A national education research organization says Oregon deserves a failing grade for the report cards on individual schools’ performance that it releases every fall, which the group says mask just how far behind many students remain in the wake of the pandemic.

Oregon was one of just 13 states that the nonpartisan Center for Reinventing Public Education gave an F for making it wildly difficult for parents to find and compare data about long-term school performance.

At the end of spring football, Utah State interim head coach Nate Dreiling and defensive line coach Cedric Douglas knew they still had work to do with the Aggies’ defensive line.

There was talent on the roster, with guys like Blaine Spires, Enoka Miago and Bo Maile back from the previous year, plus an influx of transfers like Gabriel Iniguez Jr., Miguel Jackson and Taz Williams. But overall depth was lacking.

The defensive line — a major weakness for USU in 2023 — needed reinforcements. The entire group needed to be better too, or the Aggies would inevitably struggle defensively again.

Fast forward to Utah State’s opener against Robert Morris last Saturday and the changes made by Dreiling, Douglas and company appear to have paid off in a big way.

The Aggies’ defensive line was arguably the best group on defense in Utah State’s win against the Colonials, holding RMU to only 14 points and 362 yards.

Per Pro Football Focus, Aggie defensive linemen were better than all other defenders, outside of a safeties group that includes star junior Ike Larsen and instant impact transfers in Jordan Vincent and Torren Union.

Jackson, a defensive tackle, was the second-highest-rated defender on the team, behind Larsen. And Williams, Miago and Spires were all top 10-rated defenders overall.

Williams and Spires had performances of note. Williams tied his career high with five tackles, including a tackle for loss, only the sixth of his career.

And Spires had a sack, which bumped him up to six in his Aggie career and 8.5 in his collegiate career. No defensive lineman played better than Jackson, though, who routinely took on double teams inside and still affected the RMU run game regularly, particularly in the second half.

The defensive line’s performance did not escape the notice of Dreiling.

“Hats off to the players for earning the trust of the coaches and when it was their time to go in, they played ball,” he said.

For Dreiling, though, it was less about any individual performances and more about how many defensive linemen Utah State was able to play against Robert Morris. It was a group that included the aforementioned Jackson, Williams, Iniguez Jr., and Maile at defensive tackle, plus Miago, Marlin Dean, Cian Slone, Lawrence Falatea and Gabe Peterson at defensive end.

Given the Aggies’ offensive system — which prioritizes speed and quick strikes — depth on defense has been the most critical thing to build; in the first game of the year the Aggies looked like they have developed the needed depth up front.

“That is the deal with this offense,” Dreiling said. “We are going to go as fast as we can and you have to be able to play a bunch of guys. More importantly, you have to be able to trust them. That is what I am proud of.”

“We should never play tired football up front,” he added. “We have enough talent that we feel like we should stay fresh and stay rotating. And that is what you need if you are going to get a pass rush or stop the run. It is going to have to be with a lot of bodies rotating in. Those guys did a great job.”

It wasn’t perfect, of course. Dreilng singled out the lack of a real impactful pass rush as being a genuine problem.

“I wish our pass rush was a little more consistent,” he said. “They had a little too much time back there.”

But overall, for a group that had many question marks entering the season, USU’s defensive front met and perhaps even exceeded expectations.

That could be said for the Utah State defense on the whole, though.

Outside of a few plays in the first half, the Aggies’ defense did what it wants to do, that is force teams to drive the length of the field for their points and capitalize on mistakes that offenses make along the way.

“We want teams to have to drive down the field to earn their points, but you can’t have bad plays and that is what we had (early against Robert Morris),” Dreiling said. “It only takes a couple (plays) in college football to give up points.

“We just have to be locked in more consistently. … We have a chance to play really good football as the season continues, regardless of it is the first, second or third guy up. I think there is a chance for this to be a special year on the defensive side.”

