353 yards passing with no picks. Sacked only once. While #1 RB is still learning how to play. I’d say the right calls were made.
This was a lot like Hoover's demolition of BYU last year in some ways: they loaded the box so the sensible thing is to take what they give you. Ball security and knuckle-head penalties were a problem. A few such errors here and there you can attribute to players. A culture of such errors is ultimately on the coaches. Will those errors prove to be week one rust or the team's fundamental culture? We'll see. Briles needs to get the dropsies, fumbles, and extra-curricular shoving sorted out by the time we play UCF.
Also, we scored in the red zone, yes, but we really had to struggle to do it. Scoring is often hard--the other team doesn't usually want you to do it. But does "had to work hard in the red zone to score vs Stanford" indicate that we can score when we need to, or will better teams consistently cause us to stall out inside in the 20? We'll see.
There are reasons to be hopeful and reasons to be doubtful.