To its own admission, Oregon didn’t look very good in its first road game at Texas Tech. The Ducks needed to turn it on in the fourth quarter in order to secure the 38-30 victory.
No doubt, head coach Dan Lanning will use that as motivation as his Ducks prepare to go to Stanford and play a rebuilding Cardinal team. Oregon is favored by four touchdowns.
“I thought Jalen Hurts said it perfectly the other day when he was talking about 1A and 1B. 1A: win. 1B: playing to the standard. If you do either one without the other you’re going to feel unfulfilled,” Lanning said after Wednesday’s practice. “And that’s really what it’s about for us is making sure we hit 1A and 1B. We want to play to the standard and we want to win the game. But win the game most importantly. We were able to do that at Tech, but we didn’t feel like we played the standard and that’s what we want to make sure we bring this week.”
The environment will be a unique one. Usually the road team turns up the volume in practice to simulate the expected crowd noise. But at Stanford, the Ducks are expecting a library-type of atmosphere.
“We’re just recognizing this environment’s going to be a little bit different. We need to change the environment a little bit at practice,” Lanning said.
Realistically, there could be more Duck fans in the stands than Stanford faithful. It’ll be a quasi-home game for Oregon. The Cardinal seemingly doesn’t have the talent to stay with the Ducks for 60 minutes, but as we saw in 2021 when Stanford upset a No. 3 Duck squad, anything can happen on the gridiron.
For the first time this year, the Ducks are a little banged up. Running back Noah Whittington is out and will be out for a few weeks due to a leg injury. Both defensive backs, Jahlil Florence and Bryan Addison are questionable, but like good teams, the Ducks have the quality of depth to overcome, especially in the backfield.
“We got plenty of guys back there that can tote the rock and are ready to go. But it’s not just toting the rock. It’s how they’re doing protections,” Lanning said. “It’s what they do from a route standpoint, but we have the guys there that can do a good job. You’re not going to fill Noah Whittington’s shoes. What that guy has done for our team you can’t fulfill that, but we do have good players on our team.”
One of those players who should receive Whittington’s carries is Jordan James. He’ll need to show that he’s much more than a goal line specialist and in the few times James has carried the ball in between the 20s, he has been really good.
Stanford comes into this contest as healthy as possible, but the Cardinal are 1-3, so that might not be a good thing. They’ve lost three straight, including an embarrassing 30-23 loss to Sacramento State two weeks ago.
But they do have tight end Benjamin Yurosek. He was a Second-Team All-Conference performer a year ago and is a preseason First-Team pick in 2023. Opposing defenses know Yurosek is Stanford’s only legitimate weapon and he still leads the team with 15 catches, 227 yards and a touchdown.
Stanford has played two quarterbacks in Ashton Daniels and Justin Lamson, but it was Daniels that took most of the snaps last week in the 21-20 loss to Arizona. Daniels is completing nearly 60 percent of his passes and 133.5 yards per game.
While the offense has been inconsistent, the Cardinal defense has done everything possible to keep the team in the game. The stats have been skewed thanks to that 56-10 loss to No. 5 USC. Other than that Trojan beatdown, the Stanford defense has been good enough to win.
Unfortunately for the Cardinal, they’ll be facing an Oregon defense performing much better than keeping its team in the game. The Duck defense is playing at a level they have wanted and expected to since Lanning arrived in Eugene from Georgia.
Oregon is third in the Pac-12 in total defense and just .2 yards from being No. 1. The pass defense is No. 1 (159 ypg) and the rush defense is fifth at 105 ypg. The Ducks give up just 13 points a game. Lanning has to be pleased with that effort and outcome.
Against the Buffaloes, who came into Autzen averaging 407 yards through the air, Oregon completely shut down Shedeur Sanders. Colorado’s quarterback could just muster up 157 yards and a lot of that came in the fourth quarter and the Duck starters sitting out the rest of the contest.
“I thought our coaches showed really good patience when to take advantage of opportunities and when to take risks. On the same note, we were able to get a lot of things done with just rushing coverage and not feel like we had to throw everything at them (Colorado) to have success,” Lanning said. “We felt like we had an identity of who they were and what they had to do to be successful.”
Oregon should be able to do much of the same down on The Farm.
Prediction: Oregon 54, Stanford 13