Oregon v Ohio State - A Tale of Two Stories - Part 9: Attempts

Today, I'm going to take yet another look at the stats, only this time, instead of looking at just the yards, I'm going to look at the per attempts.

Passing:
Note: Masoli is ranked 68th and Pryor 97th in passing. 
tOSU averages only 9.90 yards per pass completion defense and Oregon averages 12.04 per completion.  The Ducks average 10.53 yards pass defense and the Bucks average 13.19 per completion.  The difference is the Ducks get 2.14 more yards per catch against the Bucks and the Bucks get 2.63 more yards against the Ducks.  However, having said all of the above, Masoli has accounted for a total of 27 TD's to Pryor's 23. 

Advantage Ducks

Rushing:
tOSU averages 2.66 yards in run defense and Oregon averages 5.51 per run offense.  On the other side the Ducks give up 3.41 yards per run and the Bucks get 4.66 yards per run.  Roughly that is a 3 yard difference when the Ducks have the ball and only about 1 when the Bucks have the ball.

For rushers who have rushed at least 100 times this season, tOSU has three, Saine, Pryor and Herron who have rushed 412 times for 1959 yards and an average of 4.76 per carry.  Oregon on the other hand has two, James and Masoli who have rushed 330 times for 2135 yards and an average of 6.3 per carry. James by himself has more yards, fewer carries and a better average than tOSU's top two rushers (Saine & Pryor).

Advantage Ducks

Totals:
tOSU gives up an average of 4.07 yards per play and Oregon averages 6.13 per offensive play.  Meanwhile the Ducks give up 4.58 while on defense and the Bucks average 5.54 per play.  Again that is 2 yards more that the Ducks average while on offense verses only 1 for the Bucks.

Advantage Ducks

Passing Efficiency:
tOSU averages a passing efficiency defense of 97 rating and a completion percent of 54.66 and Oregon averages 131.71 passing efficiency and a completion ration of 59.12.  On the other side, the Ducks average a passing efficiency defense of 110.60 and a 55.26 completion rate while the Bucks average 127.45 and a completion percentage of 54.32 while on offense.

Advantage Bucks

Special Teams:
On kickoff's Oregon averages over 24 yards per return compared to tOSU's over 23 yards.  On punting Oregon averages 39.64 yards per punt and returns 11.41 yards per punt.  tOSU averages 37.97 yards per punt and only 8.39 per punt return.

Advantage Ducks

Turnovers:
tOSU averages 1.33 turnovers per game and Oregon only averages .25 per game.  However, the Bucks are +3 on fumbles and the Ducks are -3 on Fumbles.  The Ducks averaged a little over one Int per game and the Bucks averaged a little over 2.

Advantage Bucks

This and That:
tOSU averages 2.42 sacks per game while Oregon averages giving up only 1.00 sacks per game.  On the other side, the Ducks average 2.67 sacks per game and the Bucks give up 1.67 sacks per game. 

tOSU averages 6.17 tackles for a loss (TFL's) per game and Oregon averages 6.00 per game.


Advantage Ducks


This takes care of all the official NCAA stats that they keep or at least publish.

So...the bottom line here is that by all accounts it should be the Ducks that wins the Rose Bowl and I am still going to go with what their scoring averages indicate;

Ducks 38
Bucks 29

Oregon v Ohio State - A Tale of Two Stories - Part 8 - Scoring

Okay, today we'll look at how each team scored against their opponents and how well they defended scores by their opponents.

