Cal's Craig Woodson Wants to Show Stanford `Y'all's The Little Dogs'

The senior safety is fired up for the Big Game, but the Cal coaches are wary of the Cardinal after its win over Louisville

Stanford quarterback Ashton Daniels on the run. / Bob Kupbens-Imagn Images

For six consecutive defeats, the Stanford offense appeared helpless. The Cardinal averaged just 15 points over that span and ranked near the bottom in the Atlantic Coast Conference in almost every key offensive statistic.

Then Stanford rose up and knocked off Louisville 38-35 on Saturday, its highest point output against an FBS opponent all year.

That performance, including an ACC Quarterback of the Week showing by Ashton Daniels, certainly caught the attention of the Cal coaching staff heading into Saturday’s 127th Big Game at Memorial Stadium. 

But that outcome changes nothing as far as Cal sixth-year safety Craig Woodson is concerned.

“We still feel the same way about them. We’re coming out Saturday to dominate them,” Woodson says in the video at the top of this story. “With them beating Louisville, it doesn’t change anything. It just makes us even more (determined) to show them y’all’s the little dogs and we’re the Bears.”

Cal (5-5, 1-5 ACC) has won the past three Big Games and is a two-touchdown favorite to make it four in a row. 

With bowl eligibility on the line, the Bears won’t take anything for granted. “That’s definitely true,” Woodson said, “ . . . anybody can lose on any given Saturday.”

Stanford ranks 16th in the ACC in scoring (22.2 points) and Daniels, a 6-foot-2, 215-pound junior from Buford, Georgia, is 16th in both passing yards (1,309) and pass efficiency (122.8). But he’s also the most productive running QB in the conference with 515 rushing yards and a pair of touchdowns.

And against Louisville, he completed 22 of 33 passes for a season-high 298 yards with three touchdowns to freshman wide receiver Emmett Mosley V.

Mosley caught a Stanford freshman-record 13 passes for 168 yards, giving coach Troy Taylor a nice complement to sophomore Elic Ayomanor. A physical 6-2 sophomore from Medicine Hat, Alberta, Canada, Ayomanor has 110 receptions for 1,673 yards and 12 TDs in his brief 22-game college career.

“Talk about a talented trio,” Cal defensive coordinator Peter Sirmon said. “Ashton Daniels, we know exactly what kind of athlete he is, what kind of quarterback he is. I think he’s continuing to get better. Troy’s doing a good job of bringing him along.”

Cal head coach Justin Wilcox also knows Taylor, the one-time Cal star quarterback, will have something special up his sleeve for his alma mater.

“Coach Taylor’s very creative,” he said. “They’re going to have different formations and schemes — they will give you different looks week to week. It’s not going to be exactly what you saw before.”

INJURY UPDATE: Wilcox said sophomore inside linebacker Cade Uluave remains day-to-day this week. The reigning Pac-12 Defensive Freshman of the Year, Uluave aggravated a lower-body injury in the Bears' win over Wake Forest two weeks ago and sat out last week against Syracuse.