Let’s Get Elevated: Utah Game Preview
If the Ducks beat the Utes tomorrow night, they’ll be actual Pac-12 North Champions.
The Ducks are continuing their pursuit of Pac-12 dominance with a trip up, up, up to Salt Lake City for a meeting with the perennially tricky Utah Utes.
I’ll be honest, I forgot that Utah existed. After they lost to BYU and San Diego State to start the year—and after their starting quarterback quit on them—I found it really easy to forget an already forgettable college football program.
Yeah, sure, they’re probably the best program in the Pac-12 South over the last five years or so, but I fancy myself a gigantic fan of the conference and Ootah literally only crosses my mind during either Holy War Week or whenever we play them.
And it’s looking like we’re probably gonna have to play these mystery men twice over the next three weeks (knock on beaver wood) so I might as well start giving them the time of day, yeah?
But all we have to worry about this week, is this week.
We’ve been running the ball and playing defense at a championship level these past few weeks, and it’s looking like the 23rd-ranked Utes fancy themselves as a team that does the exact same things.
It’s a clash of physical titans (or at least one titan) and we know that Mario Cristobal has built his program to shine bright in this moment.
Utah RB Tavion Thomas (#9) is built like a bowling ball, and even though he missed last week’s game against Arizona, he had just ran over 160 yards in two straight games prior to that. Thomas bounces off tackles and gets downhill fast, so if he’s healthy (and he’s expected to be) it’ll be imperative that the Ducks to flock to ball defensively, stay low, and tackle with every ounce of strength in their bodies.
Even if Thomas can’t go for whatever reason, they have Oklahoma transfer, TJ Pledger (#5) and Micah Bernard (#2) that can surely step up and be a formidable rushing duo in their own right.
Ute QB, Cam Rising (#7), is also mobile enough in his own right, and is probably the most physically unique signal caller the Ducks have faced all season.
They call him ThiccBoi7.
Rising is 6-2, 220 pounds, which actually makes him shorter and lighter than our QB1, but when you combine his bulky flack jacket with his wide helmet and wider rear end, you understand why he goes by Thicc.
TB7 also has a proclivity to scramble when he needs to, and he fight for hard yards. He’s nothing close to DTR in that regard, but containment will be just as important as pressure so that we don’t ask DJ James to take down ThiccBoi in space on 3rd & 5.
Just like in the 2019 Pac-12 Title Game, Utah doesn’t have an edge over Oregon on either the offensive or defensive lines, and that’s going to ultimately be the deciding factor in this game.
Kayvon & Co. will make sure that Utah doesn’t have anything close to enough time for explosion plays on offense, and they sure as hell won’t let them get a consistent rhythm in the run game. The Utes will likely be hamstrung with running slip screens and draw plays that have been mildly successful in gaining yards against the Ducks, but not enough to beat ‘em.
And Oregon’s o-line is once again hitting their November stride, helping the Ducks rush for 300+ in their last two games.
I expect more of the same on the ground, even though Utah’s run defense will be either the best or second-best unit that the Ducks have seen all year.
‘Memba when 2019 Utah had tHe bEsT rUsH dEfEnSe iN tHe cOuNtRy?
How’d that work out again?
But I should also note that against other defenses that were strong against the run like UCLA and CU, JoMo and AB found their shots through the air, too, and that invited explosion plays all over the field.
I think Devon Williams and Troy Franklin are ready to eat some more.
We know the Ducks show up for big games, and the games just keep getting bigger starting tomorrow night.
Dominate along both lines.
Trust who you always have been—run the damn ball.
Oh, and also score at least one more point than the other guys.
That’s how it’s done.
34-27, Good Guys.
Go Ducks.
PS - Elevation is also no joke, folks. The team flies out to SLC today, and they’ll get one night to “Sleep High” but I spent a week in Wyoming this past summer and it was a shock to the system that first night when we slept at 8,600’.
I was lightheaded, dehydrated, and the last thing I wanted to do for the first 24 hours was anything that involved physical exertion.
Rice-Eccles is just at 4,600’, but that’s still an insane leap from Eugene’s 430’, so I hope the Orem, Utah native, Noah Sewell, can help prepare his teammates to let their bodies adjust and rest up tonight so that they’re ready to go by 5:30 pm local time.