More photos » by John Miller - AP

Nick Foles and the Arizona offense racked up 41 points against the Ducks. However, this number was skewed due to two overtimes.

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If you've spent two seconds perusing any Ohio State Buckeyes blogs, you'll have no doubt read about the poor Oregon defense. This has been quite infuriating, simply because the analysis provided has been woefully ignorant. Case in point, a post from Buckeye Battle Cry, which will be joining SBNation on January 1st (Welcome guys!).

With a few exceptions at the beginning of the year, the Oregon D has been allowing apposing offenses to rush for pretty close to their season averages.

The crown jewel of this chart is Stanford’s #11 ranked rushing offense and the 236 yards they gained on the ground against Oregon, which of course led to a 51-42 defeat of the Ducks.

The good and still improving #17 [OSU] rushing offense (198.92 ypg) against the #40 [Oregon] rushing defense (130.64 ypg) that gives up basically whatever the offense wants to take.

Sounds good to me.

Unfortunately, this type of 2nd rate analysis is standard throughout the Buckeye blogosphere. SBNation's tOSU blog, We Will Always Have Tempe, front-paged this post.

What we can take from all of these posts is the infatuation with all things "total." Total yards, total points, total defense, etc. I've even seen some commenters go so far as mention time of possession. And if you're looking at the Ducks through this narrow lens, of course Oregon will not stack up.

Yet on January 1st, Buckeye Nation will be in for a rude awakening.

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Quite a bit of quack from over the weekend, so let's get right to it.

• The men's basketball team dropped their third straight to the St. Mary's Gaels on Saturday, 81-76. In the end, the Gael's made plays when it mattered, and the Ducks just didn't. Oregon held a five point lead in the second half, but couldn't pull out the victory. St. Mary's is a good team, but should a Pac-10 really lose to them three years in a row?
  
• Unfortunately, it's not just the Ducks that are terrible, it's the entire Pac-10. SBNation's college basketball blog, Searching for Billy Edelin, asks if the Pac-10 is a one-bid league after UCLA and Washington fell on their faces over the weekend.
• However, there is some good basketball being played in Eugene. The Oregon women have been excellent this year and sit at 8-1, and set out on their first big test of the season on Wednesday at Georgia Tech.
• Moving to football, the Ducks had a competition day yesterday, which the defense won due to an offensive penalty. The players seemed to really get into it after some time off. Some young guys also got some looks during the practice, as Coach Kelly wanted to see them compete. Just one more benefit of the extra 15 practices bowls provide.
• The Register Guard will be profiling a Duck every day until the Rose Bowl. Over the weekend Carson York and Blake Ferras were profiled. Today's Duck is Casey Matthews, who was also discussed in qsouther's weekend fanpost. 
• While Rose Bowl practice is big, the coaching staff is throwing recruiting into high gear, and most of the coaches flew all over the country last week visiting the Ducks top targets this year. Oregon has made significant strides in national recruiting, and that is seen most is simple name recognition, which has grown by leaps and bounds over the years.
• TheState.com, has a profile on Marcus Lattimore, one of the most sought after recruits of 2010, and who will be visiting Oregon on January 22nd. Lattimore has the physical tools to succeed, but he's also been an inspiration to his community off the field, and has not let the publicity or hype go to his head. In that way, he reminds me of Jonathan Stewart. Good luck to Marcus in his final decision.
  
• Lastly, KVAL is counting down the top 10 Ducks of the 2000s, and one of my favorite Ducks, Keenan Howry, comes in at #8.

As always, leave your links and comments below. After the jump, a video of competition day.

