Tennessee Vols at Oregon Ducks: Statistical game preview

A weekly look at our upcoming opponent from a statistics perspective. CAVEATS: You'll get tired of hearing this, but yeah, we know that small sample sets preclude concrete conclusions. One game (or even two or three) doesn't provide enough data to approach the predictive accuracy of even a Magic 8 Ball, but that doesn't mean we're not going to look at what little we have. The results from 2012 and 2011 are understandably a mixed bag, but they also suggest that it's a worthwhile endeavor.

Also, this: All of the following information is gleaned exclusively from the NCAA statistics and does not account for things like injuries, shared playing time, suspensions, and other stuff difficult to see in the stats from a bird's eye view under time constraints. We generally put the "conclusions" and "predictions" at the top of the post, with the data upon which those are based below.

Sketchy Conclusions

• Guard the ground. So far, the Ducks' offensive numbers indicate a strong preference for the ground game, for which they rank extremely high nationally. Their passing game is only middle of the road so far.
• Red zone! Red Zone Offense may (or may not) be something to watch. Their numbers there aren't very good, but that could be because the Ducks don't need no red zone.
• Do your yoga. Tennessee's defense under Butch Jones to date is stronger in the red zone than it is outside of it, suggesting a bend-don't-break philosophy. If (if!) the Ducks are even a degree weaker in the red zone, bend-don't-break becomes even more important. That all makes some sense intuitively, as smaller spaces for teams that thrive on open spaces have to be uncomfortable. Rusty from Addicted to Quack on last night's podcast called it "making them play in a phone booth" (although he wasn't talking about the red zone but the play around the line of scrimmage). But yeah, less space with these guys is better.
• SO KEEP THEM IN FRONT YOU. To force the game into the red zone, the defense will need to keep Oregon from making big plays and bypassing the red zone altogether.
• Penalties. There is currently a wide disparity between the two teams' propensity to give away free yards and extra plays to their opponents by way of penalties. Tennessee ranks first in that category, and the Ducks are in the cellar. Those yards and tries could add up.
• Sigh. Even with all of that, the Ducks are almost certainly just too good for the Vols to beat at this time, but playing well will go along way toward providing evidence that the program is in fact on the right track.

Predictions

• Oregon 42, Tennessee 24.

Schedule and Animated Drive Charts

Nicholls Colonels	8/31/13	win 66 - 3	coverage
@ Virginia Cavaliers	9/7/13	win 59 - 10	coverage
Austin Peay Governors	8/31/13	win 45 - 0	coverage
Western Kentucky Hilltoppers	9/7/13	win 52 - 20	coverage

So both Tennessee and Oregon have played an FCS opponent and another team that's probably in the "decent" category. Both dominated their opponents offensively and defensively, although WKU was a tougher chore for the Vols than Virginia was for the Ducks. Plus, you have to put a quirky asterisk next to any game that included seven turnovers by the opponent. If you didn't know we were talking about a team ranked second in the nation and one that is unranked and trying to climb out of a smoking crater, you might make the mistake from looking at those two schedules that the teams have similar resumes. I guess they do at this point in the season, but the national polls have weight here.

National Unit Rankings

Offensive observations. First, it looks like the Ducks are primarily a ground team. An extremely good ground team, but still. They're in the top three in Rushing Offense, Total Offense, and Scoring Offense, but their Passing Offense is ranked only 56th. When they do pass, though, they get a bunch of yards from doing it. They also don't allow sacks, which is bad news for a team that has struggled with making them.

I don't generally include Red Zone Offense here, but I wanted to note it for this game because it's one area on offense (along with Passing Offense) in which the Ducks don't rank well. That could be because they don't need the red zone, thank you very much, because they're always scoring directly from the middle of the field and bypassing the red zone altogether, but hey. Somebody should look into the details on that and help us get a clearer picture. It could be important, especially for a bend-but-don't-break defense.

Defensive observations. Well this is more like it. Keeping in mind who they've played (which in this instance cuts against them), Oregon's defense doesn't look to be spectacular. Last year's passing attack would have had a fighting chance against a team not defending the pass at a level commensurate with their #2 national ranking. Total Defense is only 38th, and I'm guessing that those rankings for Sacks and Tackles for Loss will take a hit when they go up against Tennessee's offensive line. On the other hand, they do keep points off the board, and that's what matters most.

Special teams and turnovers observations. I have this notion that Oregon is fantastic on special teams because of their speed and their use and understanding of space and angles, but so far, the numbers don't really bear that out.

I haven't included penalties in this section in the past, but I wanted to include it today to show the disparity between Tennessee's #1 ranking in the category and the Ducks being actually bad there. Hey, we'll take free yards and do overs. As many as we can get.

Players to Watch

Offensive Observations. QB Marcus Mariota is good. Really good. At a lot of things. RB De'Anthony Thomas is also a workhorse, and it looks like the Ducks will spread the ball around to multiple carriers. But Thomas and Mariota will get the bulk of the carries. When passing, Josh Huff appears to be Mariota's favorite target.

Defense. There are multiple guys on the team ranking nationally for interceptions, but that stat category is particularly volatile early in the season. Watch defensive lineman Tony Washington breaking through the line of scrimmage, and then watch for linebacker Derrick Malone to clean up whoever gets past the line.

Special teams. Well, forget what I said about not being good at special teams, because Bralon Addison does rank 18th in the nation in punt returns.

Head to Head Comparisons

			Comps	Result Against Comps	Prediction
UT rush v. Oregon rush defense	277.5 (#23)	105.5 (#30)	WKU (228) (#110)	240	170
UT pass v. Oregon passing yards allowed	137 (#108)	215 (#61)	WKU (173) (#34)	142	170
Oregon rush v. UT rush defense	125 (#43)	425 (#2)	WKU (193.5) (#54)	171	300
Oregon pass v. UT passing yards allowed	177 (#38)	239.5 (#56)	WKU (246.5) (#53)	222	220
UT scoring offense v. Oregon scoring defense	48.5 (#13)	6.5 (#7)	WKU (39) (#109)	52	24
Oregon scoring offense v. UT scoring defense	10 (#15)	62.5 (#3)	WKU (27.5) (#72)	20	42

Again with the caveats: These are informed guesses rather than mathematical calculations, and this early in the season, the guesses are particularly sketchy. But here's the general analytical framework: We are averaging X in a certain category. The opponent averages Y against that, which is most closely comparable to some identified previous opponent, against whom we did Z. All of that leads to an informed guess labeled as Prediction. And one more time for emphasis: The less data you have, the more sketchy the guess, and the guesses range from ALL CAPS SKETCHY WITH EXCLAMATION POINTS at the beginning of the season to merely lower case sketchy for the last game.

This week's example: We're averaging 277.5 yards on the ground. Oregon gives up only 105.5 per game, good for a national ranking of #30. The closest comp is our only FBS opponent, WKU, but that's really not even close enough to be considered a cousin of a comp because their rank is 110. Still, it's all we have. Against WKU, we ran for 240 yards. The only thing left to do is basically split the difference, so I'm going with a prediction of 170 yards rushing for the Vols.

So I have the Vols getting 340 yards and the Ducks getting 520, which meets the eyeball test. I figure that against their defense, we'll get only about half the points we've been getting and that our defense (hopefully) should be able to hold them to fewer (but not too many fewer) points than their previous two opponents.