Oregon Ducks Football: Defensive Struggles Not a Huge Issue

The best defense is a good offense.

The Oregon Ducks football team proves that point quite nicely.

If you can score more than 50 points in a game, then giving up 30 means that you still win the game. At the end of the day, it doesn't matter if you lead the nation in scoring defense or total yards; the only stat that matters is if you won the game or not.

The Ducks shouldn't worry too much about not having the greatest defense because of the way Chip Kelly has them play.

Oregon had 12 possessions Saturday night in Tuscon, with the average being at two minutes and 10 seconds. Stanford, who beat Arizona two weeks ago, averaged three minutes and 58 seconds.

With Oregon's offense being so explosive and fast, the Ducks rarely have control of the ball, meaning that the opposing team will have more possessions and a much larger time of possession.

Arizona was able to run 92 plays against Oregon. Compare that to the 62 that they ran against Stanford, and you see why the Wildcats were able to score an extra two touchdowns against Oregon.

The Ducks defense makes the right plays at the right time. When it really counts, you can be assured that they will make the play and the stop. But for the most part, with the opposing offense being able to run all of those plays, the defense will tire out and will give up some plays. It's bound to happen and impossible to stop.

If anything, the Ducks defense seeing so many plays is actually a good thing when you start to look at every aspect.

In seeing more playing time, the defense will get tired causing them to be subbed out. With so many players seeing playing time, depth is built, which means injuries won't be a huge factor anymore.

People shouldn't look at Oregon's defense; the stats lie.