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Well, things have really slowed down this week. Here's the quack that's out there:

• The Duck men's basketball team has a chance at revenge this weekend. After losing to St. Mary's two years in a row, and a historically bad loss last weekend at Missouri, the Ducks will be going for the win tomorrow, though without Joevan Catron and possibly without Tajuan Porter, who is listed as day-to-day. Bob Clark's practice report for yesterday also had an interesting note. The cold weather in Eugene so affected Mac Court that most players were practicing in long sleeve shirts. Yep, it's time for a new arena.
• SBNation's Big 10 blog, The Rivalry, Esq., has an interview with AndyPanda from Building the Dam, to learn a bit about the Ducks from their rival. While Andy does a good job overall, he stumbles into the same excuses many Beaver fans do, blaming lost opportunity for the loss. So quickly the Beaver fans forget that on their last 2 drives, with the game on the line, the Beavers had 10 plays for 37 yards.
• Hank Stern from the Willamette Week takes a page from ATQ and does a Q&A with an OSU fan to talk about everybody's favorite topic: Terrelle Pryor.
• Ted Miller has a post comparing the preseason and postseason Pac-10 all conference teams. 
• tOSU bloggers are starting to talk about the game. Here's a post on the early point spread from the Buckeye Blog. The early opinion of tOSU seems to be that the Buckeye's will push the Ducks around on offense and stop the Ducks spread offense on defense. This shouldn't really surprise anyone. Then again, the Buckeye's couldn't beat the 6th place Pac-10 team. At home. Against a true freshman QB who was started for the second time.
• Lastly, if you were looking for Rose Bowl tickets, looks like you're going to have to buy them through a third party, as the Ducks will use up their allotment.

As always, leave your comments and links below. GO DUCKS!

More photos » by Don Ryan - AP

Chip Kelly led the Ducks from disaster to a Pac-10 championship. Congrats on being named coach of the year, Chip!

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First off, Congratulations to Chip Kelly and LaMichael James, who were given great honors today. Coach Kelly was named the Pac-10 Coach of year, and he undoubtedly deserved it. After the debacle at Boise, Oregon rebounded and won the Pac-10 be two whole games. LaMichael James was named the offensive freshman of the year, setting the Pac-10 rushing record for freshman, and was the most explosive running back in the conference, if not nation.

Rounding out the Ducks on the all conference teams, Ed Dickson was named to the first team, while Jeremiah Masoli, LaMichael James, Will Tukuafu, and Casey Matthews were named to the second team.

I think what the voting for this award proves is that Oregon was by far the best team in the conference. It's pretty shocking that Oregon won the conference by two games, yet only got 5 players onto the all conference teams.

Meanwhile, OSU had 7 players on the first team alone, yet couldn't hang with Oregon in the 4th quarter. UCLA had four players on the first team defense, but had a worse defense than Oregon by almost any statistical measure.

While it would have been nice to see the individuals on the team recognized to a greater degree, Oregon gets to take home the ultimate prize: the Pac-10 championship.

The end of the regular season of college football is always bittersweet, with that magical time coming to an end. But we have something pretty great to look forward to: The Rose Bowl!

• Oregon handed out their team awards at a banquet yesterday. Jeremiah Masoli and LaMichael James shared the award for Mose Outstanding Player, while Will Tukuafu and Walter Thurmond III shared the award for most inspirational. There were a number of other awards handed out and Moseley has some more stories from the event. I'm hoping to see some video of Coach Frost razzing Jeff Maehl.
• Yet the celebration will not last long. The Ducks are already looking forward to the matchup with the Ohio State Buckeyes. Kelly has already been watching films of the Big 10 champs, who have the best defense the Ducks have seen this season. However, Kelly does not seem too worried. The Ducks have the versatility on offense to create mismatches all over the field, and have been incredibly successful isolating those all season long.
  
• Meanwhile, Jim Tressel is looking at the Ducks as well, and the focal point defensively will be Jeremiah Masoli, whom Tressel described as "scary." He also stated the the Buckeyes will need to "get in shape" after seeing the quick pace of Oregon's offense. I think the Buckeyes will have problems keeping pace with Oregon over 4 quarters, just as almost every other team has this season.
  
• Lastly, though this is old, for those of you that may have forgotten about when OSU played USC: This is why I am not worried about the OSU offense. I'm very much excited for the Chip Kelly/Jim Tressel coaching matchup.
• In other sports news, while we had let some time pass without mentioning Oregon volleyball, they made it to the NCAA tournament, and won a match versus Clemson before falling to the 13th ranked Kentucky Wildcats. It was a great season for the Ducks, who were ranked in the top 25 for nearly the entire season.

