Some of the recent data points going into the long-standing rivalry game.
It’s back to action for the Notre Dame football team. The Irish had their first bye of the 2024 season during Week 6. And looking back at the smoldering heap of last week’s carnage I’m kind of glad that Notre Dame didn’t have the chance to join in that series of unfortunate events. Hopefully whatever dark magic or eclipse was at play last weekend has gone somewhere else so Notre Dame can keep its win streak alive.
The next opponent up is Stanford. The Cardinal, not to be confused with the Cardinals, are coming into the game 2-3 and ranked 13 out of 17 in the ACC. They are 1-2 against ACC opponents and are only outperforming Florida State (conference: 1-4), California, North Carolina and North Carolina State (conference: 0-2). This is their first year in the ACC following the first dismantling of the Pac-12.
Season Summary
Stanford dropped its season opener against TCU, 27-34. They bounced back from that the next week with a +34 point win against Cal Poly and eked out a +2 win over Syracuse. But they’ll be heading into their Notre Dame matchup reeling from two major losses. They lost to Clemson with a -26 point differential and dropped their most recent game against Virginia Tech by a -24 point differential.
Offensive Summary
The Cardinal had their best offensive game against Cal Poly. They tallied up 437 yards of total offense, around 26% of total offense for their five games so far. Most of their yards during that game came by the way of the air. If you remove the Cal Poly game, they are averaging 147 passing yards per game. Passing accuracy hasn’t been so great this season. It hit 87% against Cal Poly but hasn’t been above 61% outside of that game.
Stanford had their best rushing game against Clemson when they recorded 236 yards on the ground. For the rest of the games they’ve averaged 137 rads on the ground. They got the most bang for their buck on Syracuse and Clemson. When they’re not hanging out around five yards per carry, though, their floor is consistently around 3.3 yards per carry.
Receiving Details
Wide receivers Elic Ayomanor and Ismael Cisse are Stanford’s main receiving weapons. Ayomanor has recorded 24 receptions for a total of 317 yards. Cisse has 22 receptions for 186 yards. Tight end Sam Roush has 12 receptions for 97 yards.
Rushing Details
Quarterback Ashton Daniels leads the Cardinal in rushing yards. He’s tallied up 250 yards on 50 carries so far. Micah Ford and Chris Davis Jr. are Stanford’s most productive running backs. Ford has 47 carries for 230 yards and Davis Jr. has 26 carries for 188 yards.
Defensive Summary
Stanford had their worst defensive performance in the TCU loss. The gave up 457 yards of total offense against the Horned Frogs, 27% of all offense allowed. They’re defense got stingier against Cal Poly and Syracuse but has been back on the high end in their last two games. They gave up 405 yards against Clemson and then 337 yards against Virginia Tech.
They Cardinal defense gave up the most passing yards in the TCU and Syracuse games. If you remove those games they’re allowing an average of 220 yards of passing offense per game. Stanford’s defense held Cal Poly and Syracuse to 25 and 26 rushing yards, respectively. If you remove those two outliers opposing offenses are averaging 130 rushing yards against Stanford.
Teams have generally thrown the ball accurately against the Cardinal defense. Completion rates range between 64% and 74% if you remove Clemson’s 48% passing performance.
Final Thoughts
It’s really hard for me to get a feel on this game. Stanford’s offense is trending negatively in the scoring area as they get deeper into their new ACC competition. They only put up 14 against Clemson and then 7 against Virginia Tech, despite a strongish start to the season. The Irish defense, even with the injury monster on the prowl, is still as best as you’re going to find in CFB this season so I don’t for-see any real issues there.
Except for Cal Poly, teams have really lit up Stanford’s defense from a scoring perspective. Syracuse scored 24, Virginia Tech had 31, TCU scored 34 and Clemson had 40 points. And their offense was only able to cover that Syracuse game with 26 points. Given the kind of sort of streak that the Notre Dame offense is on, there shouldn’t be any concerns there either.
But this is a season of crazy and I don’t think the road is going to get less bumpy. Not that the job won’t get done but things may get rocky.
Cheers and Go Irish!!