WBB: Stanford 73 Cal 40; Stanford 79 Cal 65 - Printable Version
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WBB: Stanford 73 Cal 40; Stanford 79 Cal 65 - 81alum - 01-09-2020
Preview:
We play Cal twice this weekend. Cal is 8-5 but we should not take two wins for granted. Cal played UConn relatively close, with Sara Anastasieska going off on them for 25 points. They beat #20 Arkansas and lost to #14 Kentucky by 2 points after tying the game up with 9 seconds left. On the other hand, they have lost to Harvard, Washington, and Washington State. Inconsistent is the word--and that may be bad news for us, since Cal is not consistently bad, and when playing 2 games in one weekend, they might get a 25 point performance out of Anastasieska on one of those days. Massey has them at 75--they plunged 29 spots after being swept at home by the Washington schools. I imagine Charmin Smith, our own former player and former assistant coach, will get them turned around to compete.
About 20% of Cal's made shots are treys, but Cal doesn't have any player who averages more than about 1 a game.
Jaelyn Brown shoots them at 36% but is a well rounded 6'1" senior forward who leads the team in minutes and points (16.)
Alaysia Styles is a 6'3" junior forward who is their second leading scorer.
CJ West, who we discussed years ago in our recruiting thread, is a powerful 6'4" center who shoots 55% (all from inside) and leads Cal with rebounding. My memory of her is that she might be vulnerable in the fourth quarter if we run the floor and keep the pace high.
Anastasieska is a 5'11" redshirt senior guard from Australia who is only their 4th leading scorer and shooting a paltry 37%, but is obviously capable of "going off" against the likes of UConn.
Their fifth starter is 5'5" freshman point guard Lelani McIntosh who leads the team in assists.
Chen Yu has actually been playing 14 minutes a game--I don't think we have seen her play before. She is probably relieving CJ West. Yu is 6'7"
FRIDAY GAME
Overview:
Stanford played suffocating defense and Cal was not ready for it. After three quarters the score was 58-18, and Cal players were visibly upset. Only after Stanford sent in the third team did Cal manage to have a respectable offensive quarter.
Performances:
We led for the last 36 minutes of the game. Cal took a 5-4 lead on a free throw a few minutes in to the first quarter, and that was the last point they scored that quarter. By the end of it they were behind 20-5. For the game, we shot 47%, they shot 27%. Cal has been an awesome rebounding team, but today we out rebounded them 50-29.
As for individual leaders, Prechtel led everyone in efficiency, Fingall led in that other overall stat "usage percentage" (she had 4 steals) and Jones led in points with 17. Every player who could put on a uniform played, Moschkau had 7 minutes but everyone else had at least 10. It was a well balanced effort--every player except for Lacie scored, and Lacie was busy helping to hold Cal's leading scorer to 4 points.
Why did we do so well? We played our offense with a lot of motion and pace, and while it did not always result in a good look at the basket, it clearly wore Cal out trying to keep up. They are not deep. Jones was 7/10 and managed to score inside and around the Cal defense. Prechtel was even better at 6/7, and particularly heartening was that she used her dropstep to get around both West and Yue. But our close defense, combined with refs who called only 11 fouls on us, was what won the game. No Cal player got double digits.
Conclusion to the Friday game:
It is fun to watch games like this. My greatest worry, though, is that it can't help but promote overconfidence going into Sunday's game at Cal. I doubt that we will get a 40 point lead there. On a night that saw Oregon go down and Oregon State barely eek out a victory, it sure looks as if we are improving at the right time. Let's hope Sunday goes well and we can use some of this magic on next week's Oregon trip.
SUNDAY GAME
Overview:
Our defense was not as intense and Cal was not as incompetent, which allowed them to score 65 points. But we led the whole way and there was never much doubt about the outcome. Williams and Jone repeatedly slashed to the basket, allowing us to score 52 points in the paint, to which we added 54% three point shooting. Many pretty over the shoulder layups by Williams and an incredible pass half the length of the court to Jones by her. A satisfying offensive win.
Performances:
Unlike Friday, tonight we had 4 players who played in the mid 30 minutes, so the bench did not get a whole lot of time. The exception was Belibi, who started but played only 7 minutes. Most of her time went to Lacie Hull, who played 26 minutes despite leaving the game in the first half with a bloodied nose, and reappearing in the second half with a face mask. Prectel got only 8 minutes--and scored 11 points in that short stretch.
