Just a few years ago, UCLA and Stanford played each other for the conference title. But Saturday’s contest had no implications on the PAC-12. Just California pride was at stake.
Stanford already clinched their bowl eligibility, and UCLA was out of the running with only three wins. Still, we got an exciting game as the Cardinal edged out the Bruins 49-42 to extend their win streak over the Bruins to 11 games.
After the game, David Shaw said, “I truly believe that this is a future PAC-12 championship game right here” and credited Chip Kelly for his reasoning.
In Kelly’s first season, his team has been underwhelming, but after last Saturday’s game, Shaw seems right. UCLA will threaten Stanford’s spot on the block sooner rather than later.
UCLA led this game at one point, and they easily could have won, getting the ball twice in the closing minutes. For Stanford, the extra week of rest definitely paid off. Bryce Love was visibly healthier. JJ Arcega-Whiteside returned and scored three touchdowns. KJ Costello was flawless after an early interception, throwing five touchdowns and a game-winning bomb to Osiris St. Brown.
Arcega-Whiteside was not surprised by his quarterback’s turnaround, stating, “If you get a chance to see and talk to him on the sideline, you know that no matter what happened in the past his motor is still going. Nothing phases him. Nothing affects him.”
“[KJ Costello] is coming into his own,” Shaw commented, “and over the next year, he’s going to be one of the best quarterbacks in America.”
The trust between coach and player has clearly been established. In the last four games, Costello threw over 40 passes twice and over 30 passes the other two times. In all of those games, he threw for over 300 yards.
Costello was at his best, and the Bruins still almost broke Stanford’s streak. Why? Because Stanford was defenseless against the pass.
Stanford allowed Wilton Speight to throw for 466 yards, an eye-popping number against a team that averaged less than 240 yards per game this season. Overall, Stanford’s defensive performances have been troubling throughout the year, allowing an average of 36.5 points per game in their four losses.
Traditionally, the Cardinal identity has been founded on a spectacular defense and a spectacular rushing attack. Traditionally, Stanford does not win shootouts. That has not been the case this year. The defense lacks star power, and the rushing attack has disappeared, despite having Heisman runner-up Bryce Love in the backfield. Meanwhile, the passing game has improved.
Stanford football has regressed to two four-loss seasons over the past two years, but at the same time though, there’s been some positives. David Shaw, in my opinion, has adjusted to his personnel. Specifically, he has become more reliant on his quarterback rather than running back.
Next year, I’m confident Costello will return as the focal point on offense. As for Costello’s weapons, most can return next year. Trent Irwin is out of eligibility, and it seems like Arcega-Whiteside will depart for the NFL. But young, impressive pass-catchers like Colby Parkinson and St. Brown should return though, and the Cardinal passing game will continue to flourish.
One game remains on the schedule, and if Stanford hopes to defeat Cal, they’ll need that passing game to thrive. Cal prides itself in stopping the run, allowing fewer than 100 yards in four of their last five games. The defense collectively has allowed no more than 21 points in their last six games. In other words, the defense is legit.
Stanford has been taunting UCLA for 11 years now. The Rose Bowl must feel like home for David Shaw and company. Heck, they’ve only lost one game there this decade. But David Shaw needs K.J. Costello to win this upcoming game and to thrive next season, or else Stanford may lose its reign over the state of California.
Comments
Probably losing Kaden Smith too...
By brandtjl1 on 11.26.18 12:35pm
Shaw probably wonders whose team he's coaching.
This is to the detriment of the program. Not because KJ Costello isn’t a total gamer and one of the best downfield passers we’ve had since I’ve been following, but because we are not going to go far as an air raid offense.
The running game helps our defense and as we’ve seen in a number of games, our lack of ball control allows the other team’s offense the opportunity to rack up points. We’re not going to win the Pac-12 throwing the ball 40 times a game. If Shaw doesn’t regain the run-first and run in your face mentality, we’re going to be irrelevant real quickly.
