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Sunday afternoon thoughts - Louisville - msqueri - 11-01-2026

1. The road woes continue, with little sign we belong in Power Four but at least with some signs of life. Are we the worst power team (dropped to Sagarin #97 and SP+ #118)? Yes, with Big Game shaping up to be a clash over who avoids the dunce cap. Are we playing better in the last three games than we did earlier in the season? Also yes, with scoreboard outcomes befitting #95, #61, and #118 reinforcing how miserable this team is yet undeniably also being better than the first six games befitting #83, #151, #141, #70, #233, and #182. In the big picture, it's hard to get past the bleakness of a program that's so bad that SP+ views it as competing for worst in the land in offense (with Cal), defense (with West Virginia), and special teams (with Cal and Colorado) and for which the recruiting pipeline under supposedly turnaround leadership looks like it's somehow taking a step backward. Belief in where this program is going is not very rational. Nonetheless, Luck and Pritchard aren't going anywhere and neither are the program's most incorrigible diehards. What's left to us surveying the wreckage is to find enough glimmers of hope that this interminably long crawl phase of the third post-Shaw reboot can spin its way into a better situation this offseason. The most obvious source of spin is four wins with a better than even chance for one more win. There are also obscure statistical insights such as our yards per play margin on the season being right on track with last season as the best of this bleak era. Those still inclined to saintlike patience in the belief that a rebuild from shattered foundations requires multi-year culture and program building may still choose forbearance. For the rest, it gets increasingly frustrating each game that goes on without the team showing it belongs in power football. Both camps understand that what matters much more than the games is what we do in talent acquisition after the season. But for now, games are all we have so let's turn over the stones in the rubble.

2. I came into the Louisville game with subterranean expectations and, as a result, found myself less despondent than some compatriots. We were tied with 11 minutes left in the third quarter, an entire quarter more of sticking with an opponent on the road than we've seen this season. Mathematically, garbage time didn't start until there was only 10:13 left in the game. Our -1.62 points per non-garbage drive margin was bad but much better than the -4.11 against Notre Dame, -5.04 against Wake Forest, and -2.72 against Duke. Yesterday was the first road game this season the offense even scored more than a point per drive. The defense was in the ballpark of what they allowed in the Duke and Notre Dame games. In other words, it was terrible but not quite as terrible as all the other road games. One can believe that the degree of improvement is just polishing a turd or that the longest journey begins with single steps. My vote is that there's always a greater risk Stanford's complacency and country club coddling fails to light a fire than there is that insufficient patience leads us to change course from something that would have worked. Still, I have to acknowledge yesterday wasn't as bad as the previous road humiliations.

3. Louisville is a very good team (now joining Notre Dame, Miami, and Wake Forest as Sagarin top 25 teams), coming in with a yards per play advantage over its opponents of +2.08. Unfortunately, we made them look even better, +3.70, a pretty comprehensive beating. We scored 2.18 points per non-garbage drive, making the #93 points per drive defense look like #65. We allowed 3.8 points per non-garbage drive, making the #21 points per drive offense look like #2. Not captured in either stat was another seven points coughed up on a badly-executed trick play that became a scoop and score in the opposite direction. The offense and defense both came up short relative to Louisville's norm. The Stanford offense's 5.09 yards per play is the most we've had in a road game since last September's Virginia game, but it must be noted Louisville has a crappy defense and we had about half a yard per play less than Louisville's average allowed. The other side of the ball was a contrast in terms of facing a dynamic opponent but not in terms of the subpar result. Louisville came in as one of the nation's most explosive offenses and we gave up a yard more per play than even their stellar average, giving up a whopping 8.79 yards per play. As bad as the Stanford defense has frequently been, those are the most video game numbers on a per play basis in three years, going back to the Oregon State and USC blowouts in 2023. This is the second worst yards per play margin we've had this season, ahead of only Wake Forest. The Isaac Brown 75 yard touchdown came in garbage time, so while the margin was pathetic I don't think it swamps the evidence that it was a relatively competitive road game for us. But competitive for us is still really bad.