As a team, we shot 53%, but allowed Cal to shoot to shoot 38%. That is about Cal's average, up from Friday's woeful inability to hit the broad side of a barn. We gave up 17 turnovers, while they had 15--it was our turnovers in the first half that kept Cal in the game and prevented us from blowing them out like Friday. The other massive equalizer was that Cal had 18 points off free throws while we had 4. This is a big clue. My guess is that we tried to defend them the same way we did no Friday, and these refs called the game much more tightly--preventing our very close defense from having the same effect.
Individually, Kiana Williams looked like a ballet star out there, pirouetting around the basket, threading the needle with long assists, and accumulating 21 points and 5 assists.
Haley Jones was 9/15 also for 21 points, with 4 assists.
Fingall played 34 minutes--probably her longest game of the year, and only had 2 points, but contributed 6 rebounds, 3 assists, and 3 blocks.
Lexie was 7/14 for 17 points. I already mentioned Prechtel, who came in for a short stretch and promptly buried 11 points, going 3/3 from long range.
In terms of +/-, Williams was far and away the most outstanding player at 24. Lexie, Fingall, Jones, and Lacie all had good ratings in the mid teens. No one else--even Prechtel--came close to those five.
Conclusion:
I am glad that our freshmen had another hostile away game--this is really only their second. It won't prepare them for next week, but there were 7000 fans at Cal--double our own home crowds--so it gives them the faintest hint of what it will be like in Oregon. I'm also happy that Cal gets OSU first, and that Oregon got a win today. Best to face those two schools after they have wins rather than losses. How will we do? I don't have the faintest idea. But I think I am in agreement with Mary Murphy--next weekend will be clarifying one way or the other.
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - M T - 01-09-2020
As outstanding as Tara is, she probably draws upon a class of ideas that, over the years, she has shared with Stanford players & coaches. When we play against teams that have coaches that trained at Tara U, I worry that they can anticipate and counter some of that Tara "magic".
However, if somehow the ability of Tara to reconfigure the play during the game is neutralized, the skill of the players becomes even more important for the outcome. I feel that we have the most skilled team (in total, but not yet the most skilled best player) since the mid 1990s. Our recent set of players seem to have no gaping hole that is an obvious place for an opponent to attack. Perhaps we are not yet as good as we want and need to be.
I haven't seen Cal play this year so I can't properly judge them. I am not certain the Stanford WBB team has the "Beat Cal" attitude the team probably felt when Cal was at its best some years back. Stanford may feel a sense that Cal is just another team they need to beat, while Cal may have the "Here's our chance to beat our big sister and prove we are a threat."
To me, that makes these trap games, particularly if we win handily on Friday, and aren't as sharp on Sunday.
But, if the recent batch of players are available, I suspect Stanford's skill should win both, but we may be tried.
(Last week, we had a small crowd on Friday, but a good crowd on Sunday. I hope Stanford turns out a good crowd for the Cal game on Friday. Maybe we can get a good crowd of Stanford fans on Sunday at Cal.)
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - martyup - 01-09-2020
Baylor just smoked UConn. Held them to 6 points in the 4th Q.
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - BobK - 01-09-2020
Baylor up about 3 with 5 to go and uconn fell apart.
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - BostonCard - 01-09-2020
(01-09-2020, 07:01 PM)BobK Wrote: Baylor up about 3 with 5 to go and uconn fell apart.
It breaks your heart, doesn't it?
BC
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - BobK - 01-09-2020
Love seeing Geno mad
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - BostonCard - 01-09-2020
(01-09-2020, 07:17 PM)BobK Wrote: Love seeing Geno mad
To quote Richard Sherman to Geno "You mad, bro?"
BC
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - 81alum - 01-09-2020
(01-09-2020, 06:49 PM)martyup Wrote: Baylor just smoked UConn. Held them to 6 points in the 4th Q.So how far does UConn fall when it loses to Baylor, which was ranked lower than us? Does this make Oregon the new #1? I think so, unless Oregon State as an undefeated edges out their cross state rival.
And as much as I like to see UConn lose, I like Baylor even less. The beauty of such a game is that I am bound to be happy with the outcome.
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - BostonCard - 01-09-2020
Yeah, I was hopin for the sweet meteor of death to strike the arena.
Oh well.
