After years of being over-optimistic in this score prediction game in the past, I promised myself this year I would pick Stanford to lose three or four times, so after USC (which I did not predict), I’m currently picking the remaining losses to be UCF, Washington State, and Notre Dame.
Stanford can and should win this game. As far as I’m concerned, UCF haven’t proven anything against good competition. They’ve shown themselves to be susceptible to the running game, and I think Cameron Scarlett is way way underappreciated and under-estimated. He may be the hero of this game and show the world how good he’s become. I rewatched the USC game, and feel like if we had KJ, we score a lot more points. Maybe not 45, but a lot more than 20.
Re-watching the USC game was worrisome in terms of pass coverage. Everyone’s gripes about the thinness at safety Were prescient. I had to keep referring to the roster list to try to keep track of all the different defensive backs we tried throwing in there to slow the SC aerial attack. USC finally got offensive momentum when they realized we just didn’t have enough backs to cover their elite three receivers, and they realized with what we were showing, Pittman and was going to be open every play. But while UCF has maybe one very good receiver, and one or two more serviceable ones, it’s nothing like USC. I don’t expect Stanford will ever face a wide receiver matchup problem like they did with USC, except maybe Washington State, and maybe, hopefully USC again.
So I really do hope and think Stanford can win. Maybe Scarlett has a coming out party, the tunnel workers’ union returns, and Stanford grinds out over 250 yards running and eats up the clock. Or maybe the defensive line squeezes their running lanes, and gets to their quarterback. Or maybe KJ demonstrates the full power of this offense and wins a shootout.
But I just feel like my heart gets too much in the way, and I just need to pick up a few losses each season. So I’m gonna have to pick this to be one of them. The humid weather, the distance travelled, the two away games in a row, the three brutal opponents in a row, the injuries, the blown assignments and lack of gap discipline I’ve seen especially against USC, the young defensive backs who are not Adebo, the missed tackles, the degree to which this is UCF’s biggest game of the year, it’s just a lot.
Stanford can and should win this game. As far as I’m concerned, UCF haven’t proven anything against good competition. They’ve shown themselves to be susceptible to the running game, and I think Cameron Scarlett is way way underappreciated and under-estimated. He may be the hero of this game and show the world how good he’s become. I rewatched the USC game, and feel like if we had KJ, we score a lot more points. Maybe not 45, but a lot more than 20.
Re-watching the USC game was worrisome in terms of pass coverage. Everyone’s gripes about the thinness at safety Were prescient. I had to keep referring to the roster list to try to keep track of all the different defensive backs we tried throwing in there to slow the SC aerial attack. USC finally got offensive momentum when they realized we just didn’t have enough backs to cover their elite three receivers, and they realized with what we were showing, Pittman and was going to be open every play. But while UCF has maybe one very good receiver, and one or two more serviceable ones, it’s nothing like USC. I don’t expect Stanford will ever face a wide receiver matchup problem like they did with USC, except maybe Washington State, and maybe, hopefully USC again.
So I really do hope and think Stanford can win. Maybe Scarlett has a coming out party, the tunnel workers’ union returns, and Stanford grinds out over 250 yards running and eats up the clock. Or maybe the defensive line squeezes their running lanes, and gets to their quarterback. Or maybe KJ demonstrates the full power of this offense and wins a shootout.
But I just feel like my heart gets too much in the way, and I just need to pick up a few losses each season. So I’m gonna have to pick this to be one of them. The humid weather, the distance travelled, the two away games in a row, the three brutal opponents in a row, the injuries, the blown assignments and lack of gap discipline I’ve seen especially against USC, the young defensive backs who are not Adebo, the missed tackles, the degree to which this is UCF’s biggest game of the year, it’s just a lot.