1. Perspective

Such a bummer to not have time to dip the frothy fingers of Cardinal ponderings into the gooballs of another great football game. I am getting crushed at work and on the farm. Less time for The Farm. I expect that to change next week, as the first Playoff rankings will be released.

But I wish I had more time to expound on the glory of Coach David Shaw’s 4^th down decision-making in this past game. Early in the 2^nd quarter, facing a 4^th and 3 from Washington’s 29, Shaw went to the power formation. Hogan killed or pretended to kill the first play option and then kept barking to try to draw the defense offside. For a second, I thought it was just a ploy that would end with a timeout and a field goal try. But then the center snapped the ball and Hogan pitched to McCaffrey. Got to love it. Give it to your best player in that situation. Beautiful call, and I’m going to go ahead and give credit to Shaw, Bloomgren, and/or Hogan for the decoy of lulling UW into thinking Stanford was just trying to catch the defense offside. That was a nice little twist.

In the 3^rd quarter, on 4^th and 1 from its own 46, Stanford again went for it. Mathematically, it is absolutely, without question, the correct call. Remound Wright picked up the first down without much trouble. I am very pleased to see Shaw make the correct call here, and it was against one of the best defenses in the conference. We’ll see if perhaps Shaw has seen the light on how to handle these 4^th down situations.

I am completely loving Stanford’s offense. It has the power—sometimes boring—run game that brings a ton of satisfaction (and success) over the course of the game. But it also has a lot of fun and dynamic plays. It is complicated, and can be even more complicated, but the train is always moved down the tracks by the offensive line and the power run. It is a weird juxtaposition, and I am really enjoying it.

And we keep seeing new plays. There was a screen pass to fullback Daniel Marx that went for a nice gain. I’m pretty sure we haven’t seen that all year.

Of course, my favorite play is still when McCaffrey comes from the backfield or the near slot and goes one-on-one against a linebacker. There are four other receivers out downfield, so all the cornerbacks and safeties are tied up. One-on-one against a linebacker! As the ESPN announcer said, “That just isn’t fair.” He gets about five yards past the line of scrimmage then jukes the linebacker, usually slanting inside. It is unstoppable. On 2^nd and 19, McCaffrey picked up 24 yards with this play. We have only seen it at most once per game. If we’re in a tight battle, we may need to use it a few more times.

2. Up Next: Washington State (5-2)

Walk me out in the cold, rain, and snow, my friends. Well, no snow, but it will be cold, wet, and windy. Got to think this favors Stanford. But it feels like a weird night, Halloween and all. You have to think Stanford will be able to move the pile, so I think this game might come down to turnovers. If Stanford can hold at least even on turnover margin, it has a nice chance to win the ball game.