[stupac2]

[quote author=OutsiderFan link=topic=17715.msg206817#msg206817 date=1508185014]
Funny, I don't think UW had any asterisks put next to their Stanford win last year, when Stanford was missing both starting CBs, McCaffery was banged up, and we all now believe AT Hall wasn't healthy either.

Very True. But we aren't them.
[/quote]

And? It doesn't matter. None of it matters. Stanford's path to a NY6 bowl is very, very, very simple:

1) Win the conference.

That's it. There's no plan B. We were 9-3 last year and saw what that got us. If we lose another conference game we'll have fun rooting for maybe the Holiday bowl.

Meanwhile, the only conceivable path to the playoff is:

1) Win out.
2) Hope for some truly spectacular chaos.

Again, perceptions about UW won't matter. We'd need at least one other conference (probably the ACC and/or Big 12) to implode and produce a 2-loss winner. Beating UW at full strength vs hobbled won't move the needle at all and I don't know why anyone thinks it would. Look at 2015 when we clearly had the #3 resume, but it didn't matter because even the committee still does the stupid cult of zero "sort by loss column" ranking method.

[stupac2]

[quote author=OutsiderFan link=topic=17715.msg206817#msg206817 date=1508185014]
Funny, I don't think UW had any asterisks put next to their Stanford win last year, when Stanford was missing both starting CBs, McCaffery was banged up, and we all now believe AT Hall wasn't healthy either.

Very True. But we aren't them.
[/quote]

And? It doesn't matter. None of it matters. Stanford's path to a NY6 bowl is very, very, very simple:

1) Win the conference.

That's it. There's no plan B. We were 9-3 last year and saw what that got us. If we lose another conference game we'll have fun rooting for maybe the Holiday bowl.

Meanwhile, the only conceivable path to the playoff is:

1) Win out.
2) Hope for some truly spectacular chaos.

Again, perceptions about UW won't matter. We'd need at least one other conference (probably the ACC and/or Big 12) to implode and produce a 2-loss winner. Beating UW at full strength vs hobbled won't move the needle at all and I don't know why anyone thinks it would. Look at 2015 when we clearly had the #3 resume, but it didn't matter because even the committee still does the stupid cult of zero "sort by loss column" ranking method.