Oregon vs. Stanford: Thoughts and Analysis from the Ducks' Victory

The Oregon Ducks traveled down to Palo Alto for a Pac-12 showdown with national championship implications on the line, and ended up speeding past the Stanford Cardinal in a 53-30 thriller.

The score at halftime was close—Oregon was up by eight—but anyone watching the game could tell that the Stanford defense was going to have a tough time keeping up with Oregon's high-octane offense.

Stanford's defense only surrendered 387 total yards to LaMichael James and the rest of Oregon's attack, but it was Oregon's defense, which forced timely turnovers and played stout defense for the entire 60 minutes, that won the game for the Ducks. 

The Ducks' defense forced five turnovers and intercepted Andrew Luck twice, giving him the first blemish in his 2011 Heisman Trophy campaign.

While Stanford's receivers did drop quite a few passes from Luck that were right on target, Luck was missing some throws and didn't look comfortable throwing against the quick and relentless Ducks' defense.

LaMichael James, who tried his best to get his name put back into the Heisman Trophy talk, rushed for 146 yards on 20 carries and found the end zone three times.

Darron Thomas wasn't too shabby either, completing 11 passes on 17 attempts with three touchdowns.

Stanford's strategy coming into the game was to slow down Oregon any way they could.

One way they tried to do so was keeping the grass on the field long, and they hadn't mowed the grass on the field since Wednesday.

Unfortunately, that plan backfired on Stanford, since the players were losing their footing on cuts throughout the game.

It was Oregon, the team that was supposed to be doing all the slipping, that stayed on their feet and took advantage of the thick grass.

So now that the Ducks beat the No. 4 in the country and have a firm grasp on winning the Pac-12, the question will be how far the Ducks fly up in the BCS rankings.