SB Nation - Anthony Kimble

Getting to know the Stanford Cardinal: Q&A with Various Provocations

jtlight — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 20:08:54 -0000

Stanford is going to have a very tough time stopping the Oregon rushing attack, led by Jeremiah Masoli and LaMichael James.

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What? A Stanford blog? YES! We found one! It was tough work scouring the depths of the internet, but we found a real life Stanford fan who writes about the Cardinal online! We caught up with Darius, whose blog is Various Provocations, and asked him a few questions about the Cardinal. Many thanks to Darius for giving us a bit of insight into how Cardinal fans are looking at the upcoming game.

There's been some debate among Oregon fans about the strength of the Stanford offensive line. What are their strengths and weaknesses and how will they be able to handle a quick Oregon defensive line?

The Stanford offensive line is excellent all-around. It run-blocks very well and pass-blocks pretty well too; statistically, they match up pretty well with the Pac-10. Mostly it's a zone-blocking scheme that's being used, though I think they switch sometimes to man blocking. In terms of specific players, we start two redshirt freshmen. David DeCastro at RG (#52) is excellent on traps and pulls (particularly on the classic "Power" play) and very very strong; he matched up pretty well with Brian Price and Lawrence Guy, whom I see as the premier DTs in the conference.

The other redshirt freshman starting is Jonathan Martin (# who's been starting off-and-on at LT due to Allen Smith's injury problems (who's truly an unfortunate player: a first-day NFL pick two years ago, he's had two years destroyed due to knee inuries) Martin is maybe a bit undersized, but very mobile--Harbaugh has sent Martin into motion pre-snap to block on running plays. If there's a weakness in the line--and I see it as a minor weakness--it's senior RT Chris Marinelli, who's a natural guard, not a tackle; he's gotten beaten a few times while pass blocking.

I expect the Stanford OL v. the Oregon DL to be the most favorable matchup for Stanford: departed OL coach Chris Dalman was a disciple of Mike Shanahan, who favored lighter, more mobile offensive lines. The line is built in that image; moreover, it's very strong. I expect Martin and DeCastro to be NFL players when they leave Stanford (barring injury)

Andrew Luck has been very efficient this year, but has not excelled when the game has been put in his hands. What do you expect from him on Saturday?

I guess I'd quibble with the premise here, that Luck has been bad when the game has been placed in his hands. There are three games where the passing game took the forefront: Oregon State, Wake Forest and Arizona. Luck passed for 270+ yard and 430+ yards against Wake and Arizona, with pretty good accuracy; meanwhile, against Oregon State--Owusu, our handsless WR, dropped an 80 yard bomb on the first play of the game. Obviously, Stanford won neither game, but that wasn't Luck's fault. It was the defense's in both of those games, along with weird fluky stuff that happened in each game that I won't burden your readers with; suffice it to say both of those games could have been wins with changed circumstances. You might say a win's a win, and that's true, but never confuse achievement with performance. The hype for Luck is entirely justified: his arm strength is superlative; his accuracy is improving. A lot of the time, he hits receivers with passes that are catchable, but don't lead them well. That could stand to improve. He is surprisingly mobile, though obviously not as good as Masoli. He sometimes has problems sensing the rush, and sometimes has problems checking down. But he doesn't really throw interceptions or force the ball that much. We mostly have Luck throw deep, which accounts for his 58% completion rate (but 9.4 yards per attempt!). In my opinion, Andrew Luck's the best young QB in the Pac-10, better than Barkley and Foles (haven't seen Tuel, so who knows about him).

The main question in my mind, offensively this game, is whether or not Stanford is able to keep it close. Watching a few games of Oregon's, I think Stanford ought to be able to run the ball (USC had 5.9 ypc once the sacks are filtered out; last year against Oregon, Stanford's Anthony Kimble, the since-graduated backup, ran for 4.4 ypc with a dramatically worse QB piloting the offense at Autzen). The question is whether we'll be able to; obviously you can't run down by a substantial margin, which happened to USC last week. Oregon's defense's best weapon is Oregon's offense.

Toby Gerhart: best running back in the state of California?

