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WBB: Stanford 78 Pacific 43 - 81alum - 12-15-2012

Stanford handily beat a very good (7-2) Pacific team, but there is plenty to worry about as we look forward to the next few teams that collectively simulate an early NCAA tournament.  Pacific could easily be a 1st round opponent, South Carolina is up next, then Tennessee, and finally Connecticut.  If we are going to run the gauntlet we will need better play from everyone not named Ogwumike.  Then again, this was the first game back after finals and there must have been some rust to dust off.

The atmosphere for the game was much better than the last home game around Thankgsiving.  We had 4200 instead of 3100 present, we had our popular announcer back, and the band showed up.  There were a few fabulous plays that brought the crowd to its feet, but I am sure the next home game (UConn) with be several orders of magnitude louder yet.

Two truly significant events of this game:  First, Taylor Greenfield had a nasty crash as a Pacific player attempted to take a charge off her (unsuccessfully--it was a blocking foul.)  She fell to the floor and stayed there for several minutes before being helped off to to the locker room.  She walked off very slowly and was supported on both sides.  The AP story says she hit her chin and they worked on her neck.  What that means we cannot yet know.  Let's all hope it proves to be a minor injury and not a major one. 

Second, Chiney scored a career high 31 points and could have scored more had she been kept in.  She also had 13 rebounds, 7 of them offensive. 

The game did not start off in such a promising fashion at all.  For the first 12 minutes of the game Pacific lived up to its excellent record and Stanford led only 21-18, with Chiney being doubled and only contributing 6 points.  Then Stanford went on a 17-2 run and any remaining suspense went out of the game.

Pacific started out with a very aggressive defense that constantly came out to the perimeter and into the perimeter passing lanes, making it difficult to do any of the old triangle stuff.  At first Stanford seemed to have problems with this, but by the end of the first half and beginning of the second half we were punishing Pacific by passing to Chiney and Joslyn who got behind the defense for easy layups.  There was a lot of high-low stuff this game, with Ruef getting five assists, while our guards got relatively few.

As the game wore on it was clear that they had absolutely no answer for Chiney.  If the shot clock was coming down she would get it at the top of the key, put the ball on the floor, take it to the hoop and score.  She looked like a woman among girls. 

In the early going Joslyn looked very good--as they doubled Chiney Jos would sometimes be the one to get behind the defense to receive the high-low pass.  As the game wore on, no one looked that great on offense other than Chiney.  I was left thinking that this will dispose of Pacific, but some of the games that are coming up will demand greater contributions from the rest of the team.

Particularly woeful was our three point shooting.  Actually, in the first half we took very few three point shots--it seemed as if the strategy against Pacific was to get it inside as our top priority.  For the game, we were 2/11 from three point range.  We will need to do better.

Tara seems to be playing around with the point guard slot again.  When Toni was in the game, she brought the ball up most of the time rather than Amber.  Amber was pretty aggressive about driving to the basket, and finished 4/11 for nine points.  Toni was 3/6 for eight points.  Jasmine played for 19 minutes and also slashed to the basket a couple of times, but wound up 0/4.  Her defense and her ball handling looked good to me, but her shot just is not returning to her after her year off.  None of the guards had many assists, the three combined were 4 assists to 5 turnovers.

All in all, a wonderful game for Chiney, a worrisome injury for Taylor, an effective game for Ruef (who had 13 rebounds, 3 blocks, and 5 assists) and an opportunity for Tara to see all her players.  Sara, Tess, and Bonnie all had significant minutes and some points in the latter going.

(In good news for WBB in the Pac12, Colorado beat number 8 Louisville and Washington State beat number 20 Ohio State tonight.)

Re: WBB: Stanford 78 Pacific 43 - BobK - 12-16-2012

The question is what is a point guard?  Orrange is our Point and you see that always in the half court sets.  Toni is so fast you will often see her leading the break. We are like the Knicks.  We have two but really look when we set up our O it's Orrange. 

Some great wins for the PAC 12 yesterday.  Recently several writers predicted 5 in the Dance.

Re: WBB: Stanford 78 Pacific 43 - Yellowlab - 12-16-2012

Good write up 81alum.  Besides last night's wins, I also noted UCLA's convincing win over Texas earlier.  The Pac-12 might actually start getting some love.  Maybe not.

I would say that Toni looked like her old self.  That was great to see. 

I don't like to see Tinkle hanging around the arc and hoisting up 3's.  On the other hand, she did not finish well on a couple of contested shots around the basket.  That was a bit frustrating too, but I would still rather see her either posted low or at the high post with the offense going through her.  She did make some good quick cuts to the basket, which resulted in some easy points.

Amber is much improved from last year, but her shot sort of comes and goes game to game.  She did have one pretty pick pocket steal, which highlighted her quick hands.  She is also very tough.  It really sets a tone when your point guard is both mentally and physically tough.  She is.

I cannot count the number of games last year when an opponent hung around, and hung around, causing fan agita, until Stanford would go on a run and put the game away.  Last night was a flashback.  Pacific was a good team, but vertically challenged.  They hung around until Stanford went on a 17-2 run.  I was a little surprised they didn't resort to a hack a Chiney strategy, because they had no other answer for her.

