It wasn’t supposed to be this way, and at least recently, hasn’t been.
For Stanford and Notre Dame, this weekend’s meeting will be the first time since 2009 that the two will meet both as unranked teams. In fact, it’d be the first time since 2010 that BOTH don’t enter the game ranked.
The shine is off this year’s Legends Trophy battle, and both come into the game searching for a desperation win from different ends of the world.
For Stanford, disappointment has come swiftly and viciously. The Cardinal have been chopped down and tossed in the wood chipper to the tune of 86-22 the last two weeks by Evergreen State foes Washington and Washington State. There are a lot of forced tree references in that last sentence, mind you.
It’s looking increasingly realistic that their impressive string of three Pac-12 titles in four years is going to end, and not at the hands of old, reliable, high-scoring Oregon. There’s a current changing of the guard in the conference, and not even the return of Christian McCaffrey could ride them away from it one more season.
The defense has been pillaged by injury, but eviscerated all the same in ways we’re just not used to seeing Stanford get sliced up, particularly through the air. The offensive line has struggled protecting the quarterback and getting the running game going. They got only 61 yards on 26 rushes last weekend, and were out of it against Washington before it even made sense to turn around and hand the ball off the previous week, it seemed.
While the Cardinal aren’t spiraling out of control by any means … just mired in a down season they’re not nearly used to seeing at this level … Notre Dame limps in with an entirely different perspective.
Long the barometer of “Program X is BACK!” wins, the Irish opened up with a loss to Texas in a thrilling game, and then provided grist for the “Michigan State is still a powerhouse” mill. None of the above were true, and the reality is, ND just isn’t very good.
They’ve gone through one defensive coordinator and have taken turns on finding inventive ways to lose games, be it the shootout against Texas, a potential comeback fallen short to Sparty, just all around defensive-ugly against Duke, and then sloshing around in a game that could have easily and reasonably been canceled against North Carolina State.
None of this was foreseen when Brian Kelly came to South Bend. Kelly has done nothing but have constant, program-changing success everywhere he’s been, and that collective “oh, hell …” you heard was from ND rivals in 2012 when they spurred off to an unbeaten regular season and eventual 12-1 record.
It wasn’t ever supposed to be possible to not achieve under Kelly, but here we are, with the Irish getting blasted for lack of success from all sides and genuine discussion about whether or not that post needs a change (not from this spot, however). They’ve recruited well, but it simply hasn’t translated onto the field.
So when they meet Stanford this Saturday night, pardon the atmosphere if it seems like two unemployed single guys who spent the day looking for jobs online meeting up at a local watering hole looking for something, anything to go right. One is dealing with the newfound disappointment of not being as good as you were.
The other dealing with the harsh reality of not being good at all, and having nothing go right when it wasn’t supposed to be this way.
There’s only one girl at the bar, and that means Saturday night, 2016 will be a reprieve for one, and a lonely walk home into the continued abyss for the other.
