An Evening in the Desert: Oregon vs. Arizona Preview
By Editorial Staff
The Ducks travel to Tucson this weekend for a Saturday night kickoff (7:15pm) in the desert against the Arizona Wildcats.
The Wildcats feature Nick Foles one of the best drop back passers in college football. Can Foles alone beat Oregon? Arizona on average only rushes for 55.7 yards a game so far in 2011. The Wildcat’s record reflects their one dimensional offense. Arizona beat Northern Arizona (41-10) in week one, followed by back to back losses against Oklahoma State (37-14) and Stanford (37-10). Foles has kept Arizona in ball games, throwing for 364 yards a game (5th in the nation). Last week Oregon gave up 104 yards passing to Missouri State. Arizona isn’t Missouri State and if Oregon can’t get to Foles I would expect to see Arizona hang around with the Ducks this Saturday night.
So far the desert storm defense is ranked 83rd in the nation giving up 28 points a game. Oregon’s gang green is a little better ranked 51st overall in the NCAA FBS averaging 22.3 points given up a game. The stand-out stats in this match-up are rushing yards and points scored. Arizona has not been able to get the ground game going yet this season, but are they possible better prepared having already faced two national powerhouse programs? Both schools have faced off against at least one heavy weight opponent. Oregon played on the road against LSU, and then faced two less formidable foes in Nevada and Missouri State. The Wildcats got a warm up against Northern Arizona. After a home opening win the Cats traveled to Oklahoma State squaring off with a very high powered Cowboy offense. Arizona got a jump start in league play facing a Pac-12 opponent in week three. Stanford and OSU both scored 37 points against Arizona. The Wildcats came into this 2011 season labeled “young” but with the schedule they have played so far people are going to grow up and grow up fast. Is this the week that Arizona puts it all together?
Will the Ducks get their offense going with the air or ground game? Arizona likes to stack the box and keep four to five guys on the defensive line (four down lineman, one linebacker). Chip Kelly will need to be able to spread the strength of Arizona’s defense across the width of the field in order to give James room to run between the tackles. Luck and the Cardinal offense did a good job of getting the Arizona defensive secondary to freeze on play action passes allowing deep routes to open up over the middle.
Oregon should incorporate a similar scheme. Tuinei and Paulson need to find the end zone this week. Chip Kelly seems to be allowing Darron Thomas to throw the ball more this season. Oregon is using the passing game to help open up the strength of this team’s offense, the ground attack. Oregon needs to have a balanced attack at the end of the night Saturday. The Ducks have plenty of weapons on offense and they should stack up yards against the Wildcat defense. Can Cliff Harris and company step up? The Ducks defense as a whole will be under a microscope this week. Allioti needs to apply pressure to Foles. The Ducks cannot afford to let him get comfortable in the pocket. If Arizona wants to live by the pass, Oregon must make them die by the inability to pass the football for big gains. This will take excellent man coverage by the corners and equally impressive play by the safeties from Oregon.
Saturday night will prove to be an electric atmosphere in Arizona. A night game televised on ESPN will showcase two fueled up teams looking to gain elite status within the Pac 12. (Fans, this will be a very hostile environment for the Ducks remember 2009’s game?). Even with a loss to Stanford, Arizona is still in the hunt for a conference title and Oregon has yet to beat a quality opponent. I expect a game that will feature a dominant Oregon performance but a tight score until the 3rd quarter due to a few big pass plays by Arizona.