Oregon finished its final practice of the week before it heads south to face No. 7 Stanford in a Pac-12 showdown on Saturday night.
The Ducks (6-3, 4-2 Pac-12) have momentum after defeating California 44-28 last weekend, marking the third-straight win for the team. Despite the uptick in success, they still head into the game predicted to lose by more than a touchdown.
As for the Cardinal (8-1, 7-0), it has been on a roll since a season opening blip against Northwestern. Since that game, Stanford has looked like the premiere team in the conference and has its eyes firmly set on a playoff berth.
Oregon head coach Mark Helfrich discussed whether his team pays attention to who is favored and how they make subbing decisions during games.
How did you feel the final preparations for Stanford went?
Our work this week has been great. Guys have been focused, energized and have worked hard. Now, we are just putting the finishing touches on the physical preparation and the mental preparation leading up to the game.
This season, Oregon has more often been in the role of underdog. Do you hear the players enjoy that mentality?
To be honest the only times that’s ever brought up is in the media. I don’t know if guys are talking about it, I haven’t heard anything about it. If that brings any added energy to our preparation, great.
Is that unusual for a team like Stanford to play so poorly in their first game then turn it on?
It’s certainly an anomaly in their season when you look at their film. It doesn’t match up, and you never know why that is, things happen all around the country every week. Northwestern is a good football team, but they are playing at a much different rate right now.
Do you look at what Northwestern did?
There is no ‘oh my gosh, here is the front or here is the blitz that did it.’ Nothing of that nature, it was just kind of an execution game and Northwestern was playing with a ton of passion. They played better than them that week. It’s really that simple.
Do you let players decide when to come out of games or watch their snap counts?
From an offensive or special teams standpoint, you want the freshest possible guy in there. Sometimes that is when being a highly competitive guy is a detriment because they want to stay in there no matter what. If they are dog tired they think they are just going to gut their way through it and sometimes its best to get the other guy in there. When you are playing defensively against a tempo team you can’t do that, you have to have a predetermined rotation when there is a break.
Last game it seemed you used a lot of different guys at running back in addition to Royce Freeman. How important is it to spread the load and not put everything on him?
He is a guy we just have so much confidence in, he is such a great competitor, he doesn’t want to come out. You have to have a bit of a rotation for a guy like that, certainly in practice. Also, we have a bunch of other good guys who need the ball in their hands. So it’s that balancing act of dancing with what brought you but also getting those other guys involved.
Follow Christopher Keizur on Twitter @chriskeizur