Oregon v Stanford - In The Trenches

Today, I'm going to look at the RB's, the Lines, and the LB's because they all factor into the run game, which both Stanford and Oregon feature as well as the pass game.  To begin, we'll look at when Stanford is on offense.

	LT	LG	C	RG	RT	TE
Stanford	Jonathan Martin	Andrew Phillips	Chase Beeler	David DeCastro	Chris Marinelli	Jim Dray
	6-6,291,RFr	6-5,299,Jr	6-3,285,Jr	6-5,310,RFr	6-7,300,Sr	6-5,255,Sr
	DE	DT	DT	DE
Oregon	Will Tukuafu	Brandon Bair	Blake Ferras	Kenny Rowe
	6-4,262,Sr	6-7,268,Jr	6-6,290,Sr	6-3,232,Jr
	SAM	MIKE	WILL
	Eddie Pleasant	Casey Matthews	Spencer Paysinger
	5-11,207,So	6-2,235,Jr	6-3,226,Jr

From a size standpoint, it would appear that Oregon's front four matches up very well with Stanford's front five plus one.  The key match up appears to be Chris Marinelli and Kenny Rowe.  While Marinelli out sizes Rowe, there is a vast speed difference that may give the advantage to Rowe.  However, as a fifth year senior, there is an experience depth there that Rowe will have difficulties with.  Additionally, Marinelli is on everyone's preseason list.

When you take into consideration that Oregon's LB's like to fall back into pass protection, holes will open up for the run game, but with Luck only completing 58 percent of his passes, the run game may have to be a big part of the offense if Stanford is going to be successful.  Luck only has three picks on the season, but then he hasn't faced a pass efficiency defense even remotely as good as Oregon's who is ranked 4th in the country.

Interestingly, Oregon's total D is ranked 20th in the country and Stanford's O is also ranked 20th in the country.

This match up should prove to be very entertaining and I can not give an advantage here for the run game, however, I think Oregon has a slight advantage in the passing game if only because the Ducks have 11 picks and 24 sacks on the season.

Now let's look at when Oregon has the ball.

	LT	LG	C	RG	RT	TE
Oregon	Bo Thran	Carson York	Jordan Holmes	Mark Asper	CE Kaiser	Ed Dickson
	6-5,293,Jr	6-5,285,RFr	6-5,285,Jr	6-7,323,So	6-4,290,Jr	6-5,243,Sr
	DE	DT	NT	DE
Stanford	Thomas Keiser	Sione Fua	Ekom Udofia	Chase Thomas
	6-5,257,So	6-2,305,Jr	6-2,315,Sr	6-4,243,RFr
	SAM	MIKE	WILL
	Will Powers	Clinton Snyder	Shayne Skov
	6-4,240,Sr	6-4,240,Sr	6-3,237,Fr

The key match up here will be Thomas Keiser (who is tied with Kenny Rowe with 7 sacks) and where he chooses to line up at.  On the other hand, Masoli is such a mobile QB that not once did USC even really threaten to sack him.  Stanford only has three picks on the year and that could mean that Masoli will have his way with the Stanford LB's.  Part of the reason Masoli doesn't have as many yards as other QB's is because the vast majority of his passes are short to mid-range.  Masoli is very good at picking apart opponents defense in order to nickle and dime them to death.

While Stanford's size matches up very well with Oregon's front five plus one, usually when you go with the jumbos, you lose the speed.  In the Ducks offense, speed kills.

So what does all this nimble pimble mean Verne?

When Stanford has the offense, I would expect that Gerhart will be at the very least 50 percent of the entire offense, otherwise, I would suspect that Luck get's picked at least twice.  Stanford only has 1837 yards passing to their opponents 1919, whereas Oregon only has allowed 1435 for the year.  However, Stanford has a great advantage on their opponents in that they've rushed for 1645 yards and their opponents for only 1011.  Oregon on the other hand has rushed for 1866 yards and their opponents only for 972.

The run game may be the deciding factor in this game and with Masoli being the type of QB that he is, Stanford may be in for a long day of it.

The variable I have not discussed is special teams and I will leave that for tomorrow.

Today, I am picking Oregon 52 Stanford 21.  While in light of the above this may seem out of whack, I am thinking that the Stanford D will not be able to hang with the Oregon O.