Yeah Oregon got shafted there. You can't say the catcher wasn't blocking the plate. His foot was on the basepath.
I think the call ultimately came down to them deciding the Oregon runner had time to avoid contact because the catcher doesn't move into his path, he's just set up in the path? The Oregon runner absolutely could've dove to his right for the bag instead of crashing into the catcher. That's why they called it malicious contact because he went for contact first, base second.
Yes if this happened in Knoxville there'd be riots and Tony V would've jumped on the umps back like a rabid monkey and would've had to have been peeled off after receiving a tranquilizer.