NC State walked into Stanford with one of the softer spots left on its 2026 schedule, and walked out with a 31-28 loss that looked every bit as damaging as the scoreboard suggests.
The Cardinal came in near the bottom of the ACC in both scoring offense and scoring defense, sitting last in scoring offense and scoring defense, 15th in total offense and 17th in total defense. None of that mattered once Stanford started piling up yards. The Cardinal finished with 477 yards of total offense, the second-most NC State has given up all season.
Davis Warren was the driver of it all, throwing for 303 yards and a career-high four touchdown passes. Micah Brown added 150 rushing yards, the most by any player against NC State this year and the most since Terion Stewart ran for 174 yards in Virginia Tech’s 21-23 loss to the Wolfpack last season.
For NC State, there just wasn’t much to point to on the defensive side. The Wolfpack had injury issues, but most of them were on offense.
On defense, the only starter listed as “out” on the Availability Report was safety Tristan Teasdell. That leaves little room to explain how Stanford’s offense looked so comfortable.
Stanford’s attack made DJ Eliot’s defense look slow, confused and simply unprepared. Coming out of a bye and putting together that kind of effort on defense is hard to defend.
NC State’s offense didn’t do the defense any favors, either. CJ Bailey led the Wolfpack in rushing, while Davion Gause was the team’s top receiver. That’s not the kind of profile that usually leads to wins.
Eliot is going to take plenty of criticism, and that comes with the job after a collapse like this. But the bigger burden falls on Dave Doeren. The season’s unraveling belongs at the top, and this loss only sharpens that reality.
Doeren has been in charge since 2013 and has not usually oversold things in the preseason, but this year he alluded to a possible 10-win season. With NC State entering the year with the second-weakest schedule in the Power Four ranks, that didn’t seem far-fetched at the time.
Now it’s out of reach. At this point, even making a bowl game looks like a long shot.
NC State’s only realistic chances to be favored again appear to be against Cal and Syracuse, and after what happened at Stanford, even that no longer feels certain.
Before this game, the conversation about the ACC’s worst team might have been split between Stanford and Syracuse. After this loss, NC State belongs in that same conversation.
That’s embarrassing.
Doeren is under contract through the 2029 season, but athletic director Boo Corrigan has to be thinking hard about where this football program is headed next.
In Other News...
NC State Finally Made The Dave Doeren Decision Fans Feared
A rough start to the 2026 season finally caught up to Dave Doeren, as NC State moved on from the longtime coach after the Wolfpack fell to 3-4 with a loss to Stanford. Doeren had spent 14 seasons in Raleigh and was the longest-tenured coach in modern NC State football history, building a 98-74 record while overseeing one of the program's steadiest stretches.
The timing only sharpened the sense that the decision had been building for a while, especially after a loss to a Stanford team that had struggled in its own right. Even with Doeren under contract through 2029, the Wolfpack chose to make a change now, leaving the program to sort out what comes next after a disappointing opening half to the year. [Read more 🡒]
NC State Let A Winnable Stanford Trip Slip Away On Defense
The first trip to Stanford for NC State ended with more frustration than history, as the Wolfpack let a winnable game slip away in a 31-28 loss. CJ Bailey did his part with 256 passing yards and two touchdowns, but the offense could not quite offset a night when the defense spent too much time on its heels and the Cardinal kept finding answers.
Stanford finished with nearly 500 yards and four touchdown passes, a pace NC State never really managed to slow down once the game got into the middle stages. The defeat evened the all-time series at 1-1 and sent the Wolfpack home with a result that will linger, though there is little time to dwell on it with California next on the schedule in Raleigh. [Read more 🡒]
NC State Showed A Different Offensive Look Fans Needed To See
NC State wrapped up its offseason with a convincing 128-64 exhibition win over Lenoir-Rhyne at the Lenovo Center, and the bigger takeaway was the different kind of offense it put on display. The ball moved, the scoring came from multiple spots, and the frontcourt looked far more involved than it had at times in the past, which is exactly the sort of balance the Wolfpack wanted to show before the real games begin.
Ven-Allen Lubin was a force inside, while Paul McNeil gave the perimeter attack a needed spark and Robert Jurkovi added efficient production of his own. For a team trying to settle into its identity, the exhibition offered a useful snapshot of what this group can look like when the offense is flowing, with the season opener against Campbell now the next chance to see whether that rhythm carries over. [Read more 🡒]