Simple one here: yes. Jahvid Best might get more hype and NFL love, but he doesn't perform particularly well against the best defenses. Gerhart always performs. Against last year's awesome USC defense, he ran for 100+ yards and 4.4 ypc. He isn't just a grind-it-out back either; he's had multiple 40+ yrd gains and a 60 yard gain. He can win footraces. He's also impossible to tackle high, and his feet are nimble enough to get out of the way of tackle attempts low. He's just great.

The Stanford defense has a monunental task in front of them. What are your expectations this for them this weekend?

My expectations are that Stanford's defense will get gashed. As far as I can tell, dealing with Oregon's offense is about discipline: not biting on the myriad fakes, sticking to your gap or assignment, and tackling surely in your one-on-one assignment. The defense should be fine on the first two; it will suck at the last one. Stanford defenses have sucked at tackling for as long as I've watched Stanford teams (2005, when I was a freshman there). Moreover, if you love watching bubble screens, I bet you'll see a lot of them against Stanford on Saturday: our corners give up big cushions because otherwise we'd be too slow. To be fair, there's been a lot of shuffling on defense towards younger players who were better recruited--Delano Howell at safety is a huge, disciplined hitter; Shayne Skov (#11) is a true freshman who's done good work--but I don't expect much. If Stanford wins, here's how we'll do it: a key turnover or two, combined with limiting Oregon to a FG on a drive it could've gotten a TD in, then scoring 35+ ourselves. I feel pretty decent about the chances of scoring 35+; the odds of holding Oregon in that range are low.

Jim Harbaugh has done a great job turning around a program that was very low for quite a few years. Will he be able to push Stanford into the upper echelon of the Pac-10?

The only thing that can stop Stanford from consistently being an upper-echelon team is Jim Harbaugh leaving. Who knows what the odds of that are. I've heard conjecture about that in both directions, so I really have no read on how likely that is. I will tell you that the places he'd leave to are these: San Diego Chargers, because he has a relationship with the owner, Oakland Raiders, because he and Al Davis hit it off when Harbaugh coached there, and Michigan, if only because that's his alma mater (assuming they'd have him, after that controversy where Harbaugh dissed their academic standards). But if he does stay, you can expect continued success. Harbaugh's an increasingly creative offensive coach, now that the cupboard is filling up, and a great recruiter, at least on the offensive side of the ball. I have my worries about his defensive recruiting, but I guess time will tell (or it won't, if he leaves).

Stanford Notes

Nestor — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 04:00:05 -0000

So let’s open up our notebook for Stanford. Jim Harbaugh’s Stanford is coming into town on a high note. They are still high about their thrilling victory over Arizona which came courtesy or clutch last minute drive. They pulled it off with junior backup QB Alex Loukas, who took over late in the game after starting QB Tavita Prtichard went out with a mild concussion.

Stanford after flailing through the bottom feeding Harrris and Teevens era is coming alive under Harbaugh, who Ted Miller thinks is the mid-season coach of the year:

In his second season, Jim Harbaugh has led Stanford, now 4-3 overall and 3-1 in the conference, back to respectability by emphasizing a blue-collar attitude and a physical style of play. Leaning on a potent running attack that ranks second in the Pac-10 with 184 yards per game, the Cardinal have played their way into bowl contention. Moreover, Harbaugh is proving an effective recruiter as he's expected to sign a class that ranks among the top 25 in the nation.

Can't really argue against that. I like Harbaugh a lot and he would have been my pick to be Lloyd Carr's successor in Ann Arbor. Harbaugh may eventually end up at his alma mater some day, but not any time soon. Still the second year coach is already being talked about a hot coaching commodity for the Forty Niners. Our old friend, Tim Kawakami (former LA Times beat writer for UCLA, who actually knew something about college hoops) is already seeing the future:

Hmmm. The day he was hired at Stanford, Harbaugh honored Bill Walsh's legacy (Walsh was on hand); we all know that Walsh's first tenure at Stanford lasted exactly two years before he left to create the 49ers dynasty.

But I think the Yorks probably would be too scared of Harbaugh's intensity and cockiness to consider him as Mike Nolan's replacement with the 49ers.

Al Davis is a different story. Harbaugh's first NFL coaching job was on the Raiders' offensive staff in 2002-03. Harbaugh was an Al favorite then, and Harbaugh sure brightened up when I asked about the Raiders owner.

"I talk to Mr. Davis now and then," Harbaugh said, adding that the last conversation came around draft time when Davis asked him about his former quarterback at the University of San Diego, Josh Johnson.

