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Start of holiday tournaments (Wed. and Thu., Nov. 27-28)

I was just having a bit of fun about the scores of the respective games against San Francisco.

Stanford looks like they haven't put the pieces all together yet. I expect they will be really good this year, but they aren't there yet. Right now their concern is getting past Cal Baptist, never mind Syracuse. Looks like they've been trailing most if not all of the first half.

Cal Baptist vs Stanford? Intra-state rivals... you know how that goes
 
Cal Baptist vs Stanford? Intra-state rivals... you know how that goes
Cal Baptist might be the team to beat in the WAC this year. They're 7-0 so far (5-0 vs. D-I teams), while every other WAC team already has at least 3 losses.
 
Cal Baptist vs Stanford? Intra-state rivals... you know how that goes

Does that count if one of the teams just moved to Division 1 in the last 5 minutes or so? According to wiki they moved up after the '17-'18 season, but I honestly don't remember hearing the name til this year. Joined the mighty WAC (cough, cough), won't be post season eligible until '22-'23.
 
UNC defeats Temple 71-58. UNC led by as much as 24. Temple trimmed the lead down to 11, but that's a close as they got.
 
I guess Stanford heard me, they're now up 13 at halftime. Looks like no Carrington today, at least not listed in the box score.
 
One of my favorite plays of the day:

Near the end of the first half, the Cal Baptist point guard did that thing where she was dribbling near midcourt while looking behind her to get instructions from her coach. Kiana Williams charged at the ball, picked her pocket and scored an easy layup.
 
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One of my favorite plays of the day:

Near the end of the first half, the Cal Baptist point guard did that thing where she was dribbling near midcourt while looking behind her to get instructions from her coach. Kiana Williams charged at the ball, picked her pocket and scored an easy layup.

Oh man, I always question that. Rueck does that sometimes. I can't recall it leading to a turnover, but it always makes me nervous.
 
Anyone having streaming issues? I can't see the game for the last 15 minutes.
 
Anyone having streaming issues? I can't see the game for the last 15 minutes.
Yeah, my stream cut out as well.

Edit: I just got it back on. Stanford up 69-61 with 9 minutes left.
 
Holy cow, Stanford looked like they were running away with it in 3Q but Cal Baptist has charged back, now down by only 2 in mid-4Q. This is going down to the wire.
 
Let's understand this clearly. Stanford is going down to the wire against Cal Baptist. A team that lost by 9 to Georgia State.

By the way, I just discovered that I've been paying for FloHoops all year and am just catching up to watching Stanford/Cal Baptist. I'll be watching the rest of their broadcasts this year! Oh my.
 
Let's understand this clearly. Stanford is going down to the wire against Cal Baptist. A team that lost by 9 to Georgia State.

Aren't they 7-0?
 
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Aren't they 7-0?
Yep, so true. So are the Birmingham Bearcats. The New Mexico Lobos are 6-0 as are the Northwestern Wildcats. It could be said that Cal Baptist is the second best team they've faced so far.
 
Yep, so true. So are the Birmingham Bearcats. The New Mexico Lobos are 6-0 as are the Northwestern Wildcats.

I was just wondering who lost to Georgia State by 9, because I'm not seeing that on Cal Baptist's schedule/results this year.
 
I was just wondering who lost to Georgia State by 9, because I'm not seeing that on Cal Baptist's schedule/results this year.
Sorry, you're right. Cal Baptist was undefeated going into the game after crushing a tough Life Pacific team last time out. My mistake.
 
I was just wondering who lost to Georgia State by 9, because I'm not seeing that on Cal Baptist's schedule/results this year.
Yes. By the way, Stanford was the first team Cal Baptist played this year with a winning record.
 
Holy cow, Stanford looked like they were running away with it in 3Q but Cal Baptist has charged back, now down by only 2 in mid-4Q. This is going down to the wire.

told yall :rolleyes:
 
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Stats don't tell you everything, but they are interesting. Both teams attempted 69 FG. Cal Baptist was 17-40 behind the 3 point arc, Stanford only 4-23. So CBU nearly pulled off the big upset by bombing away on a night Stanford couldn't hit anything from distance. Big FTA advantage for Stanford as well--26-9.

All 8 players that show up in the box score for CBU hit at least one 3, 6 hit 2 or more, one player had 4.
 
Couple things to add some context to the Stanford-CBU game (while noting that I did not actually watch the game):

1. We are a younger team than we look, in terms of experience, largely due to injuries. If you look at our starting lineup, we have one player who's been a consistent starter in every game since the beginning of last season: Kiana Williams.
-Senior Nadia Fingall missed most of last season with an ACL tear and is on minutes-restriction, which really hurts what we can do inside (note how effective she was in the windows she was on the floor - 18 points in 14 minutes), and also makes it harder for her to develop offensive consistency.
-Senior Dijonai Carrington had knee surgery over the summer and didn't even play last night. She's also been on minute-restriction when she has played. (And she missed a chunk of her sophomore year with an injury, and was also out for a game or two last season after a concussion.)
-Senior Anna Wilson has missed significant chunks of the past few seasons with a variety of injuries. Both she and Carrington were injured in their McD's A-A game and I feel like have often had question marks about their health.
-Junior Maya Dodson has been in a boot since the season began and missed a chunk of last season with a similar stress fracture. Perhaps because of this, she has been a very minimal paint presence for us since her freshman year, despite being a consensus top tier recruit out of HS.
-Sophomore Lexie Hull missed half of last season with a stress reaction/fracture, and while she's coming along quite nicely now, I still think losing that floor experience hurts.

