The Stanford Cardinal lost to the San Diego State Aztecs 20-17, the second time that the Cardinal have lost to the Aztecs in school history, with the last loss to the Aztecs back in 1985. Now they have dropped to 1-2, with their only victory over an awful Rice team and the only bright spot being running back Bryce Love.
The first problem is quarterback Keller Chryst, who looked great in game one, average in game two against USC and like a disaster in game three, throwing only 72 yards and responsible for three turnovers. Now granted, the offensive line has been inconsistent to say the least, helping Love get to 184 rushing yards but letting up four sacks against the Aztecs front.
That still does not excuse a steep descent from Chryst, who has fallen off the map in three weeks. This leaves David Shaw and the Stanford coaching staff in a bind, whether to stick with Chryst, go back to the starter from a year ago in Ryan Burns (Lord please no) or try to throw in the sophomore K.J. Costello and hope the running game is enough to bail him out. Whatever they do moving forward, the Cardinal have already found last year’s big problem.
The second problem may actually be more concerning, which is that the defense failed to force a turnover or get crucial stop down the stretch. The Aztecs went on three double digit play drives and four drives of 50 or more yards. They dominated the time of possession with 41 minutes, 14 seconds of offense, slowly grinding down the clock and doing exactly what Stanford has done to so many teams.
And to the Stanford faithful, yes I realize that the first Aztecs touchdown was on the heels of a Chryst interception deep in Stanford territory. But the Cardinal defense bailed out this team time and again last season. Even last game against Sam Darnold and the Trojans, the defense had their struggles and lapses, but still gave their offense extra possessions via turnovers.
This team is a flawed one, in need of a quarterback, offensive line, and defensive front to find themselves and play like we hoped they could headed into the year.
Comments
If the QB position was more productive
it would not only help the run game and keep drives alive improving TOP, it would also give the defense more time to rest. Stanford is getting killed on time of possession. Chryst looks like he’s playing with ankle weights and lead in his arm – I did not see a single miss directional play – the inability to scramble has eliminated the ability to create. Because we’ve seen Byrnes in action, I’d really like to see what Costello can do. My fear is Stanford isn’t coaching any of their QB’s well enough to succeed.
Stanford will be lucky to win 3 or 4 games this year. They will only be favorites against Arizona State and Oregon State. UCLA, Oregon, Washinton State, Cal and Notre Dame will all be favored to beat Stanford going forward this year.
By kollesteral on 09.18.17 5:23pm
You should be hoping for losses
It’s the kind of direct kick in the balls Shaw needs to realize that he needs to improve things.
By hpaskov on 09.18.17 6:03pm
Fear the Tree.
Everyone wants to blame "The O Line". Balderdash, I say. The real problem is Shaw’s oversized play pad. He has reverted back to way he called shots in past years. Go back and see the really big games we lost because of poor offensive play calling. The "D" played their hearts out and kept the game close. Our QB sucks pure and simple. We shut down Penny, and should have won the game even with poor play by Chyrst. The season is not lost.
By bodumb on 09.18.17 6:38pm
about that play book
the irony is that Stanford has this (rumored to be) incredibly complex play book and they use very little of it. How many reps does it take for a QB to get the hang of it?
By kollesteral on 09.19.17 8:42am
Give the QB some easy reads to get him in rhythm
Lots to dissect from a bad performance. First up the OL development is not going the way we expect. So everytime Chryst goes back to pass he is worried about getting hit and sacked. Secondly the pass patterns take very long to develop and require a lot of 1-1 matchups to be identified.
Instead we need to get the QB in rhythm by giving him short throws like those back shoulder curls, easy slants, screens, etc. David shaw can also learn a few pass concepts from leach with the rub routes, mesh concept to use a receiver to clear a zone while getting another receiver to get open.
Finally use the pass to setup the run. Another leach thing we can learn from. We have so much talent at TE that we should utilize in the pass game but have the ability to check into a run against lighter boxes.
Make it simple on the QB. Not every call should be on Chryst. Give him 3 options when he is ready for it instead of this overload
By layman on 09.19.17 8:43am
Agree
We have a tendency to overcomplicate matters. Simple is often the better route to go. Hit 5-yard passing routes so that their linebackers have to move away from the LOS, then gash them with the run. Rinse, repeat. This is the offense we ran under Luck, the offense Hogan executed brilliantly in 2012; and we have the TEs to do it again this year. Keep it simple and execute, but mix it up. We are so predictable that it hurts.
By Jeff Tarnungus on 09.19.17 1:23pm
I dont think they were fooling us
But some of us maybe were fooling ourselves.
Rice is not a good football team. They were overmatched by Stanford, which in 2017 so far is an average football team. We overreacted, probably. USC is a better football team than Stanford. SDSU is pretty evenly matched with Stanford, because the game could have gone the other way without that INT, but that just means they are evenly matched. Stanford is not a terrible team, but with the weaknesses it has, it is an average team this year, and in an improved Pac-12 (Cal, Oregon, SC all better, UCLA and Wazzu probably about as good as last year and Stanford worse) it will be a slog this year. Probably the worst year since the good run began. It would eventually happen. The key is what does the program do to make this a one year issue and not persist — that is the pressing question.
