Happy Thanksgiving to all who celebrate. With Thanksgiving comes college football’s annual rivalry weekend. In year 2 of UW’s Big Ten era, the Huskies (8-3, 5-3) host #6 Oregon (10-1, 7-1) at the end of the season instead of the Apple Cup. There’s no love lost between the two programs, and in recent years this match up has had significant post-season implications, further elevating the stakes. This year’s stakes are all on the Oregon side.
The Duck’ #6 ranking likely gives them control over their own destiny with regards the College Football Playoff. However, that assumes that Oregon receives an at-large bid. As we’ve seen in the past, nothing is guaranteed as a contender for an at-large bid. Although it would be a massive controversy if Oregon misses the playoff at 11-1. The only sure-fire way to get into the playoff is as a P4 conference champion.
As a quick refresher, to get an automatic qualifier bid to the CFP, your program must be one of the five highest ranked conference champions (typically the P4 champions and the top G5 champion). Heading into this week’s games, Ohio State and Indiana control the Big Ten championship race as conference with undefeated conference records. Oregon is tied with Michigan for 3rd place in the Big Ten standings with one loss each. For Oregon to get a spot in the Big Ten title game, Oregon not only needs to win this week, but they also need some help. I won’t burden you with all the minutiae, but basically Oregon needs to win AND cheer for a Michigan upset over Ohio State for a shot at the conference title.
For the Huskies, a win over the Ducks not only knocks them out of the Big Ten title hunt, but it could also knock them out of the CFP hunt as well (depending on the circumstances). A 10-2 record isn’t a guarantee of an at-large bid, and it’s conceivable that a loss to an unranked UW team could drop #6 Oregon 4-5 spots, right at the cusp of the playoffs with no opportunity to rise back up without help.
Scenarios to play spoiler to our rivals down south aside, this game may be decided by the matchup between Oregon’s defense vs. UW’s offense. On both sides of the game, the on-field dynamics have changed dramatically since last year. The Ducks have improved statistically on both sides of the ball, but they have been more defense-led this season with the offense playing complementary football to great effect. For the Huskies, similar across-the-board improvements have also been made, but particularly on offense and in the trenches. Let’s take a dive into this match up.
The Scheme & Personnel
Like every year under Lanning, for the Ducks, the strength of their defense starts up front. Their prioritization of defensive line depth and top line talent have built them a formidable front. Last year’s breakout stars Matayo Uiagalelei and Teitum Tuioti continue to hold down the EDGE positions while former Georgia and USC transfer Bear Alexander is now paired up with A’Mauri Washington to anchor the interior. This group is as talented as any in the country, and while they’ve been extremely effective, their pass rushing production has tapered off since last year.
Lanning and DC Tosh Lupoi have historically schemed up nasty pressure packages utilizing both simulated pressure and conventional blitzes to physically dominate opposing offenses. Last year they tied for 9th in the country with 40 total sacks, but this year, through 11 games, they’ve only accumulated 19. Coincidentally that leaves the Ducks tied with UW at 94th in the country in team sacks, and most Husky fans would agree that our pass rush isn’t anything special. Aside from that, Oregon’s defense has been noticeably average in generating turnovers (T-49th with 15).
If their defense isn’t generating pressure or turnovers, then what makes them so effective that they’ve become both a top 10 total and scoring defense? What separates the Oregon defense from most others is their across the board defensive efficiency. On the season, Oregon is T-16th in yards per carry allowed and 5th in passing yards allowed per attempt. When a really solid rushing defense gets paired with a high scoring and efficient offense, opponents are forced into the air to keep up. When your team also has an elite passing defense like Oregon’s, then opponents start to spiral with nowhere else to pivot to.
Two of Oregon’s key players at the second and third level is transfer safety Dillon Thieneman. Those two are not only their top two tacklers, but they are also dynamic playmakers against the pass; Boettcher in particular is a versatile weapon. Boettcher leads the team in tackling by a wide margin and also has a sack, a pick, a handful of PBUs, and a forced fumble on the season. As their most versatile weapon on defense, neutralizing him, or at least isolating him, is likely a major priority in the game plan.
Keys to the Game
In last year’s match up, Oregon circled UW’s offensive line as a weak link that they hammered relentlessly to the tune of 10 sacks. Despite all of the protection deficiencies last season, Demond actually had a pretty comparable game to Oregon’s Dillon Gabriel. Williams was 17/20 for 200+ yards, a TD, and no INTs. Where things went sideways was actually in the run game. Including sacks, we went for 43 yards on 37 carries last year. By comparison, Oregon out rushed us by 179 yards. The Ducks’ defensive front will pose challenges once again, but sticking with the run and finding wrinkles to exploit will allow us to better control the pace of the game. We’ve got to play to win, but keeping the game close, and avoiding the death spiral so many other teams have fallen into against Oregon, is the first step.
Given Oregon’s tendency to throw a lot of pressure and disguised looks at offenses to create confusion, we’ll want to find ways of simplifying the picture Demond and the young line is seeing. Motion and shifts are an easy way to get hints at what the defense is really running. I’m sure Fisch will employ a few spread looks including empty formations. Our offense hasn’t run empty formation plays very well, or at least not very consistently, but starting off in empty and then motioning into other looks could be a way to back Oregon out of their disguised coverages.
Another way we can simplify things while also diversifying our run game is by leaning on our various Zone run concepts. Zone is our core run scheme, so it’ll help the reshuffled line if we lean on schemes we’re familiar with. Zone is also designed to be flexible enough to handle different defensive looks while simultaneously forcing the defense to maintain gap integrity under horizontal stress. As long as we mix in window dressing, like motion, shifts, and unique personnel groupings, or add option/RPO tags to our Zone concepts to keep the defense honest, we should see better returns from the run game.
Finally, we need to manufacture a few big plays to stay in this game. The blueprint is out there on how to contain Demond on the ground if you have good athletes on defense, so we can’t rely on scrambling or option runs to bail us out. A few plays are going to need to come through the air. In recent weeks we’ve done better at setting up the short and intermediate passing game with play action, bootlegs, and spacing concepts. Hitting on a few catch-and-run concepts, as well as winning a few jump balls downfield will be key to setting up scoring opportunities and extending drives.