrown for 2,733 yards and 24 touchdowns.

“He humbled himself before he knew he’s going to do great things,” Benson said. “Not a lot of people sit for a year, knowing where he could have gone, probably anywhere in the country. But for him to come sit for a year, learn the offense, that’s why you see our offense go how it’s going. Even though this is his first year playing in the offense, it’s not new to him.”

Stein calls Moore “an elite processor,” able to diagnose defenses quickly and then display anticipation and accuracy. Moore throws with pace and touch, whether he’s targeting receivers in short, intermediate or deep routes.

“I would love to see somebody better than him in throwing a football consistently,” said Stein, who was named Kentucky‘s head coach earlier this month but will stay on with Oregon through the CFP. “It’s not just one throw a game, ‘Whoa!’ and the other throws suck.”

Although Moore wasn’t a Heisman finalist like his Oregon predecessors, he has surged as an NFL prospect. ESPN’s Mel Kiper lists Moore at No. 1 overall on his Big Board for the 2026 NFL draft, ahead of Indiana’s Fernando Mendoza, the Heisman winner. ESPN’s Field Yates has Moore at No. 2 behind Mendoza in his latest mock draft.

While the gap year has helped, not hurt, Moore’s NFL chances, the redshirt sophomore will be making only his 18th career start Saturday, below the typical thresholds — 25 or 30 — for quarterback draft prospects. Gabriel finished college with an FBS-record 63 starts, breaking Nix’s mark of 61.

“There’s no rush,” Otha Moore said. “Whenever he feels like he’s ready, he’ll step up to that next level. Everyone says, ‘Hey, you should go now, you should go now.’ We don’t care about the pick where he’s going to go. It’s just about the mental aspect.”

Dante Moore’s college career might be bookended by a fast start and a fantastic finish, but the period in between perhaps molded him the most.

Could he start a trend? Might other top quarterback recruits who struggle early take the old-school approach to transferring, rather than rushing into whatever next starting role presents itself?

“It would be smart for guys to look at what he’s done, and try to emulate it,” Grier said.

Added Stein: “Most people could benefit, but nobody wants to wait, nobody wants to grind, nobody wants to think about process, they want to think about results. It’s just not reality.”

Moore attributes the pattern to “our generation” and “our society,” not excluding himself from that group, but also speaking with some earned perspective.

“When it comes to social media, when it comes to just fame in this world, people want it, and if you don’t get talked about in the current moment, you feel like you’re not worth it,” he said. “I was going through the same thing in high school. I was seeking attention on Instagram, people posted me and there’s followers.”

He reached a point where the chase for outside recognition exhausted him, while the quest for inner growth gave him a second wind. After intentionally exiting the spotlight, Moore returned to it with a readiness for whatever comes his way.

“It’s OK to be developed, it’s OK to wait your turn,” he said. “At the end of day, I hope people look at my story in the future and be like, ‘It’s OK to do it. It’s OK to sit back and learn.'”

ORLANDO, Fla. — In his first comments since being named Michigan interim football coach, Biff Poggi said Monday his players feel betrayed and angry following the firing and arrest of former coach Sherrone Moore.

During a media availability for the Cheez-It Citrus Bowl, Poggi was asked how both he and his team has handled the events of the last week. Moore was fired last Wednesday because of an inappropriate relationship with a staff member. Hours later, prosecutors said that Moore forced entry into the staff member’s apartment.

He subsequently was charged with felony third-degree home invasion and two misdemeanors: stalking in a domestic relationship and breaking and entering. Michigan athletic director Warde Manuel selected Poggi as interim coach in the aftermath.

Poggi said he has spent the last week speaking with and listening to players, having multiple video calls with parents and trying to treat everyone with kindness and empathy.

“It has been a tumultuous time,” Poggi said. “A lot of … first disbelief, then anger, then really, what we’re in right now is the kids, quite frankly, feel very betrayed, and we’re trying to work through that.”

Poggi said he has tried to help players with “lots of arms around shoulders, lot of listening, lot of telling them that you love them, but showing it, because words are cheap, and that takes a lot of time. What it really takes is you being willing to listen.”

Earlier this season, Poggi served as interim coach against Central Michigan and Nebraska in place of Moore, who was serving a suspension as part of self-imposed sanctions for NCAA violations related to the Connor Stalions sign-stealing scandal.

Before he returned to Michigan as associate head coach in February 2025, Poggi served as the head coach at Charlotte for two seasons.

Though he mentioned there was no playbook to follow in a situation such as this one, Poggi said Manuel basically told him “to love and take care of the kids.”

“I don’t know that you can prepare for something like this,” Poggi said. “It’s been complicated. I want to listen to them. I want to understand what the kids are feeling and what their parents are feeling, and so a lot of listening, and there’s been a wide range of emotions, and we are going through those steps.

“They’re not over yet, and I don’t expect them to be over for a while. The mandate that Warde Manuel gave me as the athletic director when he asked me to be the interim coach, was to love and take care of the kids, and so that’s what I’m spending all of my time doing.”

Poggi added he has had conversations with players about whether they wanted to play or opt-out of the Cheez-It Citrus Bowl against Texas on Dec. 31.

“What we’ve told them is this is a personal decision for you all, based on a very unique situation,” Poggi said. “So, we’re trying to be really sensitive to making sure that we’re not forcing anybody into doing anything.”

But he also added preparing for a football game has helped “a tremendous amount.”

“Because when they’re inside that rectangle for those hours that were either in meetings or practicing, it’s a bit of a sanctuary,” Poggi said. “And a chance to not think about what is a constant barrage of media questions and things like that.”

Texas quarterback Arch Manning will return to school to play in 2026, finally putting to rest questions about his future beyond this season.

In a text message to ESPN’s Dave Wilson on Monday night, Arch’s dad, Cooper Manning, said, “Arch is playing football at Texas next year.” Texas officials told ESPN the full expectation was that Manning would be back next season, even though Manning could have declared for the NFL draft as a redshirt sophomore.

At a media event in Orlando, Fla., as part of the Cheez-It Citrus Bowl, where Texas will play Michigan on Dec. 31, Texas coach Steve Sarkisian said Manning would benefit from one more year in college.

“He’s a young man who’s gotten better as the season’s gone on, and not only physically, but mentally, maturity-wise,” Sarkisian said. “I would think he’s going to want another year of that growth to put himself in position for hopefully a long career in the NFL. And he’s got some unfinished business of what he came here to do and what he came here to accomplish.

“We had a really good football season. We left some meat on the bone with an opportunity to be SEC champs, national champs, and so ultimately for him, I think the competitor in him is going to say, ‘Man, I sure would like another crack at trying to do those things.'”

In his first season as the starter, Manning played his best football in the second half of the season when Texas went 6-1 and made a late push for the CFP. With the bowl game left to go, Manning has gone 227-of-370 for 2,942 yards, 24 touchdowns and 7 interceptions. Only two of those interceptions came in the final seven games of the year. He added eight rushing touchdowns.