Publication Date: Friday, September 17, 2004
STANFORD FOOTBALL
Cardinal using bye week
Cardinal using bye week
(September 17, 2004)to prep for No. 1 USC
by Rick Eymer
The nice thing about a bye week this early in the season is the chance to build a little extra momentum heading into next week's game against top-ranked USC, a game that will open the Pac-10 season.
It also helps the Stanford football team to have won its first two games by a fairly healthy margin and that school will be in session, and the game will be nationally televised.
Junior defensive back T.J. Rushing was named Pacific-10 Conference Special Teams Player of the Week for his performance in Saturday's win over BYU. Rushing returned a kickoff 99 yards for a touchdown against the Cougars. It was the third longest kickoff return for a touchdown in school history.
The Cardinal will take advantage of the bye week to address some fundamentals.
"We need to tackle better. I thought we were better at that in the second game than the first, but some of our techniques need to be polished up a bit," Stanford coach Buddy Teevens said. "That's going to be the big push. We will introduce USC as much as we know about them, but we see this as an opportunity to improve our skills."
Junior nose tackle Babatunde Oshinowo, who has seven sacks in his Cardinal career, agreed.
"We're feeling pretty good about the first two wins, but we know that we have a lot of work to do," he said. "We're using the bye week to get back to fundamentals and work on basic things. We need to clean up certain things in order to play to our full potential."
Stanford will make its first appearance on TBS when it hosts the Trojans on Sept. 25 at 4:00 p.m. The Cardinal has at least two other nationally televised games: Oct. 9 at Notre Dame (NBC) and Nov. 20 at California (Fox Sports Net).
The Cardinal has outscored its first two opponents 80-13 and its 67-point advantage in back-to-back games is the best on The Farm in 13 years.
"I think the difference has been the continued development of the offensive line," Teevens said. "We played with a lot of young guys that were inexperienced a year ago. They're a little bit better physically and have developed a better sense of the game."
The last time Stanford held two straight opponents to just 13 points or less was in 1992 when the Cardinal allowed 12 points to USC (23-9) and Washington State (40-3).
"I thought our three down guys did a good job of bull rushing and trying to constrict the pocket, and the speed guys had an opportunity to make plays in the backfield," Teevens said. "Kevin Schimmelmann had a big sack and a turnover."
Stanford is ranked second in the Pac-10 and seventh in the nation with a plus-2.5 turnover margin through two games. The Cardinal have committed just two turnovers while forcing seven. Stanford has yet to throw an interception.
"We know USC is a good team and they are capable of doing certain things, but we're more focused on ourselves and what we need to do to be successful," Oshinowo said. "We know what we have to do, and we're focusing on being able to execute our game plan."
USC will give Stanford everything it can handle.
"We have to play an outstanding football game and execute as thoroughly as we can," Teevens said. "In my opinion, they are the best football team in the country by a pretty good margin. I don't see any weaknesses in their defense. They're seasoned and play very hard."
The Trojans may have received the most votes, but Stanford is not going unnoticed. The Cardinal received some votes in the most recent national poll.
"The thing I like about our team is that the external distractions seem to be minimal," Teevens said. "It's nice, but it doesn't mean a whole lot."
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