That means that our one steady, reliable starter since the start of last season has been Kiana Williams. Tara has really leaned heavily on her to run our offense, and you can tell because she keeps Williams in essentially all the time in close games.

2. Because of this, and the graduation of Alanna Smith, we don't really have a designated scorer. Williams, in theory, should be that, and she tends to turn things on in close games, but I don't know that she's naturally inclined to take over games. Lexie has shown the propensity for this, and I think will get better with time. But even though we have a really top freshman class, we don't have many players who we've had to rely on to "bail us out," and I think it shows when things get tight. It showed in the Gonzaga game, and it showed last night.

3. We really need to improve on our three point and free throw shooting. Those are two ways to bail out of trouble, and we have been hurting in both departments. CBU exploited us with the former (we shot 4-23 3pt%), and the Zags with the latter (a godawful 58% at the line) - when you don't hit your free throws, and the other team has a massive edge on treys over you, it's really hard to hold and build on a lead late in the game. In this respect, Williams' stroke has been off much of this season so far (she was 1-9 from downtown last night).

All in all, I'm sanguine about things - I always thought we'd be something closer to the 5th-6th best team rather than 3rd, as the polls seem to be ranking us. As is almost always the case with Tara teams, I think we'll improve rapidly as the season progresses, and I view this tournament as a great test to see which players will "step up" when called upon.
 
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Couple things to add some context to the Stanford-CBU game (while noting that I did not actually watch the game):

1. We are a younger team than we look, in terms of experience, largely due to injuries. If you look at our starting lineup, we have one player who's been a consistent starter in every game since the beginning of last season: Kiana Williams.
-Senior Nadia Fingall missed most of last season with an ACL tear and is on minutes-restriction, which really hurts what we can do inside (note how effective she was in the windows she was on the floor - 18 points in 14 minutes), and also makes it harder for her to develop offensive consistency.
-Senior Dijonai Carrington had knee surgery over the summer and didn't even play last night. She's also been on minute-restriction when she has played. (And she missed a chunk of her sophomore year with an injury, and was also out for a game or two last season after a concussion.)
-Senior Anna Wilson has missed significant chunks of the past few seasons with a variety of injuries. Both she and Carrington were injured in their McD's A-A game and I feel like have often had question marks about their health.
-Junior Maya Dodson has been in a boot since the season began and missed a chunk of last season with a similar stress fracture. Perhaps because of this, she has been a very minimal paint presence for us since her freshman year, despite being a consensus top tier recruit out of HS.
-Sophomore Lexie Hull missed half of last season with a stress reaction/fracture, and while she's coming along quite nicely now, I still think losing that floor experience hurts.

That means that our one steady, reliable starter since the start of last season has been Kiana Williams. Tara has really leaned heavily on her to run our offense, and you can tell because she keeps Williams in essentially all the time in close games.

2. Because of this, and the graduation of Alanna Smith, we don't really have a designated scorer. Williams, in theory, should be that, and she tends to turn things on in close games, but I don't know that she's naturally inclined to take over games. Lexie has shown the propensity for this, and I think will get better with time. But even though we have a really top freshman class, we don't have many players who we've had to rely on to "bail us out," and I think it shows when things get tight. It showed in the Gonzaga game, and it showed last night.

3. We really need to improve on our three point and free throw shooting. Those are two ways to bail out of trouble, and we have been hurting in both departments. CBU exploited us with the former (we shot 4-23 3pt%), and the Zags with the latter (a godawful 58% at the line) - when you don't hit your free throws, and the other team has a massive edge on treys over you, it's really hard to hold and build on a lead late in the game. In this respect, Williams' stroke has been off much of this season so far (she was 1-9 from downtown last night).

All in all, I'm sanguine about things - I always thought we'd be something closer to the 5th-6th best team rather than 3rd, as the polls seem to be ranking us. As is almost always the case with Tara teams, I think we'll improve rapidly as the season progresses, and I view this tournament as a great test to see which players will "step up" when called upon.
This is all great analysis.

no Carrington + no Dodson = problems for Stanford.

Stanford looked to be pulling away safely, up by as much as 21 in the 3rd quarter. Then I lost my feed for about 15 minutes or so, and when it came back Cal Baptist had pulled to within something like 7.

Cal Baptist made an ungodly number of 3s -- 17 of 40 might be what DePaul would get in their best game of the year. And because everyone on CBU was making them, every Stanford player had to be way out on the arc guarding their player close, which opened up a ton of driving opportunities. I was even more shocked at how quick some of the Cal Baptist guards were.

Fingall was the difference in this game for Stanford. For all its 3-pointers and quickness, CBU didn't have the size to match up. But as you say, when Fingall was off the floor, Stanford just couldn't seem to take advantage with Belibi and Prechtel.

If Carrington can't play against Syracuse, I think Syracuse wins this game today.
 
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