[81alum]

Two stat lines encapsulate the game:

Alanna Smith, 7-24 from the field, 3-11 from three.  She didn't just miss a few short range shots, she missed a lot of them. If she doesn't find her shooting touch again, we're not going to go very far, no matter how good the defense.

Marta Sniezek, 0-1 from the field, 3 assists, in 31 minutes.  And one of those assists perfectly encapsulates her game - she had a clear lane to drive, and Anigwe literally retreated to UNDER the basket.  Marta had a wide open 8 foot jump shot.  Instead, she waited, and threw a very good but very risky bounce pass through two players to a cutting Smith or McPhee that was converted.  When a player is willing to throw that low-probability pass, rather than take what should be a gimme short jump shot, that's not good.  And C.al figured out she has trouble getting through and off of screens - I couldn't count the number of times she got hung up on a screen, leaving Thomas to drive into the lane, and either hit a short jump shot, or pass to the screener rolling to the basket if their defender came out to help.  The plus-minus at the PG position today was unsustainable against a half-way competent team.

Thanks VG.  I incorporated a few of your observations at the top (and credited you.)  You have always been keenly perceptive about bb.

All of our observations about Sniezek's lack of scoring sound like a broken record, but today there were other problems.  She was not able to contain Asha Thomas, and she was not able to generate assists.  One of our worst games all season for lack of assists.  But Williams did not do well on either count either, with 0 assists and 3 turnovers.  A poor day from our guards.

And I just can't get over 7 turnovers from McPhee, including a couple of really bad ones--the standing still one at the end of the 1st, and the Marta-esque overly aggressive long bounce pass at the critical juncture in the 4th. 

Here is observation from the press that makes it clear that C.al was taking advantage of our focus on Anigwe.  Perhaps the problem was Tara's scheme, although whenever we left Anigwe one-on-one she was unstoppable.

Guards help Cal, seniors beat arch-rival
Stanford forced Cal’s guards to try to win the game Saturday afternoon.  And that’s exactly what the Bears’ backcourt did....“I thought our guards were spectacular today,” said Gottlieb, who remembers watching Gray-Lawson’s virtuoso performance on TV. “I think (Thomas’) performance today was as memorable as that one.”  Taking advantage of Stanford’s game plan to sag deep in the lane to focus on Kristine Anigwe (11 points, nine rebounds), the Cal guards consistently found driving lanes and regularly connected on pointblank runners and floaters.

https://www.sfgate.com/collegesports/art...622394.php

And some quotes from the audio press conference:

Tara: "I'm proud of our team for fighting back, but we didn't find a way to get it done.  I think our defense let us down basically the whole game.  They were just driving in, getting in deep and scoring.  When you are in a close game you have to make free throws and layups.  Their top players scored 50% or better and we weren't competitive enough."

Question to Alanna: "The stats had Stanford missing 14 layups.  How much of this was the C.al defense?"  Alanna: "I missed a lot of gimmes that I should have made, right under the basket.  Like Tara said, we had layups that we should have made."

Question to Britt:  "They seemed to have a lot of possessions that when they scored in the last few seconds of the shot clock.  What were they able to do to finish those possessions off?"  Britt: "They just made big plays, which you have to do to win...so....." 

Tara:  "We can't always depend on Britt to do all the scoring, or Alanna to do all the scoring.  We need more contributions from different people.  14 layups?  I mean, come on, really, in a 2 point game?  I don't know if it was concentration...if the offense is getting you layups you have to make layups." 

[81alum]

Two stat lines encapsulate the game:

Alanna Smith, 7-24 from the field, 3-11 from three.  She didn't just miss a few short range shots, she missed a lot of them. If she doesn't find her shooting touch again, we're not going to go very far, no matter how good the defense.

Marta Sniezek, 0-1 from the field, 3 assists, in 31 minutes.  And one of those assists perfectly encapsulates her game - she had a clear lane to drive, and Anigwe literally retreated to UNDER the basket.  Marta had a wide open 8 foot jump shot.  Instead, she waited, and threw a very good but very risky bounce pass through two players to a cutting Smith or McPhee that was converted.  When a player is willing to throw that low-probability pass, rather than take what should be a gimme short jump shot, that's not good.  And C.al figured out she has trouble getting through and off of screens - I couldn't count the number of times she got hung up on a screen, leaving Thomas to drive into the lane, and either hit a short jump shot, or pass to the screener rolling to the basket if their defender came out to help.  The plus-minus at the PG position today was unsustainable against a half-way competent team.

Thanks VG.  I incorporated a few of your observations at the top (and credited you.)  You have always been keenly perceptive about bb.

All of our observations about Sniezek's lack of scoring sound like a broken record, but today there were other problems.  She was not able to contain Asha Thomas, and she was not able to generate assists.  One of our worst games all season for lack of assists.  But Williams did not do well on either count either, with 0 assists and 3 turnovers.  A poor day from our guards.

And I just can't get over 7 turnovers from McPhee, including a couple of really bad ones--the standing still one at the end of the 1st, and the Marta-esque overly aggressive long bounce pass at the critical juncture in the 4th. 

Here is observation from the press that makes it clear that C.al was taking advantage of our focus on Anigwe.  Perhaps the problem was Tara's scheme, although whenever we left Anigwe one-on-one she was unstoppable.

Guards help Cal, seniors beat arch-rival
Stanford forced Cal’s guards to try to win the game Saturday afternoon.  And that’s exactly what the Bears’ backcourt did....“I thought our guards were spectacular today,” said Gottlieb, who remembers watching Gray-Lawson’s virtuoso performance on TV. “I think (Thomas’) performance today was as memorable as that one.”  Taking advantage of Stanford’s game plan to sag deep in the lane to focus on Kristine Anigwe (11 points, nine rebounds), the Cal guards consistently found driving lanes and regularly connected on pointblank runners and floaters.

https://www.sfgate.com/collegesports/art...622394.php

And some quotes from the audio press conference:

Tara: "I'm proud of our team for fighting back, but we didn't find a way to get it done.  I think our defense let us down basically the whole game.  They were just driving in, getting in deep and scoring.  When you are in a close game you have to make free throws and layups.  Their top players scored 50% or better and we weren't competitive enough."

Question to Alanna: "The stats had Stanford missing 14 layups.  How much of this was the C.al defense?"  Alanna: "I missed a lot of gimmes that I should have made, right under the basket.  Like Tara said, we had layups that we should have made."

Question to Britt:  "They seemed to have a lot of possessions that when they scored in the last few seconds of the shot clock.  What were they able to do to finish those possessions off?"  Britt: "They just made big plays, which you have to do to win...so....." 

Tara:  "We can't always depend on Britt to do all the scoring, or Alanna to do all the scoring.  We need more contributions from different people.  14 layups?  I mean, come on, really, in a 2 point game?  I don't know if it was concentration...if the offense is getting you layups you have to make layups."