Former NFL quarterback and head coach Frank Reich has long been known as “Captain Comeback.” However, in his first game as a college head coach, Reich’s Stanford team wound up on the wrong end of one.
Hawaii kicker Kansei Matsuzawa’s walk-off 38-yard field goal lifted his Mountain West school to a 23-20 win over the ACC’s Cardinal. The Warriors rallied from an early 10-0 deficit and fell behind again in the fourth quarter before producing two field-goal drives in the final two minutes.
Stanford, which has suffered four straight 3-9 seasons, was playing its first game since former star Andrew Luck became the program’s general manager last winter and later fired then-head coach Troy Taylor in March. That decision came after the public revelation of two internal investigations into Taylor’s workplace conduct.
Rather than hiring a permanent replacement, Luck appointed Reich, his former Indianapolis Colts head coach, to serve as interim head coach for the 2025 season. Reich had been out of coaching since his 2023 dismissal by the Carolina Panthers.
Reich became Stanford’s interim coach just a day before the Cardinal opened spring practices in late March. He scrapped Taylor’s hurry-up spread offense and installed much the same pro-style scheme he ran with Luck as his quarterback in Indianapolis. Stanford spent most of Saturday’s game under center, huddling and using multiple tight-end sets.
They started the game strong, driving 70 yards for a field goal, and then went up 10-0 on Hawaii’s first offensive play. Defensive tackle Clay Patterson sacked Hawaii quarterback Micah Alejado in the end zone and forced a fumble, recovered by Wilfredo Aybar.
However, Hawaii’s defense quickly adjusted to Stanford’s downhill running game, and the Cardinal did not reach the end zone in the second or third quarters. Stanford quarterback Ben Gulbranson, who transferred in from Oregon State after spring practices, struggled (15-of-30 for 109 yards) most of the day.
The Cardinal reclaimed momentum in the fourth quarter with a 20-play, 85-yard touchdown drive led primarily by running back Micah Ford (26 carries, 113 yards, one TD) to go up 20-17. They looked to go up by more on their next drive when Gulbranson completed a third-down play-action pass for 36 yards, but two plays later, he was picked off in the red zone by Hawaii’s Kilinahe Mendiola-Jensen.
Alejado (27-of-39 for 210 yards, two TDs and no INTs), a redshirt freshman making his second career start, went out with an ankle injury for part of the third quarter and was noticeably limping when he returned. However, he led Hawaii to a game-tying field goal with 2:01 left and then, after Hawaii’s defense held Stanford to a three-and-out in less than 30 seconds, went 4-of-5 to set up the game winner.
Hawaii, which has not posted a winning record since 2020, faces another Power 4 foe next week at Arizona. Stanford is off next weekend before visiting BYU.
(Photo: Darryl Oumi / Getty Images)