"I love talking to him. I consider him a mentor, and it was always special every time he would pull me aside with the Raiders or call me on the phone. He's the best.

"Nobody can talk football like Mr. Davis. Every time I talk to him, I always glean something about football."

So the Raiders have a vacancy at coach, with Tom Cable laboring as the temp. Jim, if Al calls you, what will you do?

"I'll always take a call from Mr. Davis," Harbaugh said.

Well, obviously Tim is joking (kind of?). But then again he was also joking about Pittsburgh head coach Howland coaching in Westwood back in 2002, when Lavin was taking UCLA for his last charade run to Steve-16 (sorry can’t find a good link any more on article Kawakami wrote around March of 2002, when he talked about how Howland could one day coach at UCLA). Anyway, back to the present.

Stanford is coming down to the Rose Bowl with a solid football team led by a very good football coach. I know lot of you believe that this is a must win game for UCLA, but I think we should also appreciate how difficult it is going to be for Bruins to pull out a win.

Let’s go over some numbers and will start by looking at the matchup between UCLA’s offense and Stanford’s defense.

Bruin Offense	08 Rank	Per Game	Cardinal Defense	08 Rank	Per Game
Rushing Offense	9	91.76	Rushing Defense	4	114.29
Pass Offense	6	205.50	Pass Defense	10	271.71
Pass Eff. Offense	8	108.94	Pass Eff. Defense	7	109.28
Total Offense	9	297.17	Total Defense	8	386.00
Scoring Offense	7	20.00	Scoring Defense	7	27.00

There are couple of stats that obviously stand out right away. First, an anemic Bruin rushing attack will be taking on a solid Stanford rush defense, which is barely giving up l15 yards per game. The Stanford is anchored by a defense line, which Jon Wilner (another former UCLA beat writer who used to work at the Daily News) considers to be the best DL in Palo Alto in almost a decade. From a recent post Jon published in the College Sports Hotline (his blog in the San Jose Mercury News):

It’s pretty good relative to other lines in the Pac-10 (fourth in yards-per-carry allowed: 3.4), and it’s very good compared to recent Stanford lines.

The unit is big and experienced, quick off the ball and physical. In fact, several opposing coaches have made note of Stanford’s physicality, with specific mentions of the defensive line and the Toby Gerhart-Owen Marecic backfield.

So … just how good is this line?

My first thought: It’s Stanford’s best since the Willie Howard/Matt Leonard/Riall Johnson-led group in 2000. (I’m counting Johnson as a lineman even though he was listed as an outside linebacker: he played a hybrid DE/OLB position.)

To make sure I wasn’t overlooking any lines from 2001-07, I checked with my ultra-savvy Stanford football source (USSFS).

He noted some of the more talented players over the years (Amon Gordon, Austin Lee, Babatunde Oshinowo, Julian Jenkins) but concluded that, yes, this is probably the best unit since ‘00.

And other than quarterback, there is no important position/unit than defensive line. If you can’t stop the run, you’ve got no chance (see: Oregon State v. USC).

So you can bet these guys just like every other UCLA opponent has done to date, will focus on completely shutting down the Bruin rushing attack, and dare Chow and co to beat them with Craft’s arm.

That’s where it gets very interesting. The second statistic that stands out from the number above is Stanford’s pass defense. It has given up almost 272 yards per game via air, which currently ranks dead last in the conference. So they are going to put pressure on Craft and co. to beat them with our passing game.

What will help UCLA’s case is if they can get a decent running game going against this tough Stanford defense. Obviously we can forget about replicating the rushing performance from last year when the Bruins rolled up 338 yards on the ground, highlighted by Bells 195 yards (in 19 carries). Bruins have basically a completely different offense in place, which is still working its way in developing an identity. Bell is not the same back as he is still working to get back in the same form he was before he went down with his devastating injury. IMHO it will help us if coaches increase the workload of Derrick Coleman, who so far this season has been lot more productive than Bell. I have no problem with giving Bell carries, but I think the coaches have to increase the workload of Coleman.

As for Craft, we have already discussed enough this week what he needs to do. He needs to work on doing a better job not locking down on his primary options, and make smart decisions when he has the option between running for positive yardage or forcing a throw. I think for the Bruins to win this Saturday, they will need 100+ rushing yards and a hot start from Craft. Craft has to figure out a way to get in rhythm early in the game because even though he plays better in the second half, his cold starts have been putting Bruins in tough situation.

