Pac 12 Power Rankings Week 8: Oregon, USC, Arizona State Rise, Stanford Falls
Saturday Blitz Pac 12 Power Rankings Week 8
So much for all the excitement about Stanford at the beginning of the year. The losses to USC and Notre Dame seemed like aberrations, but against a team like Arizona State, we were certain they would win playing their game. Wrong. They got beat down against the Sun Devils, and that’s a bad look. Losing 26-10 to them has forced us to open up lots of questions about this team we didn’t have before.
First off, just how good is Kevin Hogan? We thought he never had huge numbers because of David Shaw’s style, but when he was needed in a game that could have been turning into a shootout, he shrunk. That’s not what you want from your quarterback. The defense still isn’t terrible, but this year, Stanford seems to be winning low scoring games more due to bad offense than the ball control system they have. And that’s a problem.
At 4-3, this team still has to play Oregon, Utah, and UCLA, and Cal and Oregon State are good as well. All of those teams except for Utah play a much more up-tempo style than the Cardinal, and if the Cardinal are having trouble forcing people to play their game, they won’t be going anywhere.
So it’s time to raise concern about this team that we have demoted to the bottom half of the Pac-12.