4. The one thing that wasn't bad was the pass defense. That's hard to understand as you watch an opponent connect on passes of 44, 30, 22 (touchdown), 18 (touchdown), 18, and 19 yards, but this is an explosive opponent we contained through the air. Pass defense wasn't our problem. Louisville is fourth in the nation in yards per attempt and would have been higher today except we held them a yard and a half under their average (and also under their passer rating average). The problem was that Louisville demolished us on the ground, gaining 296 yards on a comical 8.97 yards per carry, over two and a half yards per carry more than their norm coming in. They are as explosive on the ground as they are in the air, but five of their other seven opponents did better in this phase than we did whereas five of their seven opponents did worse than us in yards per attempt and a sixth was right in our ballpark. We've seen this throughout the year that Richard's defense does better against the pass than the run. The holistic picture is ugly.

5. The passing game was also a relatively bright spot for us when we had the ball. We threw for about half a yard less per attempt than Louisville's average allowed and a slightly better passer rating than their average, and the passer rating would have been better but for an interception they snagged that hurt them. While Ford and Irvin battled, the ultimate output of our run game was quite bleak, 39 yards less than any FBS team has had against the lame Louisville run defense and the worst yards per carry of anybody, even Villanova. I had thought (hoped) that the run game had turned a corner, but this was a step backward. Between the passing and the running, while the former was better for us the commonality for both phases was a debilitating inability to convert on third downs.....2 for 16 is no way to succeed on offense. A handful of big plays kept the scoreboard interesting for a while. The underlying performance was considerably less competitive than a tie in the third quarter suggested.

RE: Sunday afternoon thoughts - Louisville - msqueri - 11-01-2026

6. To my eyes Warren had a solid game against a bad defense, with the highs of several explosive plays he spun it nicely and the lows of bad timing/decision-making/pocket presence (albeit with protection at fault) on the very badly timed sacks (the first quarter fourth down and the strip sack he recovered as part of the disastrous end of half sequence that killed our momentum). Taking a sack on fourth down is horrible. Throwing a fourth down interception downfield on a ball the receiver had a chance to make the play is a good decision. Unfortunately, right after I pointed out that our nation-pacing drops proclivity was a function of the first three games and seemed to be something we cleaned up, we went and had another butterfingers game, with four drops. That made Warren's life much more of a slog than it should have been, and he still did ok. Total QBR accounts for this kind of context and as a result thought that on balance he played well, 29th of 111 in Total QBR this week, one of his three best games this year for the second week in a row. On the season he's 65th of 141 in the nation. Definite bright spot for us.

7. The success Ford is having the second half of the season is also nice to see. His third consecutive 100+ yard from scrimmage game joins CJ WIlliams and Casey Filkins as the only players to do that for us this era. If Ford can keep the streak going another game he will be the first to have four games that productive in a row since Bryce Love in 2017. Also worthy of a shoutout is Nico Brown's first 100 yard game at the FBS level (though Georgia Tech was about as close as you can get). Hall's drops were killer, unfortunately all-time bad hands so far in his career. The Black touchdown had to be one of our most surprising in years. Credit to Pritchard for the off tendency call and to Black, Warren, and the protection for the execution. [Moving the chains (first down) leaderboard: Ford (6), Nico Brown (4), Irvin (2) Black, Blackburn] PFF assessed Warren, Brown, Anderson, and Ford as having good performances and Hall, House, High, Holt, Blackburn, Onovughe, Williams and Pale as weak links. Pale has most consistently been the weakest link all season and PFF says Fattig got in for 11 snaps. It would be nice to see some accountability and to give Fattig the time with the 1s in practice the next two weeks and the start against Virginia Tech.

8. The calamitous and likely game-deciding hook-and-ladder didn't bother me all that much. Louisville was the much better team and we were holding on surprisingly well by our standards to even be in the game at that point. A less creative play call may or may not have worked on 3rd and 12 and if not Louisville likely would have made it a two score game just the same a few plays later. The other play that arguably sealed the game was Blackburn's lack of detail in where he lined up, wiping out Ford's awesome 19 yard catch and run touchdown. That drive then stalling was the mathematical start of garbage time. I would have liked to see this game play out without those two plays, but we got the result we deserved.

