Defense Swarms Huskies, Shuts Down Running Game
By Rob Moseley
Editor, GoDucks.com
As is the case most Saturdays, Oregon’s defensive priorities against Washington began with stopping the run, and forcing the Huskies to gamble on big pass plays.
So what to make of a halftime stat sheet that showed UW with all of 27 rushing yards? “That was one of the focuses,” UO defensive end Arik Armstead said, “and I think we kind of checked that off the list early in the game.”
While the Oregon offense displayed impressive versatility in beating Washington 45-20 on Saturday, the UO defense kept the Huskies from doing so when they had the ball. While helping the Ducks forge a 35-6 lead through the first 40 minutes, Oregon all but shut down the UW rushing game and also coaxed quarterback Cyler Miles into his first interception of the season.
Missed tackles had been a bugaboo for Oregon through the first half of the season. While there were no official statistics on missed tackles available immediately after the game, this seemed to be the Ducks’ most defensively sound effort yet this season.
“I thought it was pretty good,” safety Reggie Daniels said. “There was still a couple missed tackles out there. But I felt like we did a better job of bringing guys down, and everybody running to the ball.”
There’s no secret to the Ducks’ success; they’ve put in hard work in increasingly physical practices. “Over the last two weeks, you guys have made huge strides,” UO coach Mark Helfrich told the team in the postgame locker room. “When? Tuesday. Wednesday. We’re right on the edge, and it’s showing on Saturday.”
“We’ve done a good job in practice – tackling, wrapping up and finishing,” junior linebacker Joe Walker said. “I think practice definitely shows in games.”
Walker led another productive game for Oregon’s inside linebackers. Rodney Hardrick and Derrick Malone Jr. led the Ducks with eight tackles apiece, and Walker added seven. Hardrick and Walker started together, Malone and Johnny Ragin III would come in on the nickel defense Oregon employs extensively, and Danny Mattingly also got several reps.
Those inside linebackers helped limit Washington’s running backs to 43 yards on 19 carries; the Huskies finished with 133 rushing yards as a team, mostly on runs by quarterbacks and receivers. “That was the game plan, shut down the run early on and make (Miles) throw it around,” Armstead said. “They like to do a lot of safe passes, and we were trying to get him to throw it down the field.”
That paid off most obviously late in the second quarter when Miles was intercepted for the first time all year. The culprit was Oregon’s Erick Dargan, whose fourth interception of the season put him in a tie for fourth nationally, based on stats entering the weekend.
“The D line did a good job of getting pressure, and the ball got away from him,” Dargan said. “I just happened to be there and made him pay for it.”
For the second straight week, about the only quibble for the Ducks defensively was a couple of late touchdowns. Oregon led UCLA 42-10 before the Bruins rallied to a 42-30 final score. On Saturday, Washington trailed 35-6 before tacking on two late scores.
“It’s a little bothering,” Daniels said. “We need to tighten down towards the end of the game. So that’s definitely something we have to work on. But I think it was pretty good overall.”
