Good Luck Ducks, Week 2: In-State Business

Oregon gets another tune-up. 

The Ducks play Portland State this week in an interstate match against an FCS opponent from the Big Sky. PSU was a replacement for a previously scheduled game against Texas A&M, who likely faced a mandate from the SEC to not schedule games against anything more formidable than a clown college. (I sure do loathe the SEC.) Part of me feels like the Ducks play Portland State pretty frequently, yet I can't actually remember writing any of these previews about them.

Oregon was a mixed-bag last week, uniforms aside. (Numbers were, as advertised, huge.) They took awhile to get going, and then blasted through the competition in the second quarter. The second half wasn't nearly as eventful, but it still seemed a step up (anything would be) from last season's comatose second halves.

Hey, speaking of last season... HAHAHAHA Florida State... wow.

Okay, I'm done with that. Moving it along, the Vikings are a Big Sky conference team with a rich history for a smaller (in sports) scale school, but they went winless last year and seem to be pretty dreadful even amongst their own ranks. This should be a walk in the park. Of note, PSU actually has the highest enrollment (community college aside) of any school in the state, but they're largely a commuter school in a major urban environment, so there's not a lot of campus cheer, exactly. I also pass through it every day on my way to work.

At any rate, it's time to take care of some business this week. Hopefully some second and third teamers get a lot of experience.

Links:

• ESPN gives Oregon pretty dismal chances at winning out (i.e. all of their games) and winning the conference, which seems pretty ridiculous considering they're one of the same outlets fueling the Herbert Heisman Hype Train. No one in the Pac-12 has convinced me that they're better than the Ducks, nor have I been convinced that the Ducks are better than anyone else... so basically, I give everything a 50/50 chance?
• I totally missed this, and it seems like a huge deal. The Ducks have incorporated the pistol offense this year, with the hiring of running backs coach Jim Mastro. I have been silently critical of this formation, which seems like it can't decide between a shotgun and an under center formation, but what do I know? Mastro apparently invented the thing, so I guess we should give him some leeway. In any case, it seems like its immediate presence in the Ducks offense was underestimated.
• Know Your Opponent: The Vikings (or the Viks as they unfortunately insist on being called) have 57 freshman on their roster. Yikes! (does not rhyme with Viks, I swear.)
• The Unis!: Greeeeeeeeeeeen. I love this.

Apparently, Oregon hasn't played PSU since 2010. That doesn't seem right, but let's check it out anyway.

Game time is 11:00 AM PDT on the Pac-12 Network. No idea who is going to be calling this one, but guess is it will be the same team (Roxy Bernstein, Anthony Herron and Lewis Johnson) since they seemed like they were content to be posted up in Eugene for an extended period.