Will Stanford Change its Quarterback vs Boston College this Week: Just a Minute

The confidence level of the Stanford Cardinal offense is not at a high by any means, according to first-year, interim head coach Frank Reich.

That is what Reich, who was hired by Stanford football general manager Andrew Luck in March, told reporters in his press conference on Tuesday leading up to the Cardinal’s home matchup against Boston College on Saturday.

“In particular, we need to be effective and to be able to play winning football on offense to get some confidence,” Reich said. “That’s what we’re searching for right now offensively.”

There is no doubt that confidence in this sport stems from the quarterback position. Except for a couple of rare formations, the quarterback is the first player to have the ball in his hands when the play starts, every single play of the game.

Redshirt-senior Ben Gulbranson, who transferred from Oregon State, has only passed for 251 yards in Stanford’s first two matchups of the season—a Week Zero loss at Hawaii and a second loss to BYU this past Saturday—to go along with a touchdown-to-interception ratio of 0:3, however. Gulbranson is passing at a completion rate of 51.6 percent (32-for-62).

Reich said there is nothing to speculate about the potential of a quarterback change when he was asked if he is going to roll with Gulbranson for a third week in a row after two less-than-optimal performances, but he did not confirm whether Gulbranson would start, either.

“Yeah we don’t make those announcements and decisions early in the week, you know, at any position” Reich said. “And don’t read anything into that. I mean … we’re not gonna make a habit of making any announcements about any position on who’s playing, who’s not playing, early in the week. That’s just kind of standard operating procedure.”

But the Cardinal’s offense is the lowest-producing passing offense in the Atlantic Coast Conference at the moment with an average of 125.5 passing yards per game, including an average yards per pass mark of 4.0. This could, in turn, warrant an early-season quarterback maneuver.

Even simple passes have caused trouble for Gulbranson.

With just over two minutes left in the first quarter of Stanford’s matchup in Provo, Utah, against the Cougars last week, Gulbranson overthrew a simple short crosser over the middle, intended for redshirt-sophomore Myles Libman, over the receiver’s back shoulder and more than four feet above Libman’s standing height (6-foot-0).

Gulbranson faced pressure from his backside when left tackle Miles McGee practically let BYU’s pass rusher escape a block and bulldoze around the edge to acquire a clear lane to Gulbranson in his throwing motion.

Gulbranson looked at multiple reads before opting for the wide-open Libman sprinting over the middle for what could have turned into an easy positive pickup, but once he spotted the open receiver and unleashed, he could not position the ball to a place where Libman could make a play.

It wasn’t Gulbranson’s vision that proved to be the issue—it was what he did after the progression of reading the field and on his attempt to make an accurate throw that caused the turnover.

Any defense in the ACC, and most of the FBS, will capitalize on a mistake like that, and BYU certainly did, kicking a field goal four seconds into the second quarter from the turnover.

Additionally, both Stanford tackles, McGee and right tackle Kahlil House, failed to consistently build a pocket for Gulbranson in the 27-3 loss to the Cougars.

On the Cardinal’s first offensive drive of the second quarter, House’s protection of the right side gave out like a flat tire due to a poor first step and high center of gravity. BYU’s edge defender from the left, Jack Kelly, dipped under House and strip-sacked Gulbranson for a second straight turnover—this time, in the redzone for BYU.

BYU’s defense racked up three sacks and eight tackles for loss due to the porousness of Stanford’s offensive line play, proving that its offensive woes are not all stemming from Gulbranson alone.

But if Reich did decide to go in a different direction, what would that entail?

The current second-string quarterback in the Cardinal’s offensive depth chart is redshirt-freshman Elijah Brown, a Huntington Beach, Calif., native who was recruited out of Mater Dei High School, a prominent program in the landscape of high school football recruiting.

Prior to his arrival at Stanford, Brown led the No. 1 team in MaxPreps Top 25 High School football rankings to two CIF Southern Section Division I championships and two CIF Open Division State Championships (2021, 2023), and totaled 8,670 passing yards, 107 touchdown passes, and eight rushing touchdowns in his high school career.

Brown was a unanimous four-star recruit, ranked as high as the No. 7 quarterback recruit in the nation by Rivals and the second-best quarterback recruit in California at the time.

The 6-foot-2, 210-pound signal caller retained his ability to redshirt after competing in only three games for the Cardinal last season, completing 58.3 percent of his passes (28-for-48) for 273 yards and two touchdowns.

He first appeared in the collegiate football scene against Cal Poly on Sept. 7, 2024, completing all seven of his pass attempts for 97 yards, and made his first career start against Wake Forest on Oct. 26, 2024.

It wouldn’t be the most outlandish decision to at least give Brown a chance if Stanford is down again by multiple scores—or more—at half time or before that against the Eagles this Saturday, but obviously Reich is still somewhat willing to start Gulbranson a third time after he made it clear that no decision has been made just yet.

Stanford is eager to rebound from a 3-9 record in 2024, and Brown might give the Cardinal its best shot at doing that for the remainder of the season.

According to Dylan Grausz of Stanford Cardinal On SI, Brown has earned the right to at least prove that he is the future of the program.

With how the first two games of the season have gone, what better way to do it than in Stanford’s first ACC and home contest of its 2025 campaign?