Duck tracks: stats, facts and quack you can’t live without

It’s Stanford week, the red circle of the season for Oregon fans, another Super Bowl for the Oregon coaches and players. It’s no time to waste repetitions or possessions.

Eschewing the franchise player tag

LeGarrette Blount, Jeremiah Masoli, Cliff Harris: Oregon is 30-5 under Chip Kelly, but in each of his three years in Eugene, the team has lost a “franchise player” to a disciplinary issue with an underclassman responding beautifully to the challenge of replacing him. Kelly’s no excuses demeanor has set a winning tone in each case. In 2009 they lost Blount for most of the season and Walter Thurmond to injury, responding by winning a conference title and earning a trip to the Rose Bowl. This year, despite Harris’ multiple suspensions, the secondary has steadily improved.

Averting a rushin’ revolution

Nick Aliotti’s defense has allowed just one 100-yard rushing performance this season, 119 yards by Isi Sofele in Oregon’s 43-15 victory over Cal in Game Five. Four other rushers reached the 90-yard mark, and two of those, LSU’s Spencer Ware and Mike Ball of Nevada hit 99. Last week they held Chris Polk, Root Sport’s announcer Joel Klatt’s pick as the best back in the PAC-12, to 24 carries for 80 yards, a paltry 3.3-yard average. Getting strong, aggressive play by the defensive is key going forward, as Stanford averages 225 yards a game on the ground, 17th in the country. Their leading rusher Stepfan Taylor, an 1100-yard man last year, has slashed for 891 yards this season on 6.1 yards a carry behind his behemoth offensive line.

A healthier Ricky Heimuli (6-4, 321) and Wade Keliikipi (6-3, 300) are huge additions for the Stanford game. Sophomore Wade K had a breakout performance against the Dogs with 1.5 sacks and 3 total tackles, while Heimuli had a tackle and an assist. These two are the Ess EEE SEE size and strength in the Oregon rotation, and as Chip Kelly pointed out in his weekly press conference, they are bigger than the two stalwarts of The Cardinal offensive front, guard David DeCastro and tackle Jonathan Martin. The defensive line had five of Oregon’s six sacks against the Huskies, their the best performance of the season.

Avoiding a ratings disaster in sweeps week

Darron Thomas’ passer ratings, week by week, from espn.com:

Since coming back from his knee injury he’s had two flat, inadequate performances against poor defenses, and now he faces two of the conference’s best in the next two weeks. Bryan Bennett came off the bench to spark victories against ASU and Washington State, and started against Colorado. Thomas was erratic and inconsistent against the Huskies, buoyed by a strong performance by his defense (3 turnovers, and holding UW to a field goal after his unforced fumble) and a great kickoff return by De’Anthony Thomas, all of which provided the Ducks short fields to work with on a night he never found his rhythm.

As we said last week, there isn’t a quarterback controversy, but the Ducks need two of his best games against The Cardinal and Trojans. It’s time for the light to come on for the junior quarterback, and it would help if his receivers gave him a little more help.