The highest-rated player in Oregon’s 2023 recruiting class, Jurrion Dickey was limited this season due to the lingering effects of a torn meniscus he suffered as a senior in high school.

Now healthy, the former five-star recruit should have an opportunity for his most playing time to date for the No. 8 Ducks in the Fiesta Bowl against No. 23 Liberty.

Dickey, who’s played in four games but not recorded a statistic this season, said he couldn’t run anywhere near full speed when he arrived at UO last summer but has felt back to 100% for the last month.

“It was frustrating but you got to go through it sometimes,” Dickey said. “Things hit you and you got to bounce back from it. Now since I did that instead of going down I look back at it and I improved a lot. It was actually a good thing because I learned a lot of things that I wouldn’t actually pay attention to when I wasn’t injured.

“Specifically knowing the game more, figuring out who I am as a person, allowing me to develop that outside of football. … With the injury, my development has been going up. my development has been climbing and climbing each day stacking mentally and physically.”

According to Dickey, he was out of shape and topping out at 12-13 miles per hour running in the summer, but now, “you can’t see me not hit 21.”

“That kid when he first got here to now, he’s a completely different kid,” quarterback Austin Novosad said. “He knows the playbook. He’s out there working, making plays and he’s a freak. He’s going to be a really good player for us in these next couple of years and this game so we’re excited for him.”

With Troy Franklin opting out of the bowl game to prepare for the NFL draft and Ashton Cozart, Josh Delgado and Kris Hutson all transferring, Oregon (11-2) will have five receivers available against Liberty and Dickey and redshirt-freshman Kyler Kasper could each see more playing time as a result.

“It gives me an opportunity to grow, see how I am on the college level on the football field in a game time situation instead of just in practice when we do two-minute drills,” Dickey said. “It helps out, Troy not being there, but he comes into practice here and there so then he also teaches me as well while he’s out.”

Dickey said he’s been practicing with the first and second-team offenses and getting to work more with Bo Nix than he has during the regular season.

It’s similar to the situation Franklin and Dont’e Thornton were in two years ago in the Alamo Bowl, which ended up being a season-best game for each of the then-freshmen wide outs.

“I think the great thing about bowl games and we’ve talked to our team throughout bowl prep, is there’s going to be somebody that shows up in this game that we haven’t really seen yet this season,” Oregon coach Dan Lanning said. “That’s consistent with bowl games throughout the year. Last year we had some guys that showed up big for us in the Holiday Bowl. I know there’s going to be some guys that haven’t shown up that will show up in this Fiesta Bowl. It’ll be fun to see that happen. Beyond that, having the opportunity for more practices to continue to develop and grow as players, that’s something we want to take advantage of.”