9. Green stood out as our best player yesterday. The tone-setting tackle for loss on the pass in the flat on the opening drive, two pass breakups, and general activity level stood out. Cooper, Davis, and Mattingly were the only other defenders to have three positive box score plays. I said last week it seemed Cooper was benched, but it seems that may have been health-related and he was back in a prominent role yesterday. He's been better recently than he usually is. Davis has taken some lumps this year but is starting to look more like the player I thought we had, with the big-time tackle for loss on the fake field goal a real highlight. Mattingly is just so frustrating. He makes some plays but he's a glaring weak link. After easing back into action last week, Morris was a mainstay, acquitting himself well with a pass breakup and a run stop. Staples had a nice two play sequence to force a punt and McAllister also had a third down tackle to force a field goal. Galvan played through the final whistle, just wish there were highlights before garbage time. PFF assessed Green (very good game), Morris, Cooper, and Galvan as having good games, with several others respectable and Eckhardt, Tafiti, Bryant, Mattingly, and Bachhuber as weak links. The eye test for Eckhardt was not kind in this one. I typically only call out starter-level snaps when it comes to PFF grades, but it's notable that Sumlin and Pollard played very little and were nuked. Pollard's struggles aside, an unsung part of our season is getting credible play out of corners in a not very talented room post-Nicholson injury. Among all 20+ snap per game defenders, four of the five guys with 70+ season grades are corners (Bryant, Nicholson, McAllister, Morris), with BMO the only non-corner grading at that echelon. Getting some solid corner play may be the one thing the Richard defense has accomplished. That being said, playing time before yesterday relied a lot on far less successful Pollard and Richardson. Hopefully we continue to see Morris be the man as we did yesterday. (Being thankful for Morris' availability was not on my preseason bingo card but good on him for persevering)

10. Kenney and the place kicking operation have had a rough go of it this year (and weren't good last year either), so it was really nice to see a 48 yard field goal. Kenney also took care of business on his kickoffs. Flintoft had net punts of 10 yards to midfield (catastrophic coverage), 32 to the Stanford 41 (sub-optimal but could have been worse with a block), 42 to the 29 (nice boomer ultimately solid in field position despite a 12 yard return), and 43 to the 26 (solid). Thorpe had a 10 yard garbage time punt return. There was a nice opening kickoff tone-setting coverage tackle by Kuo and McComber as well as other coverage tackles by Eckhardt, Edwards (potential touchdown saving on the punt coverage catastrophe, and Randall. I already shouted out Double D's points-saving play on the fake. Tre Williams had a personal foul on a touchback. I don't know what he did. On paper that seems a special kind of stupid.

11. Distinguished in Defeat: Nico Brown, Jay Green, Emmet Kenney, Malcolm Agnew

12. It feels like delaying the inevitable to have the last bye come before a road game in this era of abject uncompetitiveness on the road. I have yet to see evidence we use byes to good effect, either institutionally or under this staff. We also are reasonably healthy at this point, with the significant exception of two star defenders the bye won't help. Our recruiting trail has gone cold enough that the best reasonable hope for a bye is to make investments in 2028 and 2029 relationships that eventually pan out. The main thing I'm looking forward to the next two weeks is being in the stadium for Enter Sandman. Pumped about that and the roadie with some fellow sickos. Looking beyond the next two weeks, though, this team sitting at four wins and showing some signs of life relative to the first half of the schedule leaves big goals still in front of us. Crazy as it is, even though we are the worst power team a bowl berth is still very much alive. Let's use the bye well, keep working, put good work in on recruiting, prepare for all the major things that have to go much differently in the portal than past cycles, and keep improving. Who knows, maybe we can have our first good road game and pull a shocker in Blacksburg.

RE: Sunday afternoon thoughts - Louisville - needle - 11-01-2026

Galvan was a very good transfer signee, but the other scholarship ILB guys are clearly much worse than Mattingly. It's the position room most bereft of talent with Galvan's departure (he's out of eligibility after this season) imo, so Stanford must do everything it can to sign hopefully two starting-caliber LBers (and keep Mattingly and maybe Z. Johnson for depth).