We don’t get better at running the ball by not running the ball.
By Blackjoy on 11.26.18 2:24pm
There is a whole lot of space between the Air Raid and a run dominant team
See Washington. Or Alabama, Georgia, Clemson or Ohio State.
Jim Harbaugh’s Michigan provides a cautionary tale. In the modern age of football, banking on a dominant defense and a run-first offense can only take you but so far. If you don’t have a team that is capable of sometimes being explosive, you’re putting a cap on its potential and there are plenty of teams that can exploit that.
By Omagus on 11.26.18 7:27pm
Amen
By stanford6thman on 11.26.18 8:00pm
Stanford was run/pass 50/50 in our best years.
UW, Alabama, and Georgia, are dominant run programs. Without Myles Gaskin, UW would have been a .500 team. Alabama is totally run dominated and so is Georgia. Against Michigan, Ohio State passed the ball 31 times and ran it 40.
Running the ball and playing defense is how you get to the CFP. Air Raid is never going to get us to the CFP. It will never get Mike Leach to the CFP. Even Oregon, which had mediocre defense got to the BCS and CFP by running the ball under Chip Kelly.
Harbaugh went 10-1 until he faced Ohio State and lost because his defense didn’t show up. His defense-dominated-run first team is probably better than any team in the Pac-12 and but for whatever mental block his program has against Ohio State, he’d be in the CFP.
By Blackjoy on 11.27.18 9:42am
"UW, Alabama, and Georgia, are dominant run programs"
Not exactly.
Per cfbstats ,here is the offensive breakdown for the four teams this year
Georgia is the only one of the four whose offense comes primarily from running the ball. Both Ohio State and Alabama—ALABAMA—get significantly more of their offense through the air versus on the ground. But in some ways this is immaterial. My previous comment is simply pointing out that having an offense that can become explosive when it needs does not require going to the extreme of implementing the Air Raid.
Exactly. And if you happen to be in a game where your defense doesn’t show up, it would really help to have an offense that is capable of matching how explosive Ohio State was on Saturday.
By Omagus on 11.27.18 6:48pm
On Harbaugh
Stewart Mandel had the following observation over at The Athletic yesterday:
To some extent, the same can be said of Stanford, because we basically follow Harbaugh’s approach and philosophy for the most part (although Shaw did tweak them more this year than in any other because the OL and running game simply weren’t working). The "Stanford identity" that is associated with us is mostly Harbaugh’s approach to football. Thankfully, we don’t have Ohio State in the Pac-12. But … I suspect we will have something like them soon enough once Chip gets his own recruits at UCLA in a year or two. Note that what Mandel is suggesting is not adoption of an Air Raid or Big 12 type of approach, but rather that the old school approach of smashmouth plus D, which is also our own "identity", has issues when it comes up against a team with a truly great offense. Yes, we beat Oregon’s offense-first team in 12 and 13 doing it that way, but we had a truly exceptional group of linemen on both sides and superb linebackers all playing at the same time (and, in the case of 12, executing almost perfectly for an entire game) — a personnel "perfect storm" that is exceptionally hard to replicate with even slight dropoffs in performance at those positions.
By Brendan Ross on 11.28.18 9:08am
Shaw follows an NFL philosophy, not Harbaugh
Shaw was Harbaugh’s offensive coordinator the entire time Harbaugh was at Stanford. Shaw has stated that his approach is one that is tried and true and one that works in the NFL: Run the ball.
Harbaugh’s value-add is his ability to motivate players and identify competent staff. Harbaugh is not some genius play caller or offensive savant. Nor his Harbaugh some defensive genius/savant. Harbaugh is a leader in the right circumstance and college football is the right circumstance, especially when it comes to revitalizing a moribund program (which he’s done like three times now).
