5 best Pac-12 offensive performances of the year

Arizona QB Matt Scott's 491-yard passing performance against the Pac-12's best defense -- Stanford -- was the most impressive performance of the year. (US Presswire)

The Pac-12 boasts two of the top seven offenses in the country -- Arizona and Oregon -- and not surprisingly, those two teams take up three of the five spots in our top five offensive performances of the year.

The most surprising part of this list just might be the fact that two of our top five offensive performances came at the expense of the Pac-12's No. 1 defense: Stanford.

1. 'Great Scott'

Arizona quarterback Matt Scott made a name for himself in Week 6 when he lit up a Stanford defense that doesn't usually get lit up.The Cardinal did everything they could to slow Scott down, but none of it worked. The Wildcat senior quarterback finished the game 45 of 69 for 491 yards and three touchdowns. Both the completions and attempts totals are Arizona school records, while the 491 passing yards is the third most Stanford has ever allowed in school history. Stanford won, 54-48, in overtime, but that doesn't diminish what Scott did to the Pac-12's best defense. To put the Wildcats game in perspective, no other team has scored more than 24 on Stanford this season.

2. 'Marqise magic'

2012 hasn't exactly been a memorable season for USC, but Marqise Lee will probably remember Oct. 27 for the rest of his life. On that date, the sophomore wide receiver racked up a Pac-12 record 345 yards and two touchdowns on 16 catches. The 345 yards was the fifth-highest total in FBS history. Lee also tacked on 123 return yards and totaled a ridiculous 468 yards in the game. Unfortunately for Lee, his monster game -- like Scott's above -- came in a losing cause as Arizona beat USC 39-36.

3. 'Carey goes crazy on Colorado'

When Ka'Deem Carey broke the Pac-12 single-game record for most rushing yards against Colorado in November, the national reaction seemed to be, "Does it even techinically count, it came against Colorado?" Here's our reaction to that: 11 other teams got to play against Colorado's defense and no one got near the 366 yards Carey reached against the Buffs. It only took Carey 25 carries to reach that total, which averages out to an impressive 14.6 yards per rush. Carey also scored five of Arizona's eight touchdowns in the Wildcats' 56-31 win.

4. 'Are you not entertained? Barner burns in the Coliseum'

When Oregon and USC met in November, it quickly turned into a matchup of Matt Barkley's right arm versus Kenjon Barner's legs. Barkley threw for 484 yards and five touchdowns on the day, but he was overshadowed by the blazing Barner. The Oregon running back ran for a school record 321 yards and five touchdowns. The USC defense had no answer for Barner, who averaged 8.4 yards per carry in the Ducks' 62-51 win.

5. 'Franklin busts through Stanford brick-wall defense'

Statistically, UCLA's Johnathan Franklin's 194-yard rushing performance against Stanford wasn't his best game of the year, nor was it even one of the top-10 best yardage performances in the Pac-12 this season. However, Franklin's performance makes our list for two reasons: 1. It came in the Pac-12 Championship game; 2. He did it against a Stanford defense that was ranked No. 1 nationally against the run going into the game. Stanford was only surrendering 71.4 yards per game on the ground, Franklin had that number by the end of the first quarter. The senior running back averaged 10.2 yards per carry and two touchdowns as UCLA almost pulled off the upset.

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