I believe ND can beat Stanford by 60 points, but believe they will protect dinged up starters and
use this game as an opportunity to work on development of 2nd and 3rd string players.
use this game as an opportunity to work on development of 2nd and 3rd string players.
Go for 60 in the first half.
Let the 2nd and 3rd teamers, or even scout teamers get playing time, but don't take the foot off the Cardinal's throat.
Stanford has been a pain on all too many occasions, and they're the one team I have no issues with running up the score as much as we can.
I especially have a dislike of Tavita Pritchard.
In 2007, the refs were giving him every accommodation possible, including ignoring blatant holding by their line. Trevor Laws even had his jersey being tugged on, and the refs easily saw it, but didn't call anything.
I remember Pritchard trying to run for yardage when David Bruton was right in front of his face, about to clobber him with a clean shot.
Pritchard decided to slide literally right as Bruton was about 1 foot away from hitting him, and got his bell rung.
Bruton was aiming his shoulder into Pritchard's torso, and the last split second slide basically made Pritchard head butt Bruton's shoulder.
He then whined and cried about David Bruton making a dirty hit (even though it was 100% clean, and even the refs didn't call anything). Every Stanford fan was also similarly screaming foul, the facts be damned...
the late hit very often. Parlayed arriving late in the tackle to being a hard hitter. He was a huge faker.