14. Stanford Cardinal
Ranking coming into Week 1: No. 14
It’s a new year of college football, but something still remains: the Stanford Cardinal are the rudest team in the sport.
Not only did the Cardinal show a beautiful sense of balance with 37 pass attempts and 36 rushing attempts, they beat up Rice on both sides of the ball and then hung 62 points on them in another freakin’ country.
The Cardinal, in the process of beating the Owls into next week, appeared to have found their successor to the throne in the backfield that was held by current Carolina Panthers running back Christian McCaffrey. Bryce Love rushed for 180 yards and a touchdown on just 13 carries. That’s a 13.8 yard-per-carry average for the math nerds. That’s also very good.
When USC has the talent that they currently possess, it’s hard to pick against them in the Pac-12, but if someone can knock them off the preseason mantle they were placed on, it’s Stanford. And, they’ll get their shot with a huge meeting against the Trojans in Week 2.
Stanford has had the number of USC since that colossal upset from the Cardinal in 2007. Since that game, the Cardinal have won eight of the last 10 meetings against the Trojans, including a 41-22 victory in the 2015 Pac-12 title game. You’ll want to keep your eye on that game next week.