PAC-12 Championship Preview

Oregon and Arizona face off on Friday night in the Pac-12 conference championship. A win for Oregon and they will punch their ticket to the College Football Playoff. If Arizona wins, they will need one or two other teams above them to lose to grab one of the four tickets.

The teams have played once this season already, matching up in one of the more exciting Thursday night games this season. The Wildcats defeated the Ducks 31 – 24, and they will be looking toward the same formula to upset them again.

When football fans across the nation hear Oregon, their mind goes to one player. Marcus Mariota. He is a legitimate Heisman candidate. Mariota can do it through the air and on the ground, and is truly a dual-threat quarterback. For the year, he has 3,470 yards passing, with a remarkable TD/INT ratio of 36:2. His favorite target is Byron Marshall, with 56 receptions and 791 yards, but even though Mariota throws the ball to Marshall more than any other receivers, the touchdown passes are spread around. They have 6 receivers who have at least 4 TDs this season.

When they are running the ball and it is not being carried by Mariota, it is in the hands of Royce Freeman. Freeman has carried the ball 209 times for 1,195 yards and 16 touchdowns.

Arizona’s offense is run by their sophomore quarterback Anu Solomon. Solomon is very efficient through the air, even though he has a tendency to throw an interception and can be less  accurate than Mariota. For the year, Solomon has thrown for 3,424 yards and 27 TD’s. However, he does have 7 INTs and only carries a completion percentage of 58% for the year.

In the air, Solomon has a trio of wide receivers that he looks for. They are Cayleb Jones, Samajie Grant, and Austin Hill. As a trio, they have combined for 145 receptions, 2,022 yards and 17 touchdowns.

The Wildcats also like to take it to the defense with their running game. Their feature back is freshman Nick Wilson, who has had a strong season and has had a great November. For the year, he had 1,263 yards and 15 TD’s with 6.3 yards per carry average. He finished the season off with 281 and 178 yards rushing respectfully.

The difference-maker in the game is the Wildcats defense. When they played the Ducks earlier this season, they held Mariotta to just 1 yard on nine carries. Look for them to attempt to stifle Mariota and the Ducks run game again to lead them to a victory.

The Prediction

The Wildcats have defeated the Ducks in each of the last two seasons and Coach Rich Rodriguez in a recent interview said that it is because Arizona has been able to slow Oregon’s star quarterback with three things: turnovers, effort, and luck. Look for those trends to continue and Arizona wins again 34-31 to send Oregon spiraling out of the playoff hunt.

(Featured image: ticketmaster.com)