Justin Herbert is still acclimating to Pac-12 football, but Saturday will bring a unique challenge.
In playing ASU, the Ducks will have to defend and provide enough coverage for one of the conference’s most frequent blitzing units. ESPN’s Chantel Jennings wrote about the Sun Devils’ attack on Tuesday and the Ducks talked about it after practice.
“They bring it often,” offensive lineman Cameron Hunt said of ASU’s blitz. “Just have a big chance of negative plays, tackles for loss, sacks. But also they give up a lot of big plays.”
Hunt said defending the blitz will play an integral role in Oregon’s offensive game.
“It’s going to be a big key for this week — communication between the offensive line and Justin and making sure we’re on the same page,” Hunt said.
According to ESPN, Oregon’s true freshman quarterback has been blitzed just six times this season on 89 dropbacks. In 2016, the Sun Devils have blizted on 22 percent of offensive plays. Herbert is still looking for his first win in an Oregon uniform since taking over the reigns before the Ducks faced Washington.
Oregon head coach Mark Helfrich said the Ducks will make in-game adjustments to give Herbert enough time to complete passes.
“[Arizona State’s] numbers are down a litle bit in terms of volumes of pressures, but still substantially more than anybody we’ve played by double. They had some different approaches to some opponents, but we’ll have to figure out early what their plan is against us and adjust accordingly,” Helfrich said.
Hunt said the Ducks’ spirits have remained upbeat, despite losing five straight games for the first time since 1996.
“I think a lot of guys were really positive and liked the way that guys competed,” Hunt said, “and gave effort on the game and just continue to build off of that.”
The Ducks rallied from 21 points down on the road at Cal. Led by Herbert, Oregon’s offense came to life in the second half, outscoring the Golden Bears 28-11. Quarterbacks coach David Yost said that remains a positive that the program hopes to build on. Herbert’s ability to throw the ball downfield also encouraged Yost.
“He really did some nice things with the football,” Yost said of Herbert. “Everyone is going to talk about that last throw, but there were a bunch before that he made really nice throws on. There’s still stuff that we can improve on, but I think he showed some really good things.”
Yost said Herbert hasn’t had much exposure to Division I blitzes. He said, however, that the coaching staff will review on tape those times when he has been under pressure.
“We spent a lot of time this week — and we’ll continue — to give him the best plan of action with the O-line to get our five and six on who their six are that are coming so we can get the ball down the field,” Yost said.
Follow Jonathan Hawthorne on Twitter @Jon_Hawthorne