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Stanford falls to USC 42-24

Things did not go well in Los Angeles for Stanford

By Hemā Heimuli Jr.
NCAA Football: Stanford at Southern California Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports

The Stanford Cardinal lost to the USC Trojans Saturday night 42-24 snapping the Cardinal’s three game winning streak against the Trojans. Stanford was held to just 170 rushing yards as a team. 75 of those 170 came on one touchdown run from Bryce Love. Outside of that run Stanford rushed for fewer than 100 yards for the game. The Trojans gained over 600 total yards in the game a whopping 307 of which were rushing yards. The Trojans also won the time of possession battle 34:35 to Stanford 25:25.

Stanford could not run the ball well, did not dominate the time of possession and could not stop the run and the Cardinal only had one sack. All of the things Stanford wants to do well in order to find success they did not do.

The first quarter offense did well to stay balanced, great push from the O line on the run plays and Love did what Love does springing a 75 yard run for a TD. Defensively, corner play started off sloppy, Darnold, although under pressure, kept his composure orchestrating touchdowns on the ground and in the air.

As the first half rolled on, Stanford demonstrated more balanced play, Chryst distributed the ball well especially to the backs and tight ends. The offensive line had trouble keeping the SC defense’s hands down, batting a couple balls. SC opened up the Stanford DB’s as Burnett and Mitchell made big catches from Darnold.

In the last half the USC offense continued dominating time of possession. The defense couldn’t stop the run and although winning the turnover battle, Stanford couldn’t respond to enough of the SC touchdowns to find their way back into the game.

My take: I would have loved to see Chryst send quick short passes, targeting mostly our tight ends - Smith and especially Schultz have proven they have more-than reliable hands, they should be getting more than two receptions a game. Our secondary NEEDS to step it up. Burnett and Mitchell cut our DB’s apart, I’m happy we have the SDSU game to figure things out before UCLA.

My Players of the game: Love with 160 yards on 17 carries and Phillips on defense with 11 tackles, 5 solo.

NEXT GAME: Stanford @ San Diego State, Saturday 9/16 @ 8:30pst CBS Sports.