This wasn’t the David Shaw-Chip Kelly matchup of old. There were no Heisman hopefuls leading either team, nor championship dreams on the line. UCLA came in 1-5 and Stanford came in as the Ship of Theseus. Needless to say both teams entered unranked, and left it even more unranked. Collectively having four straight turnovers on downs will do that.
It would be pretty easy to blame Jack West for this loss. The third string quarterback made his first career start for Stanford, after only taking a handful of snaps to date. He looked skittish out there, holding the ball far too long and short-arming throws.