Stanford’s defense needs to bring the heat

After watching Stanford’s 35-24 loss to #24 UCLA on Saturday, one of the main takeaways I had was the fact that Stanford’s defense needs to do more in the way of bringing the heat. I.e. Putting pressure on opposing teams’ quarterbacks and creating chaos in the backfield.

When Stanford’s defense brought the heat and applied such pressure, good things happened. Thomas Booker’s sack, Stephen Herron’s sack, Ricky Miezan’s pressure in the backfield, and Kyu Blu Kelly’s pressure in which he had a surprise blitz all yielded positive fruit for Stanford. In some cases they helped shift momentum in Stanford’s way and in all cases, they helped Stanford get a stop that they needed.

And yet, despite all these good plays, Stanford isn’t doing so hot when it comes to applying pressure in the backfield. Stanford has just 6 sacks on the year, which ranks them in a three-way tie for 9th in the Pac-12 along with Cal and Arizona. Colorado (5), Washington State (4), and USC (3) are the only Pac-12 teams that rank lower. Arizona State and Utah lead the conference with 12 total sacks. In the FBS as a whole (130 teams), Stanford ranks ahead of just 24 teams in total sacks. Both of their wins this year came against teams who have fewer sacks than them on the year (Vanderbilt has 1), which in and of itself is an interesting and potentially ominous data point.

The question of course is why isn’t Stanford doing better at getting sacks and applying pressure? Part of it is the defensive line as a group isn’t as strong as it needs to be. Thomas Booker, the star up front didn’t capture his first sack of the year until the UCLA game. And the other two defensive linemen to get sacks this year (Tucker Fisk and Dalyn Wade-Perry) don’t have much of a sacking resume. Fisk is a bit of an unknown in that this is the first year where he’s actually getting serious minutes on defense, but Wade-Perry has just three sacks for his entire Stanford career.

Touching more on Booker, for whatever reason he appears to have regressed in this department over the course of his Stanford career. 3.5 sacks as a freshman, 4.0 sacks as a sophomore, 1.0 sacks as a junior, and 1.0 sacks so far this year. His junior year was cut short due to COVID (six games), but 1.0 sack through six games last year projects to 2.0 sacks for a full 12 game season. This year, his 1.0 sack through four games projects to 3.0 sacks for the full 12 games this year. Which would be lower than the total he had as a freshman and sophomore. Part of this may be due to opposing teams focusing more on him and making things tougher than they did his freshman/sophomore year, but still, great pass rushers find ways to get to the quarterback no matter what opposing teams do.

With the defensive line being rather weak at bringing the pressure, it’s become incumbent on the linebackers to be the leaders in sacks. Junior outside linebacker Stephen Herron is leading the way this year with his 3.0 sacks per game, which is a really good clip for an outside linebacker. Fifth-year outside linebacker Gabe Reid has had a successful career rushing the passer with 9.5 sacks on his career, so he’s due for a sack any game now.

And just watching the UCLA game, aside from Booker’s sack, the other plays I mentioned at the start of this piece were all made by linebackers or cornerbacks. Stanford’s best pass rushers aren’t at the defensive line positions. They’re at linebacker and perhaps even in the secondary.

I also need to stress that sacks aren’t the only indicator of applying pressure in the backfield, but they are a good indicator. Teams that have double the sacks as Stanford can reasonably be concluded to be applying roughly twice the amount of pressure. I.e. The more sack attempts you have, the more sacks you can be expected to get and the more pressure you are applying.

And if you are looking for another statistical indicator of pressure, Stanford’s defense is yet to force one fumble this year. Those of course don’t have to happen in the backfield, but one of the common ways to force a fumble is to strip the quarterback or pop the ball loose from a running back en route to a TFL (tackle for loss). If you aren’t getting into the backfield and getting sack attempts, you aren’t putting yourself in a position to force those fumbles and make the type of game changing plays that all great defenses make.

It’s obvious that Stanford needs to get more sacks and apply more pressure in the backfield, but the question is whether or not that’s doable. In my opinion, it is doable if Stanford doesn’t overly rely on the defensive line. If Stanford plays a more conservative defensive style and doesn’t take very many risks or gambles, they’re likely to see things stay where they are. If they get a little more aggressive and try to mix things up more by bringing different linebackers, corners, and safeties in for blitzes at the right times, they should see an improvement in this department and wreak havoc.