Make or Break Game Stretches in the Pac-10

[gofightingducks]

http://myespn.go.com/blogs/ncfnation/0- ... ules-.html

Oregon (at Boise State, Sept. 3; Purdue, Sept. 12; Utah, Sept. 19; California, Sept. 26): Oregon will know if its season is going to be special before the schedule moves out of September. This is one of the nation's most interesting four-game stretches: two marquee non-BCS powers, a visitor from the Big Ten, and California -- the team, other than the Ducks, most likely to unseat USC atop the conference. It's hard to win on the blue turf in Boise, but three of these games are in Autzen Stadium.

I was looking at other schools in the SEC, Big 12, Big 10, etc. and the Ducks have the most difficult out of conference schedule and the most difficult stretch to start the season. The Ducks should be ranked really high if they can get through the stretch 4-0, 3-1. Also, the Ducks overall strength of schedule will probably be one of the strongest in the country and they get most of the tough teams at home (Utah, USC, Cal, Oregon State) the only road game I am worried about other than Boise State is Stanford.

[spinseeker]

Hopefully we can get ranked very high because, after that, only the USC game will help us out as far as jumping anyone ahead of us in the polls without them losing. We start out beating quality teams while other teams ahead of us are destroying patsies and some voters will still say: Yeah, but... and keep us in the same spots.

[cmmadness]

A win against Cal is a must. They've beat us three years in a row and for whatever reason, they always seem to match up well againt us. I'm sure all the Seniors have the Cal game circled on their calendars.

[neezy3]

We'll be battle tested by the time the pac ten season starts thats for sure and have a good idea of what our teams gonna look like. Having the home field advantage will be big for those first 3 games imo.

[GoDucksIn09]

I agree that our toughest road game this year will be Stanford after playing Boise State. Only other one that might be a little scary will be either UCLA or Arizona. While Arizona is replacing their qb from last year they still have that tight end there I believe that gave us nothing but problems second half.. ad have to play them down there. UCLA recruited well and think they will be much improved this year. We really can not overlook anybody on our road schedule.. even the huskies.

[DmoneyDuck]

The "special-ness" of thsi season will be determined after the Boise St game. We win, we could be on another 2007 ride (pre DDix injury)..We lose, we could still rebound for 8-10 wins, a good season but nothing out of the ordinary.

[gofightingducks]

That's a pretty rough schedule that the Beevers got there....

Ha-ha yeah when you have Washington and Washington State as part of your toughest stretch that sure isn't saying much!

[UOducksTK1]

Definitely a tough stretch of games early in the season. But I'm pretty confident we'll go 3-1 in that stretch. 3 of the games are at home, and I think we have a good shot at taking Boise down.

[gofightingducks]

Definitely a tough stretch of games early in the season. But I'm pretty confident we'll go 3-1 in that stretch. 3 of the games are at home, and I think we have a good shot at taking Boise down.

I also think the Ducks go 3-1 losing to Cal..... again