UW vs Stanford: Game Prediction
Each week of the season, I make a prediction about the upcoming Washington Husky football game on my TV show, “Talkin’ Huskies” Featuring Q13 Sports Anchor Aaron Levine, Michelle Ludtka and myself (Terry Hollimon), Talkin’ Huskies airs every Friday night and Saturday morning on Q13 Fox in Seattle.
This week the Dawgs head down to Palo Alto to take on a struggling Stanford Cardinal football team. The Cardinal (2-3 Overall, 1-2 in the Pac 12) started the 2019 season as one of the favorites to challenge for the Pac 12 North title, but then things began to rapidly fall apart down on The Farm. The injury bug bit the Cardinal hard early this season, with the biggest hit coming at the QB position. Senior K.J Costello, who hurt his thumb 2 weeks ago, will be unavailable against the Huskies today and RS-Sophomore Davis Mills will make the second start of his collegiate career. Although Mills played well enough to win his first outing against Oregon State last week (245 yards passing), the Husky defense is a completely different animal than the Beavers defense. With Stanford fielding a different combination of offensive lineman every week so far in the 2019 season, I expect the Husky defense to give the young Stanford QB all that he can handle on Saturday night.
Stanford’s defense has struggled mightily this season - Particularly their passing defense. They are currently ranked 115th in the nation in that department. While their run defense has been significantly better than that, the Washington Huskies 3 headed monster of Salvon Ahmed, Richard Newton and Sean McGrew has been extremely effective for the Dawgs this season and could be problematic for Stanford. The Cardinal gave up over 200 yards on the ground to UCF earlier this year, and I expect the Huskies to have similar success.
Even though the Dawgs have not won a game in Palo Alto since 2007, I believe that the Huskies will win big in The Bay this weekend. I predict a 21 point margin of victory for the Washington Huskies off the strength of a solid showing by QB Jacob Eason and the 3 headed monster of Ahmed, Newton and McGrew. Plus the Husky “Death Row” defense will continue to improve against a Cardinal offense that is suffering from more than its fair share of challenges at this point in the season.
