Stanford, in most recent years, is one of those teams that opposing teams generally don’t worry too much about. Considering last year’s 1-11 finish, when Stanford (1-1 overall, 0-1 Pacific-10 Conference) was held to 10 points or less in 10 of its 12 games, fans can look at this matchup against the Cardinal as an almost sure win.
That’s not entirely the case this year.
While No. 13 Oregon (3-0, 0-0) should be confident heading into its first conference game – they beat Stanford 48-10 in last year’s opening game, after all – the Cardinal are showing signs of improvement under first-year coach Jim Harbaugh.
That, and the fact that Stanford crushed the hopes of Oregon playing in the BCS title game in 2001 when the Ducks were 6-0 and ranked fifth in the country before collapsing in the 4th quarter and losing 49-42 in Eugene.
Maybe Harbaugh, who gained notoriety this offseason for being vocal about Michigan’s academic standards and calling USC potentially the best team ever, is reminding his team about that game and relying on motivation from last week’s drubbing of San Jose State, a team the Cardinal lost to 35-34 last year.
“They’re not the Stanford we’ve faced the past two years,” center Max Unger said. “Overall, as a team, they’ve got some more talent.”
That, and the fact that Harbaugh has instilled some of his swagger to his team that, at times, lacked a competitive intensity during points in games last year, according to some of the Oregon players.
“New coach, new attitude, things like that,” tackle Geoff Schwartz said. “I think they’re just a lot more passionate. They play harder. They come to the ball. They tackle harder. They just look like a totally different team than last season.”
While some of that can be attributed to a new head coach’s philosophy, Stanford’s new defensive coordinator Scott Shafer, who coordinated one of the top defenses in the nation the past two years at Western Michigan, can be credited for revamping the defensive intensity, notably in last week’s win.
But it remains to be seen how his defense will be able to handle the spread offense. Last year, the offense piled on 298 yards rushing and 236 yards passing against the overmatched Cardinal defense. While most of those offensive players will be starting for the Ducks, they shouldn’t expect to see Stanford surrender yards so easily.
“Last year they weren’t prepared for what we were doing,” Oregon coach Mike Bellotti said.
The Ducks will have to wait if Shafer has his own ideas about slowing Oregon down.
“I haven’t seen what they’ve done against the spread so that should be interesting,” Unger said. “But as far as personnel goes, they look tough up front. I mean, they play really, really hard.”
Of course, Oregon believes it has plenty more to offer, hoping to cause opposing teams fits while trying to keep up with the play calling of the offense.
“We’ve barely grazed the surface of the offense,” wide receiver Brian Paysinger said. “I think we have a lot more weapons to open. It’s just the beginning.”
Even after shutting out a team for the first time in 11 years, Harbaugh doesn’t sound too optimistic about his team’s chances to contain the explosive Oregon offense. It’s not an easy thing to do when it averages more than 500 yards of offense per game and believes it has the potential to do more damage.
“That’s the thing that everybody is trying to figure out, how to slow them down,” Harbaugh said in the Oregonian. “I don’t know if I have the answer.”