Stanford Begins Week as Underdogs Against Cal

Stanford will be looking for their first Big Game win in five tries

Nov 23, 2024; Berkeley, California, USA; The California Golden Bears axe committee holds up the axe trophy on the field after the game against the Stanford Cardinal at California Memorial Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Darren Yamashita-Imagn Images | Darren Yamashita-Imagn Images

Everybody's favorite week of the year is here. We're just days away from the 128th Big Game, as Cal will head to The Farm to take on Stanford on Saturday, and while they're all important, this one holds a little extra meaning for the Cardinal.

Stanford has finished with the same 3-9 record in each of the past four seasons, and heading into this matchup with the Golden Bears, they're sitting at 3-7 with a game against No. 9 Notre Dame to follow. In order for Stanford to surpass three wins and capture that elusive fourth victory, they're going to have to beat Cal for the first time since 2021, and the first time at home since 2017.

The odds aren't exactly in Stanford's favor to begin the week, however. Over at FanDuel, they're giving Cal a slight 2.5 point edge on the spread, while the over/under in this one has been set at 49.5.

Cal Golden Bears on SI noted that the odds have actually been dropping since Saturday night, with Cal opening up as 4.5-point favorites, but in the 24 hours that have passed, Stanford has already trimmed two points off that deficit.

This game is expected to be close, but having the over/under at nearly 50 is interesting. With Elijah Brown under center against North Carolina—his first start of the season—the offense wasn't able to move the ball much throughout the game, landing them three points in the first three quarters of play.

Once UNC had taken a 20-3 lead and there were under ten minutes left in the game, the Cardinal offense snapped out of its stupor and found the end zone twice to make the final score look a lot closer than the game actually was at 20-15.

That's going to be the big question for Stanford in this game. Elijah Brown has put up stats and has been able to move the ball on occasion, but too often those occasions have been when the game is out of reach and the defense is playing a little more loose.

The other reason that this game will be hugely important for the Cardinal is that if they are able to secure a victory, they they would snap the 3-9 streak and the losing streak to Cal, which would give the next coach of Stanford football a clean slate without any baggage hanging over their head from the start.

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