By Jeremy Harness
AP photo: Stanford quarterback Keller Chryst takes a keeper for 44 yards in the third quarter to the Oregon four against the Oregon State Beavers on Saturday at Stanford Stadium
STANFORD – The game was not pretty by any stretch of the imagination, but at least Stanford is back to their familiar winning ways.
After dropping three in a four-game stretch, the Cardinal got things back on track in a dominant win over a struggling Arizona team last weekend and then kept things moving in the right direction in a 26-15 win over Oregon State Saturday afternoon to make themselves eligible to play in a bowl game.
Now here comes the bad news.
The recent losing skid seemed to have had a significant impact on fan interest. The official attendance at Stanford Stadium on Saturday was 38,813, but the half-empty appearance made that statistic extremely hard to believe.
Meanwhile, this game was marred by bad quarterback play from both schools, which was marked by missed receivers, botched snaps and interceptions
Keller Chryst, the Palo Alto High grad who took over the starting job from an equally-underperforming Ryan Burns, completed 10 of his 17 passes for only 60 yards, and he also botched three snaps – one of which was lost deep in Stanford territory – and made several bad decisions with the ball and simply took too much time to throw.
“Keller continues to grow,” head coach David Shaw said. “(He did) some good things, some not so good things. In a game like this where we score enough to win, win by two scores. You look up, could have had two more touchdown passes. (He’s) just got to connect on those.”
His quarterbacking counterpart, Oregon State’s Marcus McMaryion was not much better, even though he did throw a 75-yard touchdown pass in the first half. He threw for 137 yards on 10-of-24 passing, and he was also intercepted twice and just could not get his offense moving nearly enough.
Oh, and one more thing: When also factoring in questionable play-calling on both sides, it made this contest particularly difficult to watch.
Stanford’s day started with a comedy of errors, but with a combination of tighter defense and the fact that they were playing a bad OSU team, they got away with it.
Despite a lost fumble on a botched snap at their own 33-yard line and a pass-interference penalty on cornerback Quenton Meeks in the end zone, the Cardinal dodged a huge bullet when their defense stiffened up and watched as kicker Garrett Owens missed a 26-yard field goal.
Stanford then marched down the field and got within striking distance, but the drive eventually stalled, thanks in much part to Chryst missing a wide-open J.J Arcega-Whiteside at the Beavers’ 15-yard line that would have given the Cardinal a first down. However, Conrad Ukropina then tied a career-long with a 52-yard field goal to give Stanford a 3-0 lead.
The Cardinal got its run game going late in the first quarter, as Bryce Love found an open lane off the right side of the field and sprinted past the OSU secondary en route to a 56-yard touchdown that gave the Cardinal a 10-0 lead.
Oregon State got itself back into the game in the second quarter when Victor Bolden beat Meeks badly for a 75-yard touchdown catch-and-run, narrowing the lead to 10-7.
Stanford drove deep into Oregon State territory late in the second quarter, thanks to Christian McCaffrey’s 51-yard run that put the ball at OSU’s 9-yard line, but that drive soon stalled and forced the Cardinal to settle for a field goal.
“It went well,” McCaffrey said. “I go where the O-line goes. They did a fantastic job today of opening up holes, allowing our guys to find creases and make a play with the ball in our hands.”
McCaffrey has seemed to get himself back on track very nicely. After an injury limited his play and effectiveness, he broke through at Arizona and showed his teeth again on Saturday, rushing for 199 yards on 32 carries and a touchdown.
The defense came up big in the third quarter, coming up with a big play that was later converted into a touchdown. Midway through the quarter, Harrison Phillips deflected a McMaryion pass and allowed sophomore linebacker Mustafa Branch to make a diving interception at their own 38.
“It’s been a good group,” Shaw said. “The guys are playing hard, they’re playing smart, they’re playing together. They don’t care who gets the play. So for one guy to take up a blocker so somebody else can make a play, they get excited about that because it’s an entire unit that’s playing really well.”
Although he did not make any plays with his arm, Chryst did make one with his legs that helped make the difference in the game. Three plays after the interception, he gashed the Beavers’ defense witth a 44-yard scramble that left the ball at OSU’s 4-yard line.
McCaffrey plunged in from a yard out two plays later to give the Cardinal a 23-7 advantage.
McMaryion ran for a 3-yard touchdown to start the fourth quarter, but the Beavers could not gain any more momentum from that point, and Stanford was able to control the clock in the final period to come away with the victory.
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