Scoring O				They
Rank	Name	Points	Avg	Scored	Delta
1	Boise St.	574	44.15	19	-25.15
7	Oregon	452	37.67
10	Stanford	434	36.17	51	14.83
22	Oregon St.	389	32.42	33	0.58
41	Arizona	356	29.67	21	-8.67
47	California	351	29.25	3	-26.25
47	Ohio St.	351	29.25
47	Utah	351	29.25	24	-5.25
55	Purdue	334	27.83	36	8.17
64	Southern California	320	26.67	20	-6.67
70	Washington	313	26.08	19	-7.08
91	Arizona St.	268	22.33	41	18.67
99	UCLA	256	21.33	10	-11.33
119	Washington St.	144	12	6	-6
	Averages	340.83	28.1	23.58	-4.51
Scoring D				UO
Rank	Name	Points	Avg	Scored	Delta
5	Ohio St.	146	12.17
16	Boise St.	230	17.69	8	-9.69
19	Utah	236	19.67	31	11.33
22	Southern California	245	20.42	47	26.58
29	Arizona St.	253	21.08	44	22.92
32	UCLA	255	21.25	24	2.75
46	Arizona	278	23.17	44	20.83
51	Oregon St.	281	23.42	37	13.58
52	Oregon	283	23.58
54	California	294	24.5	42	17.5
65	Stanford	314	26.17	42	15.83
71	Washington	320	26.67	43	16.33
90	Purdue	349	29.08	38	8.92
118	Washington St.	462	38.5	52	13.5
	Averages	293.08	24.3	37.67	13.37
Scoring O				They
Rank	Name	Points	Avg	Scored	Delta
7	Oregon	452	37.67
21	Wisconsin	393	32.75	13	-19.75
41	Penn St.	356	29.67	7	-22.67
41	Toledo	356	29.67	0	-29.67
45	Michigan	354	29.5	10	-19.5
47	Ohio St.	351	29.25		-29.25
55	Purdue	334	27.83	26	-1.83
60	Navy	357	27.46	27	-0.46
64	Southern California	320	26.67	18	-8.67
82	Illinois	290	24.17	0	-24.17
84	Indiana	282	23.5	14	-9.5
86	Iowa	277	23.08	24	0.92
98	Minnesota	259	21.58	7	-14.58
120	New Mexico St.	149	11.46	0	-11.46
	Averages	310.58	25.61	12.17	-13.45
Scoring D				tOSU
Rank	Name	Points	Avg	Scored	Delta
4	Penn St.	142	11.83	24	12.17
5	Ohio St.	146	12.17
10	Iowa	186	15.5	27	11.5
20	Navy	259	19.92	31	11.08
22	Southern California	245	20.42	15	-5.42
41	Wisconsin	269	22.42	31	8.58
52	Oregon	283	23.58
56	Minnesota	295	24.58	38	13.42
79	Michigan	330	27.5	21	-6.5
90	Purdue	349	29.08	18	-11.08
93	Indiana	354	29.5	33	3.5
95	Illinois	362	30.17	30	-0.17
101	New Mexico St.	411	31.62	45	13.38
116	Toledo	452	37.67	38	0.33
	Averages	304.5	25.02	29.25	4.23

In case the above is confusing, here is the skinny. 

Oregon held their opponents to an average of -4.5 points below their average per game and yet scored an average of almost 2 TD's more than their opponents allowed.  tOSU scored an average of 4 points more than their opponents allowed and held their opponents to about 2 TD's below their average scoring.

Not unlike what a lot of pundits are saying, these two teams are complete opposites.

There isn't much more to tell about this, except to say in my subjective opinion, I am thinking that the B10's lack of offense makes the defensive unit for tOSU look good and since the P10 had respectable defenses, it makes the Oregon offense look that much better.

If we look at what each team does, Oregon's -4.51+4.23 comes out to a negligible difference on tOSU's average score of 29 points.  On the other hand, tOSU's defensive units -13.45+13.37 for Oregon leave the Ducks at their 38 points.

So a final score of Ducks 38, Bucks 29 does not seem all that far out there.

Oregon v Ohio State - A Tale of Two Stories - Part 7 - Schedules

Today, lets breakdown the schedules for both teams, it may prove enlightening.

Ohio State
09/05/09	NAVY	31 - 27	W
09/12/09	USC	15 - 18	L
09/19/09	@ Toledo ^	38 - 0	W
09/26/09	ILLINOIS	30 - 0	W
10/03/09	@ Indiana *	33 - 14	W
10/10/09	WISCONSIN	31 - 13	W
10/17/09	@ Purdue	18 - 26	L
10/24/09	MINNESOTA	38 - 7	W
10/31/09	NEW MEXICO ST.	45 - 0	W
11/07/09	@ Penn St.	24 - 7	W
11/14/09	IOWA	27 - 24	W OT
11/21/09	@ Michigan	21 - 10	W
Oregon
09/03/09	@ Boise St. *	8-19	L
09/12/09	PURDUE *	38 - 36	W
09/19/09	UTAH	31 - 24	W
09/26/09	CALIFORNIA	42 - 3	W
10/03/09	WASHINGTON ST.	52 - 6	W
10/10/09	@ UCLA	24 - 10	W
10/24/09	@ Washington	43 - 19	W
10/31/09	USC	47 - 20	W
11/07/09	@ Stanford	42 - 51	L
11/14/09	ARIZONA ST.	44 - 21	W
11/21/09	@ Arizona	44 - 41	W 2OT
12/03/09	OREGON ST. *	37 - 33	W

