Oregon Football: 2011 Will Be the Season That Makes or Breaks the Ducks

Since Chip Kelly took over the Oregon program, things on the field have gone great, but off of the field, it has been a miss.

In 2009, the Ducks broke USC's hold on the conference and made it to the Rose Bowl. In 2010, Oregon had their first perfect season, made it to their program's first national championship and won their second straight conference crown.

Through two seasons as the head coach at Oregon, Kelly has gone 22-4 and has had the Ducks heading in the right directions.

Off the field, Kelly has witnessed Jeremiah Masoli steal his way off the team, LaMichael James have an altercation with an ex-girlfriend, Cliff Harris get in trouble behind the wheel and lastly, the NCAA has been on Oregon's doorstep sniffing around at their recruiting practices.

The most important thing now is the current investigation being done by the NCAA about recruiting services and the role they play in recruiting high school athletes.

While the media certainly has come to their own conclusions on Oregon's guilt in using a recruiting service run by Will Lyles, the NCAA has not come to that same decision not have they had a reason to as of yet.

Through everything that has been discovered so far by the media and NCAA, it appears that Oregon has found a very dark grey area that they have used to their advantage. While the area has been questionable, there has yet to be a violation.

As the 2011 season approaches, the Oregon football program has been tight lipped and has almost been like a turtle that has taken shelter in their shell. It has been quite obvious that the team and staff are taking an "us against the world" approach to this season.

Oregon knows that they are not the only program that uses recruiting services and in fact, are not the only major program to use the services of Will Lyles. Lyles has now been linked to Cal and LSU but for different dollar amounts.

Since the link between Oregon and recruiting services has been discovered, it has also been reported that Alabama and Auburn have spent in excess of $100k on these same types of services.

So now that we are under a month away from the start of summer camp, Oregon is counting the days until the shift goes back to football.

It is clear that this season can go one of two ways.

Oregon can either get slammed by the NCAA if other information and facts come to light. Having this happen would completely erase the work that Oregon has done over the past 20 years.

On the other hand, the NCAA who has been investigating since the story originally broke in the spring, will finish digging and come up empty handed.

The likely result of this investigation will be much like what happened with Auburn and Cam Newton, the NCAA will realize they have a hole in their rules and do what needs to be done to close that hole.

The one thing that Duck fans must ask themselves is do you trust Chip? People have claimed he is an offensive genius and one of the greatest coaching minds.

Is that still true or do fans now believe that he is foolish enough to try and commit a violation with a paper trail a mile long?

2011 will be a turning point not only for coach Chip Kelly but also for the Oregon program. We will either see the Ducks' rise to prominence continue or see years of hard work go out the window.