A tense hearing has unfolded in one of former United States President Donald Trump’s four criminal cases, as his defence team questioned the legitimacy of the proceedings.

Thursday’s hearing took place before US District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan in Washington, DC, where Trump faces four felony counts for attempting to overturn the 2020 US presidential election.

Trump himself was not present at the proceedings. But from the outset, defence lawyer John Lauro cast doubt on the validity of the charges and the timing of the case.

“We may be dealing with an illegitimate indictment from the get-go,” Lauro told the court.

He also asserted that a recent Supreme Court decision granting presumptive immunity to a range of presidential actions should result in the case’s outright dismissal.

“We want an orderly process that does justice to the Supreme Court opinion,” he said.

But it was Lauro’s suggestion that the court’s actions were unfair that sparked a sharp exchange with Judge Chutkan.

Lauro called the proceedings “enormously prejudicial” to Trump, who is currently running as the Republican nominee in the 2024 presidential election.

“This process is inherently unfair, particularly during this sensitive time,” Lauro told Chutkan.

The judge quickly shot back, saying her concern was only the four criminal counts in front of her court. “The timing of the election,” she explained, was “not relevant” to her decisions.

“This court is not concerned with the electoral schedule,” she said. “That’s not something I’m going to consider.”

Lauro pushed back throughout the hearing. “We’re talking about the presidency of the United States,” he said at one point.

But Chutkan was quick to tamp down that argument. “I’m not talking about the presidency of the United States. I’m talking about a four-count indictment,” she replied.

She questioned whether Trump’s defence team may be angling to delay the trial until after the election. Lauro, meanwhile, said prosecutors were “rushing to judgement” with their court filings.

Chutkan, however, dismissed any suggestion that the case was progressing too quickly.

“This case has been pending for over a year,” she said. “We’re hardly sprinting to the finish here.”

Thursday’s hearing was one of the first in nearly a year’s time, something Chutkan and Lauro joked about at the start of the day.

“Life was almost meaningless without seeing you,” Lauro in a lighthearted moment with the judge.

“Enjoy it while it lasts,” Chutkan responded.

The Washington, DC, criminal case had been delayed multiple times, as courts weighed the question of Trump’s immunity from prosecution. Trump had claimed “absolute” immunity for any action taken while he was president, from 2017 to 2021.

On July 1, the Supreme Court issued a decision, dismissing any claims to absolute immunity but nevertheless granting broad “presumptive immunity” to any “official” actions the president might take.

The decision itself did not clearly delineate what counts as an “official” or “unofficial” action, but it suggested that interactions with government officials like the vice president would be protected from prosecution.

The ruling was therefore seen as a broadening of presidential power, beyond what is established under the US Constitution.

In August, in response to the Supreme Court’s decision, the prosecution in the Washington, DC, case — led by Special Counsel Jack Smith — issued an updated indictment against Trump that zeroed in on actions it considered “unofficial”.

Those included actions Trump took as a presidential candidate in the 2020 election cycle, and actions taken by his re-election campaign.

The four counts Trump faces remain the same. He is accused of conspiracy to defraud the US, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, attempting to obstruct an official proceeding and conspiracy to prevent the free exercise of rights under the US Constitution.

Those charges stem from his actions after the 2020 election, which he lost to President Joe Biden, a Democrat. Trump repeatedly claimed that the result was “rigged”, and he and his allies are accused of pressuring election officials to change the outcome.

After he encouraged his supporters to continue fighting the results, thousands swarmed the US Capitol building, in an attempt to interrupt the certification of the Electoral College votes on January 6, 2021.

On Thursday, Trump’s defence team formally resubmitted his plea of not guilty to the superseding indictment. Trump has pleaded not guilty in all the criminal cases against him so far.

When Lauro, the defence lawyer, suggested that the recent Supreme Court case would nullify interactions included in the updated indictment, Chutkan was firm.

“No, they did not decide that,” she said. “I have to decide.”