I thought Joan Bonvicini was fine. She has broadcast a lot of the games in Arizona for years probably because she coached Arizona for 17 years and has a home there. 700 wins isn't to Tara standards but she clearly knows the game.
All in all, not a lot to complain about. My takeaways:
1) A 30 point win on the road is always something to marvel at.
2) The announcers were correct, while we fans ogle the points and the offense, a key to Stanford's success has been a very good defense. Not the dramatic kind that gets a lot of steals, but the effective kind that holds the opponent to 29% shooting, as we did tonight. And 7 blocks doesn't hurt either.
3) Rebounding. We snagged 35 of ASU's misses, they got 14. ASU snagged 19 of our misses, we got 14. That is incredibly lopsided in our favor.
Brink and Iriafen had 30 rebounds between the two of them.
4) Lepolo's passing was a thing of beauty tonight. 7 assists to 0 turnovers. And she led +/- at 25 by quite a bit.
5) I am particularly pleased that Jump's shooting started to get back on track tonight. Plus she was defending ASU's best player most of the game. Tara took her out to rest her a bit more--she played "only" thirty minutes. I think playing her so many minutes may in fact have done something to her accuracy. Same thing happened to Kiana Williams her senior year, and resting her just a little seemed to help.
6) So wonderful to see Brink out there being her spectacular self again.
A good start to the road trip. Sunday will be a bigger test in front of a much more raucous crowd.
All in all, not a lot to complain about. My takeaways:
1) A 30 point win on the road is always something to marvel at.
2) The announcers were correct, while we fans ogle the points and the offense, a key to Stanford's success has been a very good defense. Not the dramatic kind that gets a lot of steals, but the effective kind that holds the opponent to 29% shooting, as we did tonight. And 7 blocks doesn't hurt either.
3) Rebounding. We snagged 35 of ASU's misses, they got 14. ASU snagged 19 of our misses, we got 14. That is incredibly lopsided in our favor.
Brink and Iriafen had 30 rebounds between the two of them.
4) Lepolo's passing was a thing of beauty tonight. 7 assists to 0 turnovers. And she led +/- at 25 by quite a bit.
5) I am particularly pleased that Jump's shooting started to get back on track tonight. Plus she was defending ASU's best player most of the game. Tara took her out to rest her a bit more--she played "only" thirty minutes. I think playing her so many minutes may in fact have done something to her accuracy. Same thing happened to Kiana Williams her senior year, and resting her just a little seemed to help.
6) So wonderful to see Brink out there being her spectacular self again.
A good start to the road trip. Sunday will be a bigger test in front of a much more raucous crowd.