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Burbank, Calif. • Utah and Stanford may be the two teams that other Pac-12 teams least enjoy playing: grinders who want to control the clock and beat you in the fourth quarter, after they've thoroughly bloodied you.

They represent a departure from the usual high-paced, air-it-out, race-to-the-end-zone approach that you'd prefer if you were facing any other Pac-12 team.

They're a headache for everybody. But, this season, not for each other.

"Thankfully," said Stanford head coach David Shaw, whose Cardinal were beaten in consecutive years by Kyle Whittingham's Utes.

"Two years in a row, just about the most physical game that we played," Shaw said at Pac-12 media days on Thursday. "Two teams that are very similar, two teams that recruit similar types of guys, similar kinds of personalities. They want big, physical, mature men, and that's what we want, too. Both teams walked out of those games knowing that they were in a pretty tough battle."

The battle isn't over off the field, though, in the Beehive State.

Stanford defensive coordinator Lance Anderson is a former LDS missionary with ties to the region, and four current Cardinal are Utah natives who held offers at the U.: safety Dallas Lloyd, guard Brandon Fanaika, linebacker Sean Barton and tight end Dalton Schultz.

Shaw said Stanford coaches regard the area comprising Utah, Colorado and Nevada as an ignored region where there is a wealth of well-rounded, Stanford-caliber students.

"First and foremost, there are really good schools in Utah," Shaw said. "We have to go where the good schools are and where the good football is. We've been able to find our combination of academics and athletics in that state multiple times, and we're excited about the guys that we have."

And Stanford is also one of few teams, seemingly, that doesn't try to dissuade LDS athletes from going on missions. Lloyd, Fanaika and Barton went on missions. Now, Lloyd is one of Stanford's most experienced defensive backs, Fanaika is vying for playing time and Barton is winning the praise of senior linebacker Blake Martinez as one of the hardest-working freshmen on the team.

It's a no-brainer, Shaw said.

"We're only talking about two years in a span of an athlete's life. They come back about 20 years old. They come back wiser. They come back more ready to play college football sometimes."

Graduate transfers throughout league

Stanford defensive end Brennan Scarlett is a first: a graduate transfer into the Cardinal program — and from rival Cal, no less.

The 2006 NCAA rule that allows student-athletes to graduate and play immediately at another school — usually in their fifth season — is the subject of debate, partly due to quarterback Vernon Adams' transfer from Eastern Washington to Oregon.

Utah quarterback Kendal Thompson is another grad transfer. This summer, Utah courted UCLA receiver Devin Lucien, who wound up at Arizona State and is expected to feature in its attack this season.

But even though Shaw's team has seen more departures than arrivals (in the past year, Stanford has lost Patrick Skov to Georgia Tech, Wayne Lyons to Michigan and Kelsey Young to Boise State, all as grad transfers), he doesn't understand the opposition.

"I'm surprised that I'm in such a minority here," Shaw said. "It makes sense to me. At the end of a young man's fourth year, if he's got a year of eligibility left and he's graduated, he should be able to weigh his options."

Shaw said he's observed that some coaches are happy to push a player out the door as a graduate transfer when that player can't help his team anymore, and then to be upset when they lose a player that they want.

Young, for instance, he wishes he could have kept. But "he's fulfilled his obligation to us. … I don't know that any of us should be able to stop a college graduate from doing something that they want to do."

Publishing financials

That Pac-12 per-school distributions aren't skyrocketing at the pace of other conferences has inspired concern from fans of Pac-12 schools that someday they won't be able to compete with the likes of the SEC.

It became so heated that in the wake of reports from the San Jose Mercury News and CBS Sports last year, Pac-12 commissioner Larry Scott sent out an email warning athletic directors against sharing financial information with the media. In the emails, acquired via a records request, it seems Scott knew the leak's identity.

For whatever reason, the Pac-12 chooses to treat its distributions as guarded secrets until their 990 forms become public, which means their numbers always lag one year behind other conferences'.

On Thursday, Scott said that's not going to change. Told that it makes the Pac-12 seem to pale further in comparison to the SEC, he said, "We'd prefer not to play that game. We're not into 'look how big mine is.' "

'The Drive' stays in the background

Asked his biggest surprise about being on Pac-12 Networks' "The Drive" series, which will feature Utah and Oregon State this season, UCLA head coach Jim Mora said "I wasn't expecting it to be so unobtrusive and easy. It was awesome."

Mora said he'd watch the episodes online before they aired, but he didn't play a hands-on role in the editing. UCLA's sports information staff knew the message it wanted conveyed, and there were no issues.

He especially enjoyed humanizing segments on Kenny Clark and Jordan Payton.

"We see that stuff every day, but most people only know them as guys in jerseys."

Twitter: @matthew_piper