By Brendan Ross on 09.20.17 6:27pm
I agree that no team is ever permanently on top
At some point, Cal was bound to come back. Oregon declined and appears to be on the rebound. USC has such a strong tradition, recruiting base and funding that, with some steady coaching, they are going to have some success. Washington is already back; and Wazzu has become a strong program under the pirate. UCLA is still a question mark, while the Arizona schools have fallen on hard times recently. OSU appears to be really bad this year. Colorado and Utah both look solid.
Obviously, the "power" relations between teams in the Pac-12 are going to fluctuate; and Stanford has been riding at the top or near the top of this conference since 2010. It would be naive to assume this would continue forever. Still, all that said, my frustration with Shaw and this program is the following: both Harbaugh and Shaw have shown that a consistently top-performing football program at Stanford is not an impossibility, despite the academic constraints. Further, our recent success has allowed us to recruit players that would never have considered us in the past, particularly players that are aiming at a career in the NFL. Recent recruiting classes have been very good to excellent; and historically, Stanford football teams have been better than the sum of the parts and have punched above their recruiting rankings through excellent player development and coaching. Our recent dominance of the USC rivalry was not due to a higher talent level, but due to recruiting the right players for the Stanford system, developing them thoroughly and coaching them to succeed in this system.
So the apparent dip this year (and it still is early days, so I am not abandoning all hope) does not appear to be a problem of recruiting: we have added a 4-5 star QB every year (Burns, Chryst, Costello, Mills), have a strong running back corps, got stand-out players on the O-line, strong tight-ends, a number of excellent wide receivers, an elite defensive backfield, two fine kickers (Bailey and Toner). Granted, we seem to have messed up recruiting on the front seven and have not reloaded the way we should have done, so this could have been much better. But overall, the talent level is very high. What seems to be missing is player development, game preparation and in-game decision-making (adjustments, play-calling, etc.). Harbaugh used to turn 3-star athletes into 4-star players. In fact, NFL scouts looked at Stanford athletes as maximally developed: a Shayne Skov was the best player he was going to be, with not a lot of upside. Same for Toby Gerhart and Stepfan Taylor and a host of other players that have starred on Stanford teams. You cannot say that today. Player development appears to have deteriorated in recent years. Four-star recruits languish and seem to evolve into average performers. When two superstars like McCaffrey and Solomon leave the team, the drop off is noticeable. In the past, we would have just reloaded.
I don’t know whether Shaw has ever fired a member of his staff. Some have left, some have retired; but on the whole, he has hung on to his lieutenants and, while maintaining a high level of stability in the coaching staff, appears to have created a comfortable family-type atmosphere. My fear is that the staff have lost their edge and have become comfortable with the system, their ways of doing things and their coaching style. The problem is, as noted above, the competition is dynamic, changing, adjusting. All the success of the past does not mean anything this season; and I wonder whether Shaw and his staff are hungry enough, or is there a certain complacency. The player talent is there. But what will they make of it this season and in the future?
By Jeff Tarnungus on 09.21.17 1:49am
Very Aptly Put
Our season playing for Rose Bowl starts on Saturday. SDSU was frustrating, but perhaps it was a real wake-up call without conference implications. Both amazingly and maddeningly, Shaw has shown that he can right the course and take the team in a championship direction after some early and somewhat inexcusable hiccups.
What I ponder about most is that David Shaw (and his coaches) are managing this team 12 months a year………not just football season. It seems unfathomable to me that you get to the start of a season with a number of talented and experienced players and somehow have not already settled on the best ones to play each position. Don’t you wake up each morning after December and play with that position chart on the wall? Shaw has made the wrong calls at QB with Nunes and Burns….and maybe now sticking with Chryst. Or maybe our system makes it just too tough on QBs without unbelievable smarts and talent (Luck) or moxy (Hogan – who has parlayed his somewhat limited skill set to a back-up QB position in the NFL and led an 85 yard touchdown drive last week). We should be about the best in the nation at evaluating O-line players given our offense. We got it so wrong that we had to change everything after two games? We have flip flopped players to a lesser extent in the past as well. This speaks to both player development and player assessment. And it happens to some degree every year.
Underneath David Shaw’s calm and somewhat smug demeanor is a very competitive leader. He got pissed at the SDSU game………sure at the other team but his level of frustration with his own team must have been very high. I would not be surprised if this gets translated to the players this week-end and we beat up on UCLA. Shaw may be stubborn, but he is not stupid. I can’t believe that he doesn’t have the capacity to see the upside in this team and what he might be able to do about it (aside from reading Rule of Tree!)
I am concerned that Chryst’s injury continues to slow him down. Honestly, production aside, he looks much more slow and unable to react quickly to things unfolding around him. I could see Costello come in as a much more mobile QB who could be used initially like the SDSU QB. Lots of roll outs and quicker passes, until our O-line has gelled. I remember Hogan’s first TD pass in the Colorado game. Roll out right, the defense sags to address Hogan and …………….TD pass. It was like where was that play all year to that point?!
So the season starts anew. All is not lost…..yet.
Let’s rock the Bruins!
By hoyaparanoia on 09.21.17 9:05am