CLEMSON – The Clemson Insider takes a deep dive into Clemson’s ACC opponents for the 2025 college baseball season.

Newcomers to the ACC, the Stanford Cardinal, are led by David Esquer who took the team to a 22-33 record during the 2024 campaign while holding an 11-19 mark in the old Pac-12.

Stanford visits Clemson for a three-game series at Doug Kingsmore Stadium, April 11-13.

STRENGTHS:

Stanford has a lot of emerging young talent, as almost all of the innings pitched from the previous season are back for this year. This gives the Cardinal a lot of depth and veteran presence on the mound. Big jumps are expected from Christian Lim and Joey Volchko in the rotation.

A huge presence to their lineup is going to be Japanese phenom Rintaro Sasaki, who made the jump last year to joining the Cardinal. The staff involving Matt Scott, Trevor Moore, Ty Uber, and Toran O’Harran are all poised to have a big year.

QUESTION MARKS

Stanford is having to adjust to a much better conference for this 2025 campaign, which is going to be a struggle in and of itself, and it is going to involve much more travel to start. The big question surrounding this Cardinal team is whether or not they are going to have enough thump in the bats to compete in the ACC, which tends to be a high scoring league.

The Pac-12 is known for their defensive prowess and pitching so that is going to have to lead the way for this club.

TOP NEWCOMERS

Rintaro Sasaki is one of the more intriguing freshmen to join the Atlantic Coast Conference. He racked up over 100 home runs during his high school campaign in Japan. Stanford has Omaha upside if the young players develop, and the veterans improve upon last year’s production.

These are two significant “ifs” for a program that was less that .500 last season. Esquer took the Cardinal to Omaha for three consecutive years in a row before last year’s tumble.

–photo by Caitie McMekin / USA TODAY NETWORK