STANFORD – Having gotten torched in its most recent outing, Stanford’s defense could use its top cornerbacks to help put out fires this Saturday when high-powered Washington State visits Stanford Stadium.

Unfortunately for the 15th-ranked Cardinal, junior Alijah Holder and sophomore Quenton Meeks are likely to be out a second straight week, coach David Shaw said Tuesday.

Both corners were held out of Stanford’s 44-6 loss to Washington last Friday, having suffered undisclosed injuries the previous week against UCLA.

“We’re being cautious with their health,” Shaw said. “When they can join us at full speed, they will.”

Holder, who ranks among the Pac-12’s leading pass defenders despite having missed last week’s game, is already doing some on-field work, according to Shaw. The coach expects Meeks to join him later in the week.

It’s unclear how much better Stanford (3-1, 2-1 Pac-12) would have fared against Washington with Holder and Meeks in the lineup. Still, the Cardinal couldn’t have done much worse without them: Stanford allowed 424 yards of total offense against the unbeaten Huskies (5-0, 2-0) – who jumped from 10th to fifth in the Associated Press’ college football poll – and also surrendered six touchdowns, twice as many as it had surrendered in its previous three games combined.

Shaw believes his defensive back corps has enough depth to compensate for the absences of Holder and Meeks.

At least one of his players agrees.

“Those guys are such amazing athletes,” junior defensive lineman Harrison Phillips said. “But the other guys we’ve got playing (at cornerback) are equally amazing.”

They’ll have to be amazing to stop Washington State (2-2, 1-0), which is coming off consecutive 50-point performances, including last Saturday’s 51-33 victory over Oregon in the Cougars’ Pac-12 opener.

Washington State coach Mike Leach is known for his vaunted “Air Raid” passing attack, which is generating 387.5 yards per game – second only to Cal’s 428.6. However, the Cougars have complemented that attack with an equally solid running game, which is why WSU leads the conference in total offense (548.8 yards per game) and ranks second in scoring offense (44.2 points).

“They’ve done such a good job passing the ball to set up the running game,” Phillips said. “It’ll be a really big challenge for us.”

• Other players likely to miss Saturday’s game include senior wide receiver Francis Owusu, who is still recovering from a concussion suffered Sept. 24 against UCLA, and junior fullback Daniel Marx. Senior tight end Greg Taboada and junior offensive linemen Casey Tucker and Brandon Fanaika, who all have undisclosed injuries, are questionable. Junior defensive lineman Solomon Thomas should return for Saturday’s game, Shaw said.

• Stanford’s offensive line struggled big-time against Washington’s front seven, yielding a whopping eight sacks against a team that was not blitzing. Six of those came against starting quarterback Ryan Burns.

“I don’t remember the last time we gave up eight sacks, or even more than five,” Shaw said. “A couple of those were noise-related – they had some really good get-offs. A couple of times, we had bad (blocking) technique. A couple of times, (the Huskies) had a really good pass rush – Ryan would make one or two progressions, and by the time he got to his second read, he’d get sacked.

“It was not a great performance by us and a very good performance by them.”

Despite the fact that Burns got sacked so frequently, Shaw saw plenty of positives from the fifth-year senior.

“It was the first time I saw him under heavy pressure,” the Cardinal coach said. “It was encouraging to see him get the ball out of his hands with people bearing down on him.”

• Although he was limited to just 49 yards on 12 carries against Washington, running back extraordinaire Christian McCaffrey still leads the Pac-12 in rushing with 121.2 yards per game.

Shaw said the Heisman Trophy candidate could rack up even more yardage if he got a few more well-timed blocks.

“The number of tackles he breaks in a game is unbelievable,” Shaw said. “He’ll break three tackles to get us a 5-yard gain.

“We’ve got to do a better job of getting him through the line of scrimmage so he can go all the way for a touchdown.”

Speaking of touchdowns, McCaffrey still has yet to score one on the road. His next chance to do that will be on Oct. 15 at Notre Dame.