UCLA Football Preview: Stanford Will Have a Tough Time Scoring Against the Bruins
UCLA Football Preview: Stanford Will Have a Tough Time Scoring Against the Bruins
The Cardinal offense couldn't find the end zone against the Sun Devils last week with the team's top running back and wide receiver both out for the season.
Like many of UCLA’s other opponents, Stanford’s depth chart lists 12 starters on offense. Rather unsurprising to anyone who has followed UCLA football for a while, that 12th starter is a fullback. What isn’t clear, however, is which player will come out when the Cardinal fullback enters the game.
It would seem as if the most likely candidate would be one of Stanford’s three receivers, but depending on the formation, David Shaw could just as easily put two of those three receivers on the line of scrimmage and replace the tight end with the fullback. In other words, that would seem to move the tight end to the backfield by making sure the Cardinal offense is using a split end on both sides of the center.
The most interesting thing in all this is that Stanford is listing a starting fullback at all given the fact that they have not actually started a game with anyone in that position this season. Stanford’s game-by-game starters do not list the fullback at all.
So, they have not begun a game offensively with two running backs this season.
Let’s look at Stanford’s offensive personnel.
Quarterback
Tanner McKee is back as the starting quarterback for the Cardinal. This season, he’s averaging 265.29 yards passing per game and he’s thrown for 10 touchdowns. While he has completed 157 of 249 passes, which is 63.05%, six of his passes have been caught by Stanford’s opponents for interceptions.
Last year, he threw for 293 yards and three touchdowns against the Bruins. So, hopefully, the Bruin defense can hold McKee in check better than last year.
Running Backs
While we would never wish an injury on an opposing player, it never hurts when that has happened — and it happened to the Cardinal’s starting running back, E.J. Smith. That’s mostly because E.J. stands for Emmitt James and he is the son of former Dallas Cowboy running back Emmitt Smith. Anytime a defense doesn’t have to stop the son of a legend like that, the defense shouldn’t have to work quite as hard and that’s the case here because David Shaw announced that E.J. would miss the remainder of the season with an undisclosed injury.
So, instead of Smith, it seemed that the Bruin defense will see junior Casey Filkins. Well, it turns out that Filkins is also probably out for this week’s game. That means UCLA will face a combination of Caleb Robinson, Brendon Barrow and converted safety Mitch Leigber. That’s going to make things a lot harder for the Stanford offense.
Now, Stanford also lists a starting fullback on the team depth chart, even though he hasn’t actually started a game. Not only that, but he hasn’t run the ball yet either. He does, however, have one reception for one yard total. So, it seems pretty safe to say that David Shaw won’t be looking to his fullback to do much other than block for Filkins or McKee in certain situations.
Receivers
Stanford has also lost their biggest receiving threat for the season. Fifth year senior Michael Wilson from Simi Valley leads the team in both receiving yards and touchdown catches. He’s gained 418 yards so far while also grabbing four of the team’s 12 touchdowns catches. Wilson is also a threat to run the ball at least once a game. He’s run the ball four times and is averaging nearly 12 yards per carry. But Wilson was hurt during the Cardinal’s game against Notre Dame two weeks ago and is also expected to be ut for the season.
With Wilson out, it will be tough for the Cardinal to make up for his production. Last week against ASU, John Humphreys made eight receptions for 90 yards and his longest was 16. That’s an average of about 10.5 yards per catch except for that 16 yarder.
In fact, Stanford’s starting tight end Benjamin Yurosek was the second leading receiver last week. He also made one long catch for 17 yards which significantly raised his ypc. The same thing happens with the other two starting receivers Elijah Higgins and Brycen Tremayne. The longest catch for each went for 19 and 20 yards, respectively. Higgins also had two 16-yard receptions.
Higgins replaced Wilson on Stanford’s running play to a wide receiver last week as well.
Analysis
David Shaw should be concerned that his offense couldn’t score a touchdown against the Sun Devils last week. Clearly, the losses of Smith, Wilson and Filkins have hurt the Cardinal offense.
If the UCLA defense decides to play angry tomorrow following last weekend’s loss to Oregon, and they should play angry, they may just shut the Cardinal out in the game.
But, even if they don’t it’s hard to see this Stanford offense being potent enough to score enough points to win.
Go Bruins!!!
Editor’s Note: This article was updated to reflect the fact that Casey Filkins is injured and will probably not play tonight.
Thanks again for supporting The Mighty Bruin. Your paid subscriptions make this site possible. Questions, comments, story ideas, angry missives and more can be sent to @TheMightyBruin on Twitter.