Still seeking its first home win under coach Troy Taylor, Stanford will host FCS opponent Cal Poly on Saturday in Stanford, Calif.
The Cardinal (0-1) opened Taylor’s second season of leading the program with a 34-27 loss last week to visiting TCU, Stanford’s eighth defeat at home since the beginning of last season.
The Cardinal’s home woes include a 30-23 setback against Taylor’s former team and Cal Poly’s Big Sky Conference counterpart Sacramento State last season.
“FCS is really good football, and they’ve got good coaches,” Taylor said Tuesday. “With the amount of talent that is out there, especially with the transfer portal, you can create a really good football team in a short amount of time.
“There’s no overconfidence in us. We lost to an FCS team last year,” he added.
While Sacramento State came to Stanford having become a perennial playoff team under Taylor, Cal Poly represents the other end of the Big Sky standings.
The Mustangs (0-1) have not had a winning record since 2016 and finished their first season under coach Paul Wulff at 3-8 last year.
Wulff said before the 2024 opener that Cal Poly has “been growing this thing for a couple years, and we feel now we’re in a position to be competitive and surprise some people.”
Year 2 with Wulff opened with a 27-21 loss at San Diego last week. A 36-yard scoop-and-score by Budha Boyd Jr. gave Cal Poly a lead early in the third quarter, but San Diego rolled off 17 consecutive points.
Quarterback Bo Kelly threw three interceptions, two of which were returned for touchdowns. Jackson Akins came on in the fourth quarter and finished strong with a touchdown pass.
Creating scoring opportunities from takeaways could be key for the Cardinal on Saturday. Taylor praised the Stanford defense’s improvement from a season ago, showing up when Jay Green and David Bailey each forced fumbles against TCU.
Stanford quarterback Ashton Daniels threw for a touchdown and rushed for 89 yards in Week 1 but was just 17-of-35 passing for 163 yards and took four sacks.
The Cardinal offensive line can expect another challenge protecting Daniels from Cal Poly’s talented edge rusher, Elijah Ponder. Ponder’s 10 sacks in 2023 were the sixth-most in the FCS.
