New president-elect who is actually a reasonable human being. Ducks looking good in their first game. Not a bad birthday.
So, is the Ducks' offense pretty good - or is Stanford just struggling? It's hard to tell this season what is real.
I expected the Duck defense to be ahead of the offense in the first couple of games. But the defense had the bigger issues tonight. The D front-7 got pushed around on too many plays but the LB's showed quickness....unfortunately, they were quick filling the wrong gaps. At least 7 times I saw a LB fill a lane that was already occupied by a DLineman, and Stanford runners exploited that. The Ducks also failed to put much pressure on the Stanford QB's. Except for a couple of hail-mary type passes by Stanford, I thought Oregon's secondary played pretty well though after having lost 3 starters from last season the offense looked decent, especially considering it was the first game in 10 months and Oregon only had one scrimmage. Shough was a little shaky in the first Q, and he threw a horrible interception, but he settled down nicely and had a decent game. Needs to make better reads and decisions but for his 1st start, he did well. The running game was good, and DJ Johnson was a big surprise at TE. Oregon has some good wide receivers as well. Joe Moorhead is a definite upgrade over Marcus Arroyo at offensive coordinator all that said, I question if Oregon is the 12th best team in the country
They started out in the 3-4. with Tayvon playing the edge rusher. That basically matched two big Dlinemen to go against 5 big O-linemen plus a TE. When they switched to their 4-3 it was not an issue. The two starting corners are good. But the depth could be an issue if either goes down.
The the 3-4 I think was indicative that they thought Stanford was coming out throwing the ball, you are correct once they went 4-3 with some adjustments they settled down.
