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Overview
Stanford beat a very good Oregon State team with an unusual strategy and somewhat balanced scoring. Chiney made 33 points, at least half with 12-17 foot jumpers, as she worked around Oregon State's Griner-sized 6'6" center. Lili Thompson exploded for a career high of 19, including 3/4 treys. Ruef played one of her best games, sinking 12 foot jumpers to collect 10 points. Taylor Greenfield came off the bench for 13. Most importantly, we had a very low 6 turnovers for the game.
Flow of the game
Attendance was sparse due to the 49ers playoff game, but the band, the dollies, and a hard core 3000 or so kept the place from feeling completely sedate.
As noted in another thread, the game began in one of the more lopsided fashions we have seen in quite some time. Pre game we had been warned that Oregon State was an excellent team that led Notre Dame deep into their game. They have a 6'6" center who is talented enough to play for the Canadian national team, and Jamie Weisner who is a sophomore phenom.Â
Oregon State scored the first basket, and then Chiney and Lili and Sara James went on a 19-0 run. OSU scored another basket and then Chiney and Lili went on a 10-0 run. With us ahead 29-4 only 9 minutes in, I think a number of us were wondering if we had been sold a bill of goods about the strength of the Oregon State team. Kate Paye had noted, however, that since we play Oregon State often, we knew how to defend them better than a team like Notre Dame who saw them for the first time in December. And sure enough, for most of the first half we mostly shut down Weisner and Weiss, their leading scorers.
On offense, Chiney often did not play close to the basket. Her first five shots were all jumpers, and she made two of them. Tara decided to adopt the Baylor strategy, and Chiney took many of her shots from 12-17 feet away. Her jumpers are not fast and they rarely swish, but the scouting report suggest that the paint would be very congested and Chiney stayed away from it much of the game. As the game progressed, it was clear that they were not going to contest Ruef's shots, and she was given numerous open looks from 12-15 feet away.Â
It seemed that after the early drubbing we delivered, Oregon State competed well, and the margin stayed relatively even the rest of the way. The "Swiss sisters" Weisner and Weiss did eventually wind up with 28 points between the two of them, so our close defense was not sustained the whole way. Even so, the last 3/4 of the game did feel a bit anticlimactic after the roaring start. We barely "won" the second half--39-37.
Tara talked after the game, and something she and Kate both said struck me. They both emphasized how competitive team practices are, and how having all our players healthy makes for much better practices. She also stressed how supportive our bench is of the starters--and noted that this is not always the case with all teams. There seems to be good team chemistry and excellent competition in practice at the same time. Kate also noted how difficult a transition it is for the frosh--hinting that other than Lili we might not expect too much out of them for a while. Roberson, said Kate, was "super fast" and is working on how to use that speed as a point guard.Â
Performances
Chiney passed Jayne on the all time scoring list and is now 4th. Kate Starbird is up next about 75 points away. That might take three games to reach. Big sister Nneka is an additional 250 points away, which Chiney should reach somewhere around the halfway point of Pac12 competition. At the top is Candice, who is about 500 points from where Chiney is now. If we go all the way through the Pac 12 tournament and at least a couple of games into the NCAAs, that is a minimum of 21 more games. Chiney could possibly do it if she carries on with a 25 point average.
What was impressive today was the way Chiney did it. She made 13/28, not bad at all for taking so many long jumpshots. Her free throw shooting was a little off today. however, at 5/9.
This was a breakout day for Lili. She was very hot in the first half, and wound up with 19 points and 5 assists to go with 0 turnovers.
Ruef played well, with 10 points, 6 rebounds, 3 assists, and 0 turnovers. Solid.
Taylor Greenfield seems to be getting most of the minutes at the 3 position, playing 23 minutes. 13 points, and to think this was a position that we were most worried about at the start of the season.Â
Amber and Sara were relatively quiet offensively, but contributed valuable defense against OSU's best players. Weisner and Weiss got most of their 7 treys in the second half after the game was out of reach. Amber had 5 assists and 2 steals to go with 1 turnover.Â
Conclusion.
An interesting stat: Stanford made 7 three point shots on only 10 attempts. But in addition to the treys, what we are seeing is a much greater reliance on jumpers than we are used to--including intermediate jumpers by Chiney and Ruef. I haven't seen Stanford with this style of offense since before Jayne. The extremely low number of turnovers, despite the fact that OSU pressed for much of the second half, reflect much better ball handling than we had just a couple of years ago. And here is a shocker--points off turnovers: Stanford 18, OSU 2. We had 9 steals. It will take some getting used to. We won the rebounding battle, 43:35, but that was not as much a factor as it would have been in prior years. Lili, interestingly, was our third leading rebounder with 5 after Chiney and Ruef.
Over the last few years, we have enjoyed watching players grow and replace graduated players. But the basic style of play was quite similar since Brooke Smith in 2005. I wonder if we are beginning to see a different style of play cropping up in certain games, that may become more prevalent in the post-Chiney era?