Now moving on to the other side of the ball, here are the numbers between UCLA defense and Stanford offense:

Bruin Defense	08 Rank	Per Game	Cardinal Offense	08 Rank	Per Game
Rushing Defense	8	171.33	Rushing Offense	2	184.14
Pass Defense	7	196.17	Pass Offense	10	149.71
Pass Eff. Defense	7	125.37	Pass Eff.	7	109.28
Total Defense	6	367.50	Total Offense	6	333.86
Scoring Defense	8	30.67	Scoring Offense	6	24.29

So what do we have here?

I guess the first question is whether Pritchard is going to be available on Saturday. It sounds like he is a go:

Pritchard has gone through the customary tests for head injuries the past two days — just as running back Toby Gerhart did after suffering a mild concussion Sept. 27 at Washington — and expects to be cleared today for a full practice.

"I feel great," Pritchard said Tuesday. "I'm right on track. They have their protocol for head injuries. You don't do anything the day after. Yesterday I did a bike workout. I did a lift today. If you stay asymptomatic throughout the whole thing, you get cleared."

Before getting his head slammed to the turf while attempting to throw, Pritchard was having one of his best games, completing 13 of 17 passes for 113 yards and a touchdown. He also had an interception.

His experience and improved play could be invaluable for a Stanford team whose easiest path to bowl eligibility would be to win Saturday and then beat woeful Washington State at Stanford Stadium on Nov. 1.

"He makes it looks easy, taking the snaps, getting in and out of the huddle, calling the plays," Harbaugh said of Pritchard. "Our terminology is very wordy, so he's got a great ability to set the formation right, get the right play called, audible at the line of scrimmage — all those things you want your quarterback to do when he's leading his ballclub. He's always been very good at it."

Even so, Loukas performed well enough Saturday to merit playing time against the Bruins, Harbaugh said.

For the Bruin defense to be well prepared, they should get ready for both Pritchard and Loukas. Here are Miller’s notes on how a 2 QB system could work out well for Stanford:

Cardinal quarterback Tavita Pritchard has steadily improved this year and was 13 of 17 for 113 yards and a touchdown before he was knocked out against Arizona with a concussion. He's likely to start against UCLA on Saturday. But Alex Loukas' running ability off the bench confused the Wildcats defense and was the key component of the 11-play, 60-yard, game-winning drive. Loukas completed a 21-yard pass and ran four times for 32 yards, and apparently earned more playing time, according to coach Jim Harbaugh. Loukas not only adds a nice change of pace, but he also forces a defense to use valuable practice time preparing for a running quarterback and some spread-option plays.

Whoever is in there will be helped out by the Stanford rushing attack of Gerhart and Kimble, who currently features the second best ground game in the conference. For the Bruins to win on Saturday, it will be imperative for them to hold the Cardinal below 200 yards rushing and force them to win with their passing game. Again here is Miller:

Sure, UCLA's rushing defense ranks eighth in the Pac-10 (171.3), which would seem to bode well for Stanford's potent ground game. But the Bruins have faced the nation's No. 6 (Oregon) and No. 16 (Fresno State) rushing attacks in recent weeks. Moreover, Stanford's more conventional power running scheme matches strength-on-strength as the Bruins defensive tackle combo of Brian Price and Brigham Harwell is as good as any in the conference. It's almost certain that defensive coordinator DeWayne Walker will try to force Stanford quarterback Tavita Pritchard to throw the ball. The Bruins secondary has been terribly inconsistent this year -- strong safety Bret Lockett is fighting to hold onto his job this week -- but Pritchard, while improving, has a tendency to force passes into coverage, see eight interceptions vs. seven TDs. The Bruins secondary has only four interceptions this season, but that has been a point of emphasis in practices this week. Stanford beat Arizona despite losing the turnover battle 0-3. It will be harder to do that on the road.

Well the other point of emphasis should be basic tackling. If we don’t see that from the Bruins early on, it is going to be another rough uphill climb for us at the Rose Bowl this Saturday. Hopefully our coaches have the guys fired up and ready for what should be an all out war against a very well coached, solid football team.

GO BRUINS.