Now that we see what each team did, lets look at how each opponent ended up (Note, I would have preferred to use the rankings as each team faced them, but apparently tOSU fans have a problem with that, so I'll use the end of season results):

				Overall	Overall
Oregon				O Ranking	D Ranking
09/03/09	@ No. 14 Boise State	0-1 (0-0)	L 19-8	8	13
09/12/09	Purdue	1-1 (0-0)	W 38-36	53	68
09/19/09	No. 18 Utah	2-1 (0-0)	W 31-24	54	20
09/26/09	No. 6 California	3-1 (1-0)	W 42-3	46	70
10/03/09	Washington State	4-1 (2-0)	W 52-6	119	120
10/10/09	@ UCLA	5-1 (3-0)	W 24-10	88	39
10/24/09	@ Washington	6-1 (4-0)	W 43-19	63	79
10/31/09	No. 5 USC	7-1 (5-0)	W 47-20	58	43
11/07/09	@ Stanford	7-2 (5-1)	L 51-42	13	85
11/14/09	Arizona State	8-2 (6-1)	W 44-21	91	12
11/21/09	@ Arizona	9-2 (7-1)	W 44-41 OT	40	21
12/03/09	No. 16 Oregon State	10-2 (8-1)	W 37-33	28	50
				55.08	51.67
Ohio State
09/05/09	Navy	1-0 (0-0)	W 31-27	84	36
09/12/09	No. 3 USC	1-1 (0-0)	L 18-15	58	43
09/19/09	@ Toledo	2-1 (0-0)	W 38-0	16	96
09/26/09	Illinois	3-1 (1-0)	W 30-0	50	91
10/03/09	@ Indiana	4-1 (2-0)	W 33-14	70	89
10/10/09	Wisconsin	5-1 (3-0)	W 31-13	34	18
10/17/09	@ Purdue	5-2 (3-1)	L 26-18	53	68
10/24/09	Minnesota	6-2 (4-1)	W 38-7	113	61
10/31/09	New Mexico State	7-2 (4-1)	W 45-0	120	104
11/07/09	@ No. 11 Penn State	8-2 (5-1)	W 24-7	36	8
11/14/09	No. 10 Iowa	9-2 (6-1)	W 27-24 OT	93	11
11/21/09	@ Michigan	10-2 (7-1)	W 21-10	59	81
				65.5	58.83

As one can see by the averages at the end of each of the last two columns, what the Ducks faced in terms of both offense and defense seem to be better than tOSU.  This is somewhat glaring in that the Ducks O faced teams, on average, ten spots better than tOSU.  On the other side of the ball, the Duck D faced teams, on average, 7 spots better than tOSU.

The inverse of the above is that part of the reason tOSU's D looks so good statistically is because they didn't face offensive juggernauts. Granted the Ducks faced Washington State, but tOSU faced two offenses in the 100's (Minnesota and NM State).

Maybe more telling, tOSU faced passing offenses that ranked an average of 68 and rushing offenses that ranked 54, whereas Oregon faced passing offenses that averaged 51 and 60 respectively.  One could argue that tOSU's D numbers should be higher and that would be true if their D was as good as advertised in the number 5 slot.  However, because the Ducks faced superior offenses, their D ranking of 32 is quite respectable.

Even more telling, tOSU faced rushing defenses that averaged 62 while Oregon faced rushing D's that averaged 52.  tOSU should have higher rushing offensive numbers, but alas they do not, still being ranked 19th isn't too bad.  On the other hand the difference between facing an average of 52 rushing D and having a rushing O of 6 is way more impressive.  For you number crunchers, the difference is tOSU 46 and Oregon 43 spots and the difference between the two rushing offenses is Oregon +37 yards per game.

What does all this mean?

Pretty much, what I've been saying since the first blog, tOSU's defense looks good because they simply didn't face the offensive units that should have challenged their defense.  Had the Bucks faced offenses like Oregon did, and I dare say their numbers would much higher - just like Oregon's are.  On the other hand, had the Ducks faced offenses like tOSU did, their numbers would be lower.

