Christian McCaffrey Injury Update: Stanford RB out vs Notre Dame
As Stanford’s season continues to fall apart, they will now reportedly be without Christian McCaffrey for the Notre Dame game.
Stanford running back Christian McCaffrey came into the 2016 season as a Heisman Trophy candidate. He had a monstrous 2015, but barely got outplayed by Alabama’s Derrick Henry, who won the award. With Henry in the NFL, it left McCaffrey in a position to be a Heisman favorite.
It may not be the junior’s year, though. He has 520 yards through five games with just three rushing touchdowns. This makes the 2,019 yards from 2015 out of reach barring multiple 200-plus yard games and staying healthy.
However, McCaffrey did suffer an undisclosed injury during last Saturday’s game loss to Washington State. It left him with just 8 carries for 35 yards and put his status for the October 15 game vs Notre Dame in doubt.
Well, it seems the 20-year-old’s status has been determined. According to Tim Prister of Irish Illustrated, he’s not going to play against Notre Dame on Saturday night.
A source has told Irish Illustrated that Stanford RB Christian McCaffrey will not play v. #NotreDame tonight.
— Irish Illustrated (@timprister) October 15, 2016
In a game where Stanford definitely could have used McCaffrey against Notre Dame’s high-powered offense, they’ll be left short-handed. That will mean relying more on quarterback Ryan Burns, who isn’t known for the big play. The Cardinal also have mostly unknowns at running back behind McCaffey.
Their second leading rusher is Bryce Love, who has just 50 career carries. However, he did average 7.8 yards per carry in 2015 and 5.1 in 2016. While it will be difficult to consistently reach those numbers and come close to the future draft pick’s production, doing anything to help this struggling offense would be a boost.
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If Stanford loses, they’ll drop to 3-3. They were just 3-0 and ranked in the top-10 three weeks ago, but have fallen off by going against top offenses. McCaffrey needs to get back for them to stand a chance in the Pac-12. If he’s out for more than just this week, then David Shaw’s squad may be in for a rough rest of the season.