Oregon (7-2, 5-1) remains in first in the Pac-10, but has only a half-game lead over Arizona, which is 4-1, and Stanford.
“We got beat by a better team,’’ Ducks coach Chip Kelly said. “If you say we got caught looking behind or looking ahead, it takes away from Stanford. Stanford is a heck of a football team.’’
The Cardinal snapped a seven-game losing streak in the series with perhaps their most meaningful win in coach Jim Harbaugh’s three seasons on The Farm, and now Stanford is in position to play a postseason game for the first time since Tyrone Willingham’s final year in 2001.
Luck took advantage of vast open areas in the middle of the Oregon defense, completing 12 of 20 passes for 251 yards. He threw an 8-yard touchdown pass to Jim Dray in the second quarter and a 31-yarder to Chris Owusu after Oregon cut the Cardinal lead to 10 points early in the third quarter. Owusu had four catches for 111 yards and two long kickoff returns.
The Ducks got back within 10 on a 3-yard keeper by Jeremiah Masoli before Gerhart carried defenders into the end zone on a 17-yard run that made it 45-28 late in the third quarter.
Gerhart, who had 38 carries, also broke his season rushing record set last year with 1,217.
The Cardinal got off to a fast start when Owusu returned the opening kickoff 77 yards to set up a field goal. Stanford’s offense didn’t slow down. A 25-yard pass from Luck to Owusu set up Gerhart’s first touchdown run and Gerhart scored again on the next possession to make it 17-7.
Luck added the TD pass to Dray and then threw a 39-yarder to Ryan Whalen that set up Owen Marecic’s 2-yard run that gave the Cardinal a 31-14 lead.
Florida 27, Vanderbilt 3 - Tim Tebow passed for one TD and ran for another, but for the most part the top-ranked Gators (9-0, 7-0 SEC) had a lackluster effort against the Commodores (2-8, 0-6) in Gainesville, Fla.
Florida had 375 total yards, and about a third of them came late in the game. A big chunk of Tebow’s 208 yards passing came on a 64-yard run-and-catch by Aaron Hernandez late in the fourth quarter. Tebow also was held to 27 yards on 16 carries.
