Pac 12 Football Teams Stanford – Arizona
The Arizona Wildcats (3-2, 0-2 Pac 12) started the season strong with three impressive wins to raise expectations for the inaugural season under Rich Rodriguez. However, back-to-back conference losses have brought the Cats back down to earth and they’re desperate to avoid three straight losses to open conference play.
The Stanford Cardinal (3-1, 1-1) have quarterback questions after a bumbling performance
against the Washington Huskies undercut all of the momentum they built up following their win over the USC Trojans. They will be out for blood as they try and atone for their embarrassing performance by taking care of business at home against the visiting Wildcats.
Keys for Arizona:
For the Wildcats, the offense hasn’t been the problem for the most part. They’re averaging 538 yards per game, good for 10th in the country, and scoring nearly 35 points a game. The problem has been the defense. Rodriguez has never fielded a top notch defense in his career, but the Cats have surrendered 87 points in their last two games against the Oregon Ducks and Oregon State Beavers.
The deck is stacked against the Cats’ defense, however, as they’ve suffered injuries to their depth and Rodriguez is trying to fit players into his system as best he can. He doesn’t have the recruits in just yet who fill the 3-3-5 defense the way he wants it, and running thin on depth isn’t helping matters.
Keys for Stanford:
The Cardinal are facing some quarterback questions after the loss to Washington, and deservedly so. Josh Nunes wasn’t expected to be Andrew Luck, but David Shaw needs him to manage the game much better than he has. In four games, Nunes is completing just 52 percent of his passes (65-for-125) for 785 yards (196 yards per game) with six touchdown passes and four interceptions. In short, he hasn’t been great.
To help Nunes, the Cardinal must get their power-running game going again. Averaging just 128 yards per game on the ground, and coming off a measly 68 yards rushing against the Huskies, Stanford must get back to the physical grind-it-out style they used to upset the Trojans. Stepfan Taylor has to be the focal point of this offense moving forward in order to give the Cardinal offense some rhythm and open up the passing game with play-action for Nunes.
College Football Saturday Arizona vs Stanford Start Time, Odds College Football Saturday Odds are forecasting a Cardinal win, though, with the host school listed as a -10 against the spread favorite in this Pac-12 clash. Today’s game total is set at 54 points and Arizona is drawing +310 moneyline odds ($100 wins …
College Football Recruiting: Alani, Viliami Latu Brothers Pledge Verbal to … … a commitment to the Sun Devils add a physicality that the Pac-12 is not usually credited with. Move over Mario and Luigi. -. James Gomez is a Pac-12 and Mountain West columnist for Rant Sports and member of the Football Writers Association of America.
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Showdown Saturday & Week Six College Football Picks If you are looking for a trap game in the PAC-12 there could be two such games. Arizona heads to Stanford after the Cardinal offense was shutdown on the road against Washington and UCLA hits the road to face a reeling California team in a rivalry game.
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Arizona’s ‘fire ants’ to meet ‘elephant’-sized Stanford The losses on defense will only make the task tougher against the Cardinal (3-1, 1-1 Pac-12), who are coming off an upset loss at Washington – one week removed from an upset victory of their own against then-No. 2 USC. The loss dropped Stanford 13 …