Saturday's Pac-10 showdown in Tucson is ostensibly about Oregon finishing off its conference title run in the same place where a near-identical steamroller of an offense was abruptly stopped in its tracks two years ago. The parallels between these Ducks and the edition that came up short in 2007 are obvious and a little eerie: Like the '07 team, Oregon goes into Arizona as a solid favorite with one conference loss, a home win over USC that announced the Ducks' arrival as the new league heavyweight, a versatile quarterback at the helm of the league's highest-scoring offense and a clear shot to the Rose Bowl.

Last time, the Ducks fell apart in this spot when Heisman frontrunner Dennis Dixon suddenly went down with a torn ACL, sending the team into a funk that cost it that game against Arizona and its last two in the regular season, a whimper of an ending for an outfit that seemed to be roaring toward a national title shot. Those heights are out of reach for this team, but another sudden collapse -- for whatever reason -- would feel just as deflating with the Pac-10's first non-Trojan championship in eight years so clearly in reach.

Just as interesting, though, is Arizona's trajectory to this point, not in its path from preseason also-ran to legitimate conference contender -- the Wildcats will win the Pac-10 and go to the Rose Bowl for the first time in school history if they win their last three, beginning with Oregon -- but also in the long run of Mike Stoops' six-year tenure. 'Zona progressively improved from one season to the next in each of Stoops' first five seasons, a logical climb as the defense gradually improved and quarterback Willie Tuitama progressed along with a surrounding cast that grew up together as multiyear starters. This year, minus Tuitama as well as record-breaking receiver Mike Thomas, All-American left tackle/second-round pick Eben Britton and injured tight end Rob Gronkowski, who hasn't played a down of his junior season, this year should have been the first great regression under Stoops' watch.

Instead, so far, the upward track has kept right on rolling with a largely new cast:

The next logical step in that progression is exactly the Wildcats are now, with a shot right in front of them to confirm their move into the conference's elite -- or to confirm that they're still destined to flatline, after all, stuck as the competent but decidedly second-rate outfit they were in 2008.

Along those lines, the big asterisk that goes above the 2009 column is that it doesn't include two of the Wildcats' biggest, most defining challenges, at USC on Dec. 5, and against the best team in the conference to date this weekend. Much as they may secretly wish it, Oregon quarterback Jeremiah Masoli's knee isn't going to give out on him suddenly during a random cut, and few quarterbacks have shredded the Wildcats as thoroughly over the last four years as Masoli did in last year's 55-45 shootout in the Ducks' favor in Eugene, where Chip Kelly's spread option attack rolled up 504 yards on almost nine yards per snap.

Oregon is not a great road team -- it's last four losses are all on the road -- but the Duck offense is rolling at a ridiculous 475 yards and 42 points per game in seven Pac-10 games. Rebounding to hold the Ducks in check offensively would be the most promising sign that the "Mildcats" Stoops inherited in 2004 are close to coming full-circle.