WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - Printable Version

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WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - 81alum - 02-10-2013

Stanford put together another solid win today.  If anything, this was a bit more impressive than Friday’s drubbing of hapless Arizona.  The crowd enjoyed it.  There were plenty of good plays to spawn the cheering.  Both sides started slowly, but at about 7 minutes Bonnie hit the first of her 5 three pointