Nicole Auerbach

USA TODAY Sports

STANFORD, Calif. — At some point during a run of sustained excellence in which Stanford has won 47 of its last 55 games, its offensive line took on mythic proportions.

Much of that stems from its willingness to use sets most other teams reserve for goal-line situations. The Cardinal regularly uses seven or eight lineman – occasionally nine – in unique formations, such as its signature Jumbo package, and unique positions, like the Ogre. The Cardinal offensive line's effectiveness has endeared it to college football enthusiasts, particularly among those who prefer a methodical bludgeoning attack to the spread offense.

Respect for the unit has turned into all-out adulation – from opposing Pac-12 coaches who get headaches just thinking about it, to NFL coaches hoping to emulate it and fans who like to get a little creative on social media.

Josh Garnett remembers that as a sophomore last season, after Stanford beat an undefeated Oregon 26-20 by maintaining possession for more than 42 minutes, he scrolled through Twitter and saw two pictures that made him laugh.

"It had our Jumbo formation and said 'What Stanford lines up in,' then a picture with 50 of us and 'What Oregon saw,' " Garnett says, smiling. "I think that showed the mentality. People were like, these guys have eight dudes but it feels like 40. That's how powerful and physical we were.

"People hadn't seen that kind of smash-mouth football."

It's a testament to the unit and the Stanford coaching staff that, unlike at many programs, this position group is not anonymous.

"If you play offensive line to gain respect from anyone outside who you block or on your team, you're going to be disappointed," senior backup center Kevin Reihner says. "We have the rare, rare opportunity where our offensive line is one of the most talked-about units on the team.

"There's pressure, in a good way, to keep it going. Pressure to work the way (those before us) worked."

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This year's offensive line is entirely made up of juniors, four of whom are technically brand-new starters.

But the beauty of Stanford's system is that, by using heavy sets, rotating up to 11 linemen in and out and using others (like new starting right tackle Kyle Murphy, who played a lot of tight end in the Jumbo set last season) in very specific roles, younger linemen can get a great deal of in-game experience even if they're not starting. It's certainly a selling point.

"All five guys who are now our five starters started their careers in one of those roles, of an Jumbo or Ogre," says Mike Bloomgren, Stanford's offensive coordinator and offensive line coach. "They've all been on the field against an Oregon, fourth and one."

"What it does for me is, No. 1, those guys are getting into the games and getting dirty. No. 2, they're also invested in the game plan so when a guy gets hurt, we feel better about them going in and playing," Stanford head coach David Shaw says. "Mike Bloomgren has done a phenomenal job of preparing those guys for their specific game plan role but also being ready to play their natural position."

Being so versatile, however, does require a great deal of familiarity with the playbook. Garnett compares studying Stanford's playbook – which is "not impossible, but it is difficult, a lot more difficult than I think a lot of other places across the country" – to the amount of work required to take another class at Stanford. "You've got to study at night, put things together; it's like school," he says. "School is challenging here, but we're all smart guys. They expect more of us."

And the linemen embrace it.

"It's been amazing to be a part of something that's really taken a life of its own," says center Graham Shuler. "Elephant packages, Monster. Originally, they were ideas and goal-line packages, and we realized we could use them all over the field and all the time. it was really cool watching Coach Bloom play around with those and make them functional."

Says Garnett: "That's stuff you don't see anywhere else. That shows the trust Coach Shaw and Coach Bloom have in us. They're trying to revolutionize the game and it take it to new levels."

Not just in the college game, either. Stanford's coaches have met the past two offseasons with some of the NFL's brightest minds, bouncing ideas back and forth. Bloomgren says he spent a lot of time with the Atlanta Falcons two years ago, and that last spring, eight different NFL offensive line coaches came to Stanford's campus to chat. Two offensive coordinators came though, as did longtime former New England Patriots line coach Dante Scarnecchia.

And those are just the teams that have come to Palo Alto.

"We get opportunities to go into an NFL facility and have 10 questions to get answered that will help our offense," Bloomgren says. "They're an open book, it helps us tremendously. What's surprising is they turn around and have five questions for us. It's flattering."

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It also makes opponents' preparation difficult.

UCLA defensive coordinator Jeff Ulbrich explains that it's not just the heavy sets that defenders struggle with, but the entire Stanford offense in general.

"We're living in an age, especially in Pac-12 football right now, where virtually every week you see spread, you see tempo, you see zone-read, a lot of the same concepts from week to week," Ulbrich says. "A team like them is very unique. They're committed to running the ball in a different way than everybody else is running it right now. They run power football."

And then, of course, there's Jumbo formation, extra lead blockers, tight ends and the like. "You face them, and the biggest struggle a lot of times is getting guys lined up," Ulbrich says. "Guys have never even seen those formations, let alone those styles of runs. I think the uniqueness and the fact that they're different from what we see week to week is a huge advantage for them."

USC coach Steve Sarkisian, whose team is facing the Cardinal this Saturday, says what makes Stanford toughest is that it's more multiple than people think.

"Everyone wants to focus on their big package, them bringing in their extra offensive linemen," Sarkisian says. "But they do traditional pro-style stuff. They do stuff out of two tight-end sets. They do stuff out of three wide receiver sets. They give you a lot of looks, and they execute really well."

And once Stanford's offense gets rolling, it's hard to stop — quite literally. Shaw's eyes light up as he describes one of his favorite parts of a game: When Stanford has a late lead, and he knows his guys are going to run the ball and the opponent knows they're going to run the ball — and they methodically march down the field anyway. "There's something to be said for that," Shaw says.

"What's really neat is at the end of the games, when our guys are making calls and the defensive linemen have heard it maybe 20 times and they shake their heads," Bloomgren says. "You see the body language. 'No more.' Teams want no more.

"That's quite a compliment to our offensive line."

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It's no coincidence that the starters are all juniors, by the way.

This has been destined ever since the day Shaw signed his 2012 recruiting class and dubbed it "one of the best offensive line classes in modern football history."

Headlined by Murphy and left tackle Andrus Peat — both five-star recruits — the class included five other offensive linemen, four of them considered four-star players by Rivals.com.

"There are going to be lean years," Shaw says. "There are going to be a years here or there that there aren't a ton of high-GPA, high-test score offensive linemen, just like every position. When they're there, we've got to take as many as we can and not worry about how many. For us to take six three years ago, hey, we had to do it.

"We've been kind of preparing for this year, knowing this was an outstanding recruiting class. We've got to get these guys ready to play. … I don't anticipate it being the smoothest transition in the world early in the season. I anticipate mid-season we'll be very good. I anticipate next year, we'll be as good as anybody in the nation. We need them to be. They have to be. They were recruited to be. They've got it in them."

Throughout their recruitment, many of the linemen became quite familiar with each other. They went on visits together, worked out at camps and played at all-star games together. "We had these relationships going before we even got here," Murphy says. "I felt so connected to all the guys and had a pretty good feeling I could play with these dudes."

Now, that connection has only strengthened. They all watch film together. Murphy and Garnett are roommates, and rarely apart. The line has organized occasional barbecues – "Gotta keep the weight up," Garnett says – and spends a lot of time together off the field.

That camaraderie, that studying, the experience gleaned over the past two years — all of that will be tested now, on the field, as this group takes ownership of this offensive line. One game in, and the coaching staff likes what it sees.

"They're starting to come into their roles pretty dang good, to be honest with you," Bloomgren says. "The communication is still coming. It's not perfect, and it needs to be perfect. One thing you can count on, though, with good football teams is you're going to make your biggest jump between game one and game two. That's something we certainly need to do this year."​