Look Out: Stanford’s Top Offensive Weapon is Already Behind You

Caleb Couturie FishWrap, FishWrap Archive

Maybe this isn’t the same Stanford. For starters, Stanford is already a three loss team, as well as an unranked team. During the past four years when they’ve played Oregon, they’ve always had a dominant lead back. Oregon, on the other hand, always had a running back by committee. Cardinal RB’s Toby Gerhart, Stepfan Taylor, and Tyler Gaffney all gashed our defense in the past, accumulating 530 rushing yards over the past four match ups.

Stepfan Taylor, as well as past Stanford backs, have been an achilles heel for the Oregon defense.

Stepfan Taylor, as well as past Stanford backs, have been an achilles heel for the Oregon defense.

Coming in to this year, Stanford appears to be the team with a running back by committee and we seem to be the team with the dominant lead back. No one on the Stanford team has more than 70 carries this year, and only Remound Wright has broken the 300 yard mark on the season. On the contrary, Royce Freeman comes in to this game with 69 carries for 402 yards over the past three games.

Needless to say, ‘times are a changin,’ but that does not mean Stanford is a team we should be any less worried about. Their defense is second in the nation in points allowed per game, whereas our defense is 61st. I’m sure you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure this out, but if Stanford can hold our offense the same way it did the Washington State offense (17 total points), we’re in trouble.

With all this being said, here’s a look at the top three offensive weapons Stanford has coming in to this week.

#3: Devon Cajuste WR/TE: At 6’4″, this guy is just straight up big. He can go up and grab any jump ball, he can run a really solid fade route in the end zone, and since none of our DB’s can even crack the 6’0″ mark Cajuste will be absolute match up nightmare. The senior is third on the team in catches and would love for his last game against Oregon to be a win on the road.

#2: Barry Sanders Jr. RB: Sanders is still very young and very raw, but boy, he has shown flashes. Son of legendary NFL RB Barry Sanders, Junior is third on the team in total carries but he leads the team with an astounding average of nearly seven and a half yards per carry. Sanders is also only 36 yards behind Wright for total yards on the season, despite having 29 less carries than him. Sanders is yet to have a touchdown to his name this season, and what better time to do it then against our beloved Ducks?

Ty Montgomery is by far Oregon's biggest worry on the defensive side of the ball.

Ty Montgomery is by far Oregon’s biggest worry on the defensive side of the ball.

#1: Ty Montgomery WR/PR/KR/Fastest Man Alive: Don’t blink, Montgomery might already be in the end zone. Montgomery officially runs around a 4.4 40-yard dash, but ask the guys who play against him on kick coverage and they’ll say it’s got to be at least half that. The senior stud of an athlete leads the next best Stanford WR by over double the number of receptions this year, and his 514 yards are 200 more than the next best as well. Montgomery also does everything for Stanford, as he has 49 receptions, 16 carries, and he’s even returned a total of 25 kicks for 557 yards and two TDs. To call this guy explosive would be an understatement, and if Oregon is going to stand a chance on Saturday, No. 7 is going to have to be covered.

 

 

Top photo by Craig Strobeck

New 2024 FishDuck Publishing Schedule….

During the off-season the FishDuck.com publishing schedule will consist of articles on Mondays and Tuesdays. Do keep checking as new articles could be published during the week when a writer has something to say.

In mid-August of 2024, we will go back to the seven-days-a-week of articles during the football season as we did in the football season of 2023.

The Our Beloved Ducks Forum (OBD) is where we we discuss the article above and many more topics, as it is so much easier in a message board format over there.  At the free OBD forum we will be posting Oregon Sports article links, the daily Press Releases from the Athletic Department and the news coming out every day.

Our 33 rules at the free OBD Forum can be summarized to this: 1) be polite and respectful, 2) do not tell anyone what to think, feel or write, and 3) no reference of any kind to politics. Easy-peasy!

OBD Forum members….we got your back.  No Trolls Allowed!