Luck of the Ducks

[LizardState]

It's all about scheduling these days. Oregon took care of giantkiller UCLA Thursday night by hanging 60 on them.

Oregon's remaining schedule:

10/30: @ USC
11/6: Washington
11/13: @ Cal
11/20: Idle
11/26 (Fri): Arizona
12/4: @ Oregon St.

I can't see them losing any of those. Breaking it down:

@ USC: In the LA Mausoleum, a horrible facility but SC always has the home field advantage there with a solid winning rcd at home. This could the best chance for an upset b/c of lots of reasons -- true soph Barkley has come of age, I watched USC vs. Stanford & they gave the Cardinal all they wanted, & Barkley was throwing pinpoint passes all night. USC is underrated b/c so many players transferred but still has a talent core that can score & hurt you. And USC has attitude these days, they are playing angry & it's understandable. Nobody should take the Trojans lightly. Oregon has an undersized DL, & their pass defense isn't great either, but they have a lot of FFs -- remember that they call SC Tailback U. for a reason, they could run over Oregon but have to maintain ball security, the Ducks are at the top of the NCAA in +/- turnover ratio. And the Ducks had 10 days to prepare for them.

U-Dub: Not a good enough supporting cast surrounding Locker, & he's been disappointing this season compared to last yr. In Autzen the Ducks should roll.

@ Cal: Cal has minimal offensive weapons beyond Vereen with any experience, & their OL is garbage, struggling all yr in pass protection. Tedford named Riley their starting QB until further notice b/c he's under fire & on a hotseat, & Riley is to say the least underwhelming. Their best LB, Mike Mohammed has been hurt off & on all yr, & they're vulnerable to high-powered offenses who score quickly, look how badly Nevada shredded them. I say Quackers by 3-4 scores in Strawberry Canyon.

Arizona: Foles has throwing arm problems, status TBD. And the game is in Autzen; Oregon by 21 or more.

@ Oregon St.: The Beavers have a shot with the Rodgers brothers but their defense has been suspect this yr. I think the Quack Attack rolls in Corvallis here.

If they finish unbeaten & so does Boise St. there will be enormous media pressure for the NC matchup of these 2 teams as they love the upstart underdog Broncos who grab headlines. Boise St. has to watch out for the high-scoring Nevada Wolfpack when they go to Reno on 11/26 but I think the Broncos will prevail there in a high-scoring shootout.

Oregon vs. Boise St. for the NC? Look at their remaining schedules & it looks like the most likely scenario even if the 1-loss heavyweights are excluded. I can't see the FBS leaving an undefeated Boise St. all dressed up & no place to go.

Edit: This is assuming that Oklahoma, Michigan St (down 10 to Northwestern as I write), Oklahoma St., Auburn & LSU (playing today) all lose.

[Babylon]

You know how they love those teams from the SEC and Big-12, if Oklahoma runs the table i'm pretty sure they'll get in. Personally i'd rather see Boise St bccause i think they'd have a realistic chance to beat the Zeros.

[umphrey]

You know you're in good shape when people are looking for a giant killer out of USC, Washington and Oregon St. It really looks like they are going undefeated. USC is not scary at all this year. Washington is terrible and I don't see how Locker could possibly go 4/20 against Nebraska yet show up and carry his team to a win against Oregon (maybe if he starts playing linebacker?). Oregon State? Maybe, in the season closer, if Oregon starts crowning itself a week early, but I don't see it.

[duckseason]

Since when is it considered "luck" to be the dominant team in your conference? All you heard during SC's decade of dominance was how talented and well-coached they were. It was a given that they would be a top 3 team each year and nobody attributed luck to that.

Big-10 has been a cakewalk for years for tOSU but never heard anybody say how lucky they were. Only heard how talented they were and how they play great defense.

You looking at our remaining schedule and seeing nothing but victories has a lot more to do with your perception of how good we are than it does with how "bad" the rest of the Pac-10 is. All of a sudden a trip to the coliseum is an auto-win for us. Hilarious. Barkley to Woods might be the best connection in the country right now yet it's an auto win. In their house, with a team full of players that we offered and wanted badly. We're just lucky to have that game at SC on our schedule because that's the reason we may go undefeated this year. Would be so much more difficult to beat a Michigan State or Oklahoma St or LSU (speaking of luck), right? We'd be favored over all those teams for reasons similar to those you listed for the Pac-10 teams. Every conference is riddled with teams who don't seem to have what it takes to beat a dominant team like the Ducks. How is that lucky for us?

Oregon looks like the best team in the country right now. If we manage to finish the season undefeated, it certainly had nothing to do with luck. And even if it did, well consider us even with what happened in '01 and '07. Has there been a more unlucky team when it comes to getting to the NCG?

Also I find it funny that we have an advantage in having 10 (actually eight) 8) 8) days to prepare for SC when they have 13 days to prepare themselves. Though with our far superior coaching staff I could see why it'd be considered advantage: Ducks... but hey that's just luck amirite?

Also find it funny that you're not even aware of James Rodgers' devastating injury which has him out for the year. (lucky for us!!!)

[LizardState]

How is that lucky for us?

My point was that Oregon has only one tough road game, USC, & the other tough opponents at home, again scheduling is everything. If you read my post you see that SC is anything but an easy win for Oregon. But win they will, mark my words.

Jeez, I was trying to paint a picture where Oregon waltzes into the NC game & this is the thanx I get