ASU football came out of the Stanford Stadium tunnel Saturday afternoon greeted by a half-empty stadium as it jogged over to the East sideline – standing across from another unranked opponent in the Cardinal.
Quite the far cry from the meeting the two teams had four years ago at the Pac-12 Championship Game in Tempe.
But despite the time that’s passed, the overhauled rosters or the incongruity of the setting, the two games followed the same tune early.
On the game’s first drive, Stanford’s running back busted out a long run, but instead of then Cardinal back Tyler Gaffney going 69 yards, current running back Bryce Love, the nation’s leading rusher, found the end zone from 61 yards out in the 34-24 Cardinal victory.