Stanford Football to Begin 2025 Campaign with Week Zero Matchup

The Cardinal will travel to Oahu, where they will look to kick start the 2025 campaign with a win.
Nov 29, 2024; San Jose, California, USA; San Jose State Spartans head coach Ken Niumatalolo and Stanford Cardinal head coach Troy Taylor hug after their game at CEFCU Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Eakin Howard-Imagn Images
Nov 29, 2024; San Jose, California, USA; San Jose State Spartans head coach Ken Niumatalolo and Stanford Cardinal head coach Troy Taylor hug after their game at CEFCU Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Eakin Howard-Imagn Images / Eakin Howard-Imagn Images
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Stanford's football schedule for the 2025 season is starting to come together. On Thursday, the ACC began the first phase of its schedule release, with the revealing of the week zero and week one slate. For the Cardinal, their season will begin on the islands, when they travel to face Hawaii in week zero.

Playing the Rainbow Warriors for the second time since 2023, facing them in week one of that season, the Cardinal will head to Honolulu on August 23 to face off against a Hawaii team that finished 5-7 in 2024. Being the only ACC team scheduled to play week zero, this move means that the Cardinal will be the ones who will look to set the tone for the conference heading into the year.

This past season, Florida State and Georgia Tech started things off for the ACC, and Tech beat state as the two programs went in different direction. Georgia Tech won the game and ended the season with a 7-6 record, going 5-3 in conference play, while Florida State went 2-10 and finished at the bottom of the ACC standings, going 1-7.

After week zero on Saturday, Aug. 23, the rest of week one will begin on Aug. 28, with games being held all through Labor Day weekend on Saturday and Sunday.

In addition to the week zero game against Hawaii, the Cardinal also have two more games on their schedule that have been confirmed, with a week two road matchup against BYU scheduled for Sept. 6 and a week three home matchup against San Jose State scheduled for Sept. 13. Those first three games round out the non-conference slate for the Cardinal, who will begin conference play the following week.

While there are no other dates confirmed for the rest of Stanford's schedule, the ACC teams that are on the docket for the Cardinal to face in '25 include Boston College, California, Florida State, Pittsburgh, Miami, SMU and Virginia.

But the game that may very well end up the most anticipated, for any football fan, could be a road game against North Carolina, where for the first time, head coach Troy Taylor will face off against NFL legend and current UNC head coach, Bill Belichick.

It will be a very important year for the Cardinal, as after finishing 3-9 for four consecutive seasons, the need to win and become a competitive program once again has become urgent. Starting with the hiring of former Cardinal quarterback Andrew Luck to be the program's general manager in November, it is evident that Stanford is doing whatever it can to return to relevance.

With the start date of their season now known, all that's left now is for the Cardinal to keep their heads down and work.

The ACC will continue with its schedule release on Friday, Jan. 24 when the ACC opener for all 17 teams is announced. Then, on Monday, Jan. 27, the rest of the ACC schedule will be released via a schedule release show that will air on both the ACC Network and ESPN2 from 6 p.m. (PT) to 8 p.m. (PT).


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Dylan Grausz
DYLAN GRAUSZ

A lifelong sports fan, Dylan has channeled his passion for sports into the world of reporting, always looking to provide the best possible coverage. A graduate of the University of Arizona, Dylan has since gone on to report on all sports, having gained experience covering primarily football, baseball, basketball, softball and soccer.