It is. Especially when you aren’t paying kids under the table. Stanford’s had particular trouble in getting great defense and offense to sync up in the same year. It’s gotten worse now that we’re routinely having players leave early. Imagine if McCaffery, Solomon Thomas, and Harrison Philips had all stayed? Yes, other programs have lots of early defections, but we don’t have that kind of talent three deep like Alabama.
The upshot is Stanford is going to have much less margin for error in recruiting and coaching and the Stanford coaches are going to have to work that much harder at recruiting the right players for the program.
By Blackjoy on 11.28.18 10:33am
"I’ll take your attempt to use statistics in good faith and point out that you’re looking at the wrong stat."
I mean…maybe. But as I already stated, the stats are immaterial to my original point. Which, again, is that there are ways to field an explosive offense that don’t require using the Air Raid.
There is obviously a whole lot to criticize about Art Briles as a person. But I will say that the offense he implemented while at Baylor was a) brilliant and b) my personal favorite in all of college football. He was often mentioned as an Air Raid guy due to being a former Leach assistant but the offense he designed was completely different. In many ways it was actually the polar opposite because it was a run-based offense; it just also made you really pay the moment it caught you slipping in the defensive passing game. Ian Boyd did a really nice deep dive into it but the summary is that it figured out how to be explosive via the run and the pass better than any offense that came before it (and probably since).
By Omagus on 11.28.18 12:24pm
Run dominant is a function of plays, not yardage
I’ll take your attempt to use statistics in good faith and point out that you’re looking at the wrong stat. The issue is play calling. Are the OC’s calling more run plays or more passing plays and the answer is just as I stated:
So I was 100% correct when I pointed out that UW, Alabama, and Georgia are run dominated teams and left out Ohio State which still runs 50% of the time. What’s more, the better the running game, the more efficient the passing game tends to be.
By Blackjoy on 11.28.18 9:59am
This is the important point.
And the run game basically opens up the passing game. USC had no answer for a basic cover 2 defense, because they had no running game to speak of.
By RavenousUte on 11.29.18 8:01am
Your Ohio - Michigan example is a disanalogy.
That statement is an example of circular logic. You have to outscore the opponent regardless of what type of defense you have. By the same logic, if your offense doesn’t show up, "it would really help" if you have a defense that can stop the other team from scoring. Cal beat UW without scoring an offensive touchdown. Likewise, UW beat WSU, only scoring 28 points, but holding them to 15. Neither Cal nor UW put up as much offense as Stanford against the same opponent, but those teams still prevailed because of defense.
Defense wins championships. It’s true in football and its true in basketball. Defense can create turnovers and dramatically reduce the burden on the offense by improving field position and keeping the opposing defense on the field longer. Stanford has had a number of years of explosive playmakers and high scoring offenses. But we didn’t win the conference until our defense improved.
UW did not regain its prominence in the conference until its defense improved. In fact, this year, UW won the North and their offense was like two touchdowns worse than it was back in 2016. But their defense is still #1 in the conference.
Offense is statistically harder to execute than defense. That’s why programs predicated on offense, like Mike Leach’s offense, don’t win conference titles unless it’s a function of running the ball (a la Oregon).
Finally, the Ohio vs Michigan game is a rivalry game which introduces a bunch of intangibles and is more likely to result in an anomalous outcome. This year, Ohio State has been mediocre by Ohio State Standards and yet they put up more point against a better Harbaugh team than in any previous meeting. In fact, that’s the most points a Harbaugh team has ever given up according to ESPN. So yeah, I’ll file that under outlier.
By Blackjoy on 11.28.18 10:22am
"That statement is an example of circular logic."
Nope.
The point I was making was about a team’s ability to adapt, or lack thereof, if their preferred method is not working (and as Brendan Ross points out, Stewart Mandel makes the same point). Actually, Harbaugh and Mike Leach essentially have the same problem—it’s just that it comes from different ends of the spectrum. Neither coach has developed an effective counter-punch if the opposing team isn’t succumbing to the first punch.
By Omagus on 11.28.18 12:24pm