I guess you have to give Chiney the game ball, but I want to give it to Ruef.  She made a couple of mistakes, and was less than graceful upon occasion, but she supplied a serious dose of "I'm not a nice girl from Stanford."  As we've noted before, she has a nose for the ball.  She sometimes threads the needle a bit too much on her passes, but most of the time her passes are right on the money and just in the nick of time to facilitate a score.

I was screened from the play where Taylor got banged up, so I couldn't see what actually happened to her.  The chin hitting the floor report makes sense based on what happened afterwards.  We thought she might've had the wind knocked out of her, but grew increasing uneasy as she continued to lay on the floor.  Obviously, we hope she is OK and ready to go for the road trip, but the most important thing is for her to play it safe for now.

I was surprised that Bonnie didn't get more meaningful playing time, and I don't quite know what to make of that.  Sara James came in and impressed.  She is very physical.  If she develops confidence in her shot, she may be able to contribute against even the best teams.  Her lack of lateral quickness remains a defensive liability, but, as of now, I am holding out some hope for her.

Tess came in and hit the boards hard.  I thought back to the times when Booth had a similar height advantage, but did not control the boards.  I will actually be surprised, if Tess does not end up playing a limited, but significant, role late in the season.  Her rebounding and defensive skills are already evident.

I don't know what to make of Jasmine.  I think she is still feeling her way back.  My gut tells me that she will be an important cog later on. 

Erica is another player I can't help but root for.  She is a pesky defender, who can defend a range of players, big and small, quick and strong.  She's aggressive and seems to know what she is doing on the offensive end, although she still seems to need to develop a reliable jumper.

This team keeps growing on me.  I can't wait to see them continue to progress.



Re: WBB: Stanford 78 Pacific 43 - M T - 12-17-2012

Unfortunately, I missed the game, so thanks for the reports.  (Hopefully, they'll post a link to the game stats sometime (it isn't in the recap of the game, or in the schedule page, or in the season stats pages).  Even Gametracker isn't showing anything.)

I imagine the coach is still trying lots of things out, seeing what works and what doesn't. For instance, if Tinkle can hit the outside shot, that makes us even stronger.  If she works on it during games like this, that's ok with me, as long as she is disciplined enough not to do it in the close games unless she gets more consistent.
I'm glad to hear that Sara James impressed wbbfan2.  She had some really good moments in a preseason game, but I hadn't seen them since.  I hope she can perform well in big games, if called upon.


Let's see, #4 Stanford played #1 Baylor and it wasn't on TV in our area.
#1 Stanford is playing #24 South Carolina, and it won't be on TV in our area.
#1 Stanford is playing #13 Tennessee, and it won't be on TV in our area.
(but #3 Baylor vs #13 Tennessee will)

Sigh... all those little "TV"s in the schedule have sure been misleading!

Exposure?  If you count ESPNU as a national network, Stanford WBB will have 3 games on national TV in the regular season (UConn, Ca.lif, at UCLA), plus hopefully the PAC-12 tourney final.

Just counting the regular season,
Texas has 5 on FSN (which is not available on Comcast Bay Area)
Duke has 5 (at UConn, at North Carolina, at Virginia(ESPN 3), Maryland, North Carolina)
Tennessee has 5 (at Baylor, at Florida, N.Dame, Vanderbilt, at Kentucky).  Texas indicates the UT-UT game is on FSN, while Tennesse indicates it is on FSN-SportsSouth
Baylor has 8 (at N.Dame, Tennessee, at Connecticut, at Oklahoma, plus 4 more on Fox Sports Net: Ok.State, Kansas, Oklahoma, at WV, Kansas State)
Texas A&M has 8 (Penn State (FSN), UConn, at Arkansas(FSN), Georgia, Missouri, at LSU, Kentucky, at Vanderbilt)
UConn has 9 (at TxA&M, MD, at Stanford, N.Dame, Louisville, Duke, DePaul, Baylor, at N.Dame)
Notre Dame has 13 (Ohio State, Baylor, at UConn,  Rutgers, Georgetown, St. Johns,  at Tennessee, at Villanova, Lousville, Marquette, DePaul, Syracuse, UConn)

Re: WBB: Stanford 78 Pacific 43 - 81alum - 12-17-2012

(12-17-2012, 02:53 PM)MT link Wrote:Unfortunately, I missed the game, so thanks for the reports.  (Hopefully, they'll post a link to the game stats sometime (it isn't in the recap of the game, or in the schedule page, or in the season stats pages).  Even Gametracker isn't showing anything.)

You can get a boxscore at espn--it usually comes up faster than on the Stanford site, although they don't have quite all the same stats.  It is here:
http://espn.go.com/ncw/boxscore?gameId=323500024
It does seem as if the Stanford site dropped the ball on the Stanford/Pacific game--still no stats listed for it.

Does the Pac12 network televise any WBB games other than those between two Pac 12 schools?  Usually those are the most interesting games. 

Re: WBB: Stanford 78 Pacific 43 - CompSci87 - 12-17-2012

(12-17-2012, 03:53 PM)81alum link Wrote:Does the Pac12 network televise any WBB games other than those between two Pac 12 schools?  Usually those are the most interesting games.

Most games at Pac-12 schools, even if nonconference, are either telecast or webcast at pac-12.com.