Stanford to open 2017 season in Australia against Rice

By AP
Published

STANFORD, Calif. (AP) Stanford will open the upcoming football season in Australia against Rice.

Stanford announced Monday that the schools had gotten approval to move the game that had been scheduled to be played in Houston to Sydney. The game will be moved up a week and played on Aug. 26, which will be Aug. 27 in Australia.

The Cardinal will have a week off after returning and then play at USC on Sept. 9.

This is the second straight year a Pac-12 team has gone to Australia with California taking on Hawaii last year.

This will be Stanford's second game ever outside the United States. The Cardinal played Arizona in Tokyo in 1986.