Personally, I think that Stanford's toughest regular season remaining game could be Saturday evening against Oregon. Offensively I believe we will move the ball against their defense and score at least 31 points but how will we get enough stops against the Ducks that yielded 777 yards against Cal to win?
!. Stop the run first, especially Royce Freeman, who reeled off 180 ground yards against Cal on 28 carries .Playing our inside LBs deeper as we do against Oregon will help them avoid being cut-off by pulling offside linemen. Lance Anderson figured that tactic out two years ago in Eugene and helped tremendously in our 17-14 upset. DEs and OLBs must hold their ground before pursuing offside runner to stop frequent miss-direction plays. Cal got burned on these. Tackle Freeman low and wrap -- he is a horse at 230 pounds. (Nothing knew about this strategy- just execution with most defenders not playing against. Oregon before.).
2. Our secondary will have to play mostly zone to better support run defense.Though Vernon Adams is no Mariota he is a good athlete and most dangerous when he escapes the pocket and creates, throwing on the run. We should try to keep him inside a collapsing pocket. At 5'11" he has vision problems inside. His arm is not especially strong and is best floating the ball over LBs to open receivers Adams is also a dangerous runner when he gets outside the pocket. Running to the side that we had press coverage could yield a big gain.
Darren Carrington's return after a six game suspension has made a big difference and his presence on the field in each formation must be quickly monitored. I would have a free safety key to his side and have loose man under coverage on him. Carrington was dominant against Florida State in last year's semi=final at those Bowl. He reminds me of Montgomery.
3. We need to make our stops early in the Ducks' possession. If not 3 and out, six and out. Once they get rolling in their no huddle, with limited line substitutions they will be most difficult to stop.
4, And, of course, 15 play Stanford possessions culminating in a TD will really help. We need to at least double Oregon's time of possession - I would like to see it a t 42-18 minutes.
Incidentally, I believe the oddsmakers have created an overlay at 8 1/2 to 9 1/2 points. I think we will win but it will be close. Oregon is back where most thought they would be at the begnning of the season.
!. Stop the run first, especially Royce Freeman, who reeled off 180 ground yards against Cal on 28 carries .Playing our inside LBs deeper as we do against Oregon will help them avoid being cut-off by pulling offside linemen. Lance Anderson figured that tactic out two years ago in Eugene and helped tremendously in our 17-14 upset. DEs and OLBs must hold their ground before pursuing offside runner to stop frequent miss-direction plays. Cal got burned on these. Tackle Freeman low and wrap -- he is a horse at 230 pounds. (Nothing knew about this strategy- just execution with most defenders not playing against. Oregon before.).
2. Our secondary will have to play mostly zone to better support run defense.Though Vernon Adams is no Mariota he is a good athlete and most dangerous when he escapes the pocket and creates, throwing on the run. We should try to keep him inside a collapsing pocket. At 5'11" he has vision problems inside. His arm is not especially strong and is best floating the ball over LBs to open receivers Adams is also a dangerous runner when he gets outside the pocket. Running to the side that we had press coverage could yield a big gain.
Darren Carrington's return after a six game suspension has made a big difference and his presence on the field in each formation must be quickly monitored. I would have a free safety key to his side and have loose man under coverage on him. Carrington was dominant against Florida State in last year's semi=final at those Bowl. He reminds me of Montgomery.
3. We need to make our stops early in the Ducks' possession. If not 3 and out, six and out. Once they get rolling in their no huddle, with limited line substitutions they will be most difficult to stop.
4, And, of course, 15 play Stanford possessions culminating in a TD will really help. We need to at least double Oregon's time of possession - I would like to see it a t 42-18 minutes.
Incidentally, I believe the oddsmakers have created an overlay at 8 1/2 to 9 1/2 points. I think we will win but it will be close. Oregon is back where most thought they would be at the begnning of the season.