After the jump, we have another edition of Inside the Pac, breaking down the Civil War. As always, leave any other Duck news below. GO DUCKS!

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More photos » by Rick Bowmer - AP

I like this picture more than the one Beaver fans always post. But it's also more important, as this run occurred in a game with the Pac-10 title on the line.

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Well, I've had almost 24 hours to digest what has happened in the world of Duck football, and, it's still as beautiful as ever. And while the game wasn't perfect, we saw our Ducks grow up over the last two games. Oregon pretty much blew through their first 5 Pac-10, winning by margins of 39, 46, 14, 24, and 27. Everything looked easy, the Ducks got some great breaks and took advantage of them to turn games into blowouts.

However, the contests against Arizona and Oregon State were not so easy. In both games, the Ducks faced adversity. But when the game was on the line, this Duck team made the plays it needed to. The offenses showed poise and confidence, and seemed to have an ingrained belief that they would come through. There was a confidence in this team that we haven't seen in some time.

To me, the play of the game was the 4th and 6 conversion to Jeff Maehl. This was a conversion the Ducks simply had to have. OSU had all the momentum at that point, up by 9 points after scoring touchdowns on their previous two drives. But Jeremiah Masoli threw a strike, that has handled by Maehl right as he was hit, and the Ducks kept the drive alive.

Without that conversion, winning that game becomes very difficult. But that's what this Duck team has done. They have converted the biggest plays of the game over and over again. They executed to the highest level and have shown the desire and confidence of a championship team.

It was this attitude that propelled the Ducks to become the first team to be Pac-10 champions by two whole games since the 1991 Washington Huskies.

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More photos » by Rick Bowmer - AP

It's fitting that LeGarrette Blount was almost the undoing of the season early in the year, and ended up saving it in the 3rd quarter.

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What a night. I still have a grin plastered across my face. The Ducks are Pac-10 champions. Here's your post-Civil War quack:

• First off, Chip Kelly. 3 fourth down attempts and conversions that saved and then won the game for the Ducks. George Schroeder caught up with him after the game, and Kelly never had any thought of NOT going for it. And the confidence that Kelly displayed spread to the whole team. Despite being down by 9 in the 3rd, the Ducks never wavered, they never gave up. They just kept on plugging, and made big play after big play, on both sides of the ball.
• Ken Woody has his post-game analysis up. A few things that stuck out: Bringing in Blount turned out to be much more than giving him some playing time as a senior. His physicality was something the Ducks desperately needed (Paul was right!). Second, for all the talk about the Beavers "controlling the clock," it was the Ducks that did that in the second half, with a number of huge drives to keep the Beaver offense off the field. Lastly, OSU seemed to make no attempt to establish a running game. The Ducks dominated the ground game, especially in the second half.
• Adam Jude has a piece on LeGarrette Blount, and the emotional night after a long and lonely season. One of my favorite parts of the night can be seen on the SportsCenter highlights of the game (they won't let me embed): The massive smile on Gary Cambell's face when he hugs Blount after his touchdown. I'm so happy for LeGarrette for getting to this point. He kept his head down, and worked hard all season, even when he wasn't being rewarded. How the entire team responded to the Boise situation makes me proud to be a Duck.
• Ted Miller has a piece on the bumpy ride the Ducks endured. It has been an exciting ride, with some incredible lows, which make the highs that much sweeter.
• The senior sendoff was a great success, and good thing it was well before kickoff, or it may have been a bit teary on the sideline.
• And, since I can't resist looking forward, let's take a quick look at recruiting. There were some huge visitors last night, including a surprise by Dominique Easley, one of the top DE recruits in the nation. Don't be surprised if the Duck commitments start rolling in.

After the jump a few videos. As always, leave your links and comments below. It's a day of celebration!!! GO DUCKS!!!

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