Gotta love the West Coast vibe. If you don’t win, just pretend it didn’t happen. Everybody feels good. Everybody gets to drink the Kool-Aid. The Oregon Ducks are champions at that as well.

The Duck football team was honored as part of Eugene, Oregon’s “Celebrating Champions” parade on January 22. Of course, headlining the event was the Pac 10 champion football team based out of Eugene. The Ducks had a tremendous season, finishing 12-1 on the year. They went undefeated during the regular season and played for the BCS National Championship.

But the Ducks want to pretend that national championship game was never actually played. It was scheduled, but the result somehow drifted into the black hole of regret and forgetfulness, never to be mentioned or heard of again.

Check out the sign. 12-0. BCS Championship Game. These images are clear as day on the banner they flaunted at the event, and I suppose that there is a level of truth about it. At one point, the Ducks were 12-0. They did play in the BCS National Championship Game.

But here is the kicker: they lost it. And for some reason, the Ducks are ashamed to admit the full truth about their season. The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth means Oregon finished 12-1. No matter how undefeated their banners say the Ducks were, they were no more undefeated than 116 other college football teams in the NCAA’s Football Bowl Subdivision.

Can you imagine an SEC team coming home after a loss in the BCS National Championship game and having a huge, self-imposed pat on the back experience such as this? And if they did, I can assure you that they wouldn’t try to pretend the actual national championship game never took place.

That isn’t the way things operate with football in the South. Maybe it’s a regional thing.

One has to wonder if this sort of selective amnesia is a serious issue with America. What is this? Everyone gets a trophy? Everyone has to get a ribbon at the Spelling Bee?

When I played Pee Wee football, we always got snow cones whether we won or lost. Winning was important, but the emphasis was learning the arts of sportsmanship and fundamentals. By the time we got to junior high football, winning was stressed even more, but technique and a tough football mentality were the focus of teaching. High school was all about winning with class and doing whatever it took to win so long as our actions were ethical and our priorities were appropriately placed.

We didn’t run from our losses. We didn’t pretend they never happened. Our record books and banners at end of the season potlucks never omitted them from the record. We earned what we earned, and we earned our losses as much as our victories.

And that was high school. The Oregon Ducks are a big time college football program.

What message does this send to followers of college football or people that went to this event? Even when you lose, you don’t really lose. Perception is reality. We’re all winners, even if we’re losers. Just pretend it didn’t happen.

You know what, though, Oregon? It did happen. You finished 12-1 on the year, not 12-0. You did play in the BCS Championship Game, but you lost it. You lost it, and Auburn played its worst game of the year. That’s the truth.

Sometimes the truth hurts, but it’s best to accept the truth for what it is. What really is beyond me is that the truth shouldn’t hurt. 12-1 is a fantastic season. Alabama wishes they were 12-1. Texas would have danced a jig to be 12-1 this year.

Hopefully this West Coast, hippie mentality stays west of the Rockies. The head coach of the Ducks, Chip Kelly, addressed the crowd at the event saying, “It’s not like this anywhere else in the country.”

It’s not like this anywhere else in the country.

Let’s hope it stays that way.