Oregon Ducks surprise Eugene campers with games, football and fan fun

Dante Moore, Jeremiah McClellan and Gavin Nix walked into the Boys & Girls Club of Emerald Valley in Eugene on Tuesday and turned a regular summer-camp day into a surprise built around football, games and time with kids. The Oregon Ducks players talked with campers, answered questions, shot hoops, tossed a football around and joined classroom activities that let the children draw and interact with them up close.

For campers at the club’s Eugene site inside the Dr. Edwin L. Coleman, Sr. Community Center, the visit landed in the middle of a summer program built around physical activities, gym games, arts and crafts, service projects and field trips. Boys & Girls Clubs of Emerald Valley has served the Eugene and Springfield community since 1999, works with youth ages 6 through 18, and its mission is to inspire and empower young people to reach their full potential as productive, caring, responsible citizens.

One camper, Angus Hunsaker, called the moment unreal and said he usually only sees the Ducks players in Madden 26. He also wanted his friend Liam to know he missed a field-trip-like surprise. Moore said he and his teammates grew up playing Madden and NCAA football games themselves, and now enjoy being the players kids can control on the screen. He said it is “huge” to be able to give back and see children interact with them in real life.

The stop was part of a broader Tuesday run through Eugene youth programs. The Ducks also visited the Bethel Boys & Girls Club earlier that day, where the club operates at the former Shasta Middle School.

He hosted a youth football camp in Eugene on June 20 at Marist Catholic High School, and the event drew hundreds of kids. Oregon’s athletics roster pages list Moore, McClellan and Nix on the 2026 football roster.