Stanford at Washington: Game preview, odds, prediction

A look at what to expect from Friday night’s game between the Stanford Cardinal and Washington Huskies.

One of the marquee games of the college football weekend will take place on Friday night. This sees No. 7 Stanford travel to Husky Stadium to play No. 10 Washington in a battle of Pac-12 teams.

On September 24, the Cardinal barely walked out of the Rose Bowl with a victory over UCLA. A late touchdown and fumble recovery for a score saw them win, 22-13. Ryan Burns and the passing game struggled, though, only gaining 137 yards on 25 attempts with a season-low 52-percent completion percentage. The senior signal-caller hasn’t quite dominated in the aerial attack (395 yards for the season), but more could be used to take the load off star running back Christian McCaffrey.

Washington is coming off a narrow victory over Arizona, 35-28 in overtime. Unlike Stanford, the Huskies have received plenty of production in the passing game from Jake Browning. The sophomore quarterback has 14 touchdowns and 904 passing yards through four games. He has handed it off to an efficient running game too, one that is averaging 5.4 yards per game. This balanced attack has scored at least 35 points in every game this season.

Going into this game, the Huskies are a four-point favorite despite this being their first real test of the season. They’ve played Rutgers, Idaho, Portland State and the already-mentioned Arizona. The latter is probably the toughest opponent Washington has faced, and they barely walked out victorious. This is all while Stanford has played Kansas State, USC, and UCLA.

Next: SEC Programs Ranked By Statistical Greatness

So who’s going to walk out a winner of this ranked contest? Washington’s defense hasn’t been put to the test much, while Stanford has yet to get into a shootout game. If the Huskies can get to 30 or more, they’ll move to 5-0. We’ll go with them to defeat the Cardinal, 31-21.