On the other side of the ball, Oregon faced stouter defenses on the whole than what tOSU did.  Again this is telling in that had tOSU faced the type of defenses that Oregon did, their offensive numbers would be lower.  The complete opposite would be true for the Ducks, for had they faced the lesser defenses that tOSU did, the Duck offensive numbers would be higher.

All in all, tOSU fans argue that the Ducks have never faced a defense like tOSU's.  However, the numbers just don't agree and in fact the numbers indicate that the Oregon D should be enough to contain some of the tOSU offense.  The other side wouldn't be true in that the numbers indicate that the Buck D won't be able to contain the Duck O.


Time to start looking at predictions and at this point I'm going to say that both teams would be equal in the passing game, but in the rushing game it looks like maybe the Ducks will prevail.

Ducks:  43
Bucks:  28

Oregon v Ohio State - A Tale of Two Stories - Part 6 - LB's

Today, I am going to look just at the LB's and here they are, both starters and reserves (I added the reserves because they tend to make an impact):

	SAM	MIKE	WILL
Oregon	Eddie Pleasant	Casey Matthews	Spencer Paysinger
	5-11,207,So	6-2,235,Jr	6-3,226,Jr
Reserves	Bryson Littlejohn	Kiko Alonso	Michael Clay
	6-1,227,Jr	6-4,225,RFr	5-11,209,Fr
	SAM	MIKE	WILL
Ohio State	Austin Spitler	Brian Rolle	Ross Homan
	6-3,234,Sr	5-11,221,Jr	6-0,229,Jr
Reserves	Etienne Sabino	Storm Klein	Tony Jackson
	6-3,232,So	5-11,227,So	6-3,225,Fr

And now let's look at what they contributed:

Ducks	Pleasant	Matthews	Paysinger	LittleJohn	Alonso	Clay	Totals
Tackles	50	72	72	9	15	30	248
TFLs	7	4	6.5	0	1	1	19.5
Sacks	4.5	2.5	1	0	0	1	9
Ints	1	1	0	0	0	0	2
BrUp	4	4	6.5	0	0	2	16.5
FF or FR	3	0	2	0	1	0	6
Block Kick	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Bucks	Spitler	Rolle	Homan	Sabino	Klein	Jackson	Totals
Tackles	38	91	96	6	10	1	242
TFLs	5	7	5	0.5	0	0	17.5
Sacks	1	0	2	0.5	0	0	3.5
Ints	1	1	4	0	0	0	6
BrUp	0	0	5	0	0	0	5
FF or FR	0	1	3	0	0	0	4
Block Kick	0	0	0	0	0	0	0

From a size standpoint, but squads match up quite equally.  Both squads have one 5-11 player and the other two being over 6 foot.  I am not sure I can give an advantage to either squad based on size alone.

Now for how they performed and the very first thing that pops out to me is that the starters for tOSU seem probably play the entire game and the Ducks do more rotation.  Howe did I come about this you ask?  Well if you look just at the starting three for each squad, you'll notice that the Ducks had 194 tackles compared to the Bucks 225.  Also notice that the reserves for the Bucks only accounted for 17 tackles compared to the Ducks reserves accounting for 54 tackles.

So what does this mean?  I would garner the argument that in the 4th quarter, the Duck LB's are going to be a little fresher on the legs, just a little.

As to the other stats, I was surprised that the only category that the Bucks lead is in the number of Ints they've snatched.  However, having said that, the differences are not that much except for the number of sacks and breakups.

Again, what does this mean?

I am going to go out on a limb here and suggest that the Duck LB's are more mobile than the Buck LB's and I make that suggestion based on a couple of things here.  First is the sacks and TFL's, which means that the Duck LB's can and do get into the backfield.  Not that the Bucks don't either, it's just that with the higher quality and more mobile of QB's in the P10, the Ducks had more success at getting to their objective.  Second, the number of break ups is far and away more dominate with the Ducks, which would also indicate that on one play they are in the backfield and in the next (because it's now 3rd and long) play, they are defending the pass.

This is not saying that tOSU LB's aren't dominate, just that they faced offenses that may have not been as good as what the Ducks faced.  Case in point, tOSU didn't face an offense in the B10 ranked better than 34th in the nation with only two teams in the top 50.  The Ducks faced in the P10 a top 25 team, 2 top 30 teams and 4 top 50 teams.  I will get into the schedules on another day.

Suffice it to say, that these two squads match up very very well, however based on the numbers and the utilization of reserves, I would have to give the nod to the Ducks - but just barely.