Inside the Game: How Stanford is turning around its season

Nicole Auerbach | USA TODAY Sports

Barely any criticism that trailed Stanford after its Week 1 loss to Northwestern remains these days. Gone are the claims of conservatism and an ineffective pro-style offensive system.

After four consecutive wins — each more impressive than the last, with a 55-17 thumping of Arizona last weekend — the tune has changed around the Cardinal football program.

"I don't think we get enough credit for the amount of talent we have on this team, to be quite honest with you," Stanford associate head coach and offensive coordinator Mike Bloomgren told USA TODAY Sports. "We're starting to show it. We're starting to show those explosive run or pass plays down the field. It's pretty fun right now.

"It's fun to be sitting here, looking at all the possibilities and all the toys we have and just trying to find the right places to put them."

The toys include quarterback Kevin Hogan, who's been terrific in recent weeks. Against Arizona, Hogan was 17-of-19 for 217 yards, two touchdowns and zero interceptions. He's been able to show, both facing pressure or with time, that he can hit his targets all over the field. That's opened up the rushing attack, too.

"It definitely helps that we're spreading the ball out and moving the ball around, stretching the field, making the defense have to guard the perimeter of the field because we have so much talent on the outside," Hogan said. "Then, we can just run the ball up the middle with these power formations. The running backs we have, they just need to have a little bit of a crease and they can hit it."

Christian McCaffrey had 17 carries for 149 yards and a score against Arizona. Remound Wright scored three times (twice on the ground). Barry Sanders added a 65-yard touchdown run. The team, as a whole, rushed for 314 yards a week after piling up 325 rushing yards against Oregon State. After the game against the Beavers, Bloomgren finally felt his offense was starting to click.

A great deal of credit for that goes to an offensive line that continues to communicate well and jell as one unit that both protects Hogan and paves the way for a steady run game. Josh Garnett, in particular, is playing as well as any lineman in the country, and had 10 pancakes against Arizona.

All of this, well — it's a far cry from the 16-6 loss at Northwestern to open the season, when the Cardinal rushed 85 yards on 27 attempts (3.2 yards per carry).

Though Stanford, now 4-1 and ranked 18th in the Amway Coaches Poll, was and still is quick to praise Northwestern's defensive strategy, Bloomgren said the loss fell squarely on the Cardinal. That surprised him, because spring practices had gone well and fall camp had been even better. Confidence entering the season had been high.

"There was nothing that prepared me for the performance we were going to have at Northwestern," Bloomgren said. "You've got to tip your hat to them, a lot of credit has to go to them. But we left there, and we always say it's all about us. That's what we believe. We believe if we go out there and play our best, we're going to give ourselves a pretty good chance to go out there and beat anybody. We made mistakes that we hadn't made all training camp. We abandoned technique. Just some really weird things occurred that day."

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The fallout from that game was swift, and the media coverage overwhelmingly critical. In a social media-fueled world filled with hyperbole and overreaction, there were questions aplenty about Shaw's play calling and whether or not Stanford's system worked any more.

"I grew up in Tallahassee, Florida," Bloomgren said. "I just never learned that inefficient was a synonym for conservative. It certainly seemed like it was, as we got asked questions — and the line of questioning the week after. We didn't play well, so now it's a conservative system. I don't know that our kids get enough credit for what they have to do. I think some people think, 'Oh, they're just big so they run the ball.' But it's much more than that. We're running intricate Sunday-afternoon schemes. We're running NFL schemes with NFL answers.

"I think some average people don't realize what defenses try to do to us. A lot of defensive coordinators will throw a front out there or a defensive scheme they've never run. It's a great compliment."

The Cardinal, even in the wake of the Northwestern game, stuck with their tired-and-true system. There was no panic; there was only a push to work out harder and run each play more perfectly both in practice and in games.

And then, when the opportunity presented itself, make the most of it, like last weekend. Arizona hadn't played Stanford since 2012, which Hogan felt was a great advantage for the Cardinal. In the Pac-12, a league known for its spread offenses, Stanford has long stuck out with its pro-style approach.

"I thought we'd be able to run the ball effectively, especially because we haven't played Arizona in a couple of years," Hogan said. "They haven't really seen a style like ours. We thought we'd be able to get out ahead of them a little bit. … It's very difficult if you aren't practicing against an offense like ours. We present so many formations and personnel groups and then run the same plays out of different formations. It's tough to prepare for. You aren't really sure what's coming at you. Then you get 300-pounders pulling and trying to kick you out. It's kind of ground and pound, but you're not really sure what to expect, so it kind of catches some people off guard."

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Northwestern was one team that wasn't caught off guard. And after that Week 1 loss, Stanford head coach David Shaw told his team it had lost its margin for error.

Stanford could still achieve its goal of winning the Pac-12 North despite a painful non-conference loss. The only way the Northwestern game would damage the remainder of the season and the Cardinal's chances to reach its goals would be if the Stanford players let it.

Though Week 1 feels so long ago, center Graham Shuler said, he and his teammates make sure to remind everyone in the program about it constantly — and, specifically, how it felt, walking off Ryan Field after the loss. They can't forget that if they want to continue to get better and win more games.

"We had our mess-up; our backs are against the wall," Shuler said. "Whenever we're down or counted out of the fight or that we can't do something, this group of guys — we all fight together and do everything we can to accomplish it. I think that's what's happening with this team."

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