BC
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - TheFarm07 - 01-09-2020
Though Baylor pulled away late and handed UConn their worst loss, margin-wise in quite a while, neither team looked unbeatable. The Huskies' Achilles heel looks to be interior scoring/defense. Nelson-Ododa, their featured post was held scoreless going 0/8, Walker scored 18 points but needed 20 shot attempts to do so and Williams had 21 points, but 0/5 from long range.
Baylor's grad transfer from South Carolina, Cooper led the Bears with 27 points and Smith was an efficient 9/13 for a double-double.
Right now, Baylor looks to be the stronger team of the two but still weaker from their national championship team. Though they are still a great team, (it was hard to defend against two dominant posts in Cox and Brown), we still found a way to hand them their only loss last season and Brown is no longer on the team.
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - 81alum - 01-10-2020
Dodson and Carrington are still out.
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - CompSci87 - 01-10-2020
I loved the Band playing the anthem! This season is the first I've heard the smaller pep band that plays indoors do that. I wonder if this came as part of the Band's efforts towards greater musicality.
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - Lorcan - 01-10-2020
Noteworthy news elsewhere as the Sun Devils protect their home court in Tempe and take down the Ducks! 72-66 final! The Sun Devils found some offense tonight and got an impressive win!
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - Griffins78 - 01-10-2020
(01-10-2020, 07:58 PM)Lorcan Wrote: Noteworthy news elsewhere as the Sun Devils protect their home court in Tempe and take down the Ducks! 72-66 final! The Sun Devils found some offense tonight and got an impressive win!all in the Fourth Quarter. Down by 12 with 8 minutes to go they then took over the game and dominated at the end.
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - BostonCard - 01-10-2020
We held Cal to 18 points through three quarters, including 5 points in the first quarter and three, THREE! In the third. They scored 22 in the fourth to get to 40, but the game was way out of hand by then. 73-40 was the final, but it was 58-18 after three. Nice D.
BC
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - BostonCard - 01-10-2020
Where is everybody?
BC
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - TheFarm07 - 01-10-2020
(01-10-2020, 10:24 PM)BostonCard Wrote: Where is everybody?
BC
I am here. Congrats to Tara for her 500th career conference victory, the first coach to do so within one conference, which was a little surprising for me, because I thought Pat Summitt would have done it in the SEC with Tennessee.
Impressed with our defense as you pointed out holding Cal to just 18 points through 30 minutes of play. We didn't need to score a lot for the easy victory. Still frustrated over forcing some balls inside unnecessarily that led to turnovers. Prechtel was great in the first half and Jones clinched the win in the third quarter with her scoring.
Wished our subs played better defense in the fourth and not give up 22, but minor point.
Bigger story of the night for me was Arizona State beating Oregon and the Beavers escaping with a two point victory over Arizona. With UCLA's thrashing of Utah, I feel like there's a six team upper half of us, the Oregon schools, the Arizona schools and UCLA, who are going to beat up on each other. So we can't afford any losses against Cal, the Washington schools, USC, Colorado and Utah if we want to win the conference title and get a top seed in the NCAA tournament.
The top six teams in the conference are so far 11-0 against the bottom six with a 25.5 average margin of victory.
RE: WBB: Stanford vs Cal Fri 7 and Sun 5 - jonnyss - 01-10-2020
(01-10-2020, 10:24 PM)BostonCard Wrote: Where is everybody?don't know about anyone else, but i was at the game. kiana looked good again. ashten had a much better game. fran had a dunk opportunity but didn't take it. haley played point a lot and scored, but was quite inconsistent. i felt bad for charmin.
BC
RE: WBB: Stanford 73 Cal 40; and Sun 5 - BostonCard - 01-10-2020
Pat summit has 458 wins in the SEC.
BC
RE: WBB: Stanford 73 Cal 40; and Sun 5 - 81alum - 01-10-2020
I think everyone was at the game :) My write-up is now at the top. Let's keep the same thread for Sunday's game.
Oregon State barely escaped from Arizona and Oregon went down to ASU. UCLA is just cruising. This conference is awesome this year, and Tara was not kidding when she said it would be a bloodbath.
Williams is playing with more energy, and I thought she looked quite good tonight. But she was actually 3/10 with only a single assist. I can't quite figure out why the stats don't line up with the eye test. Prechtel looked extremely good tonight.
Was wonderful to see everyone get significant minutes tonight. Truly everyone. And everyone but Lacie scored.
Cal did not seem nearly as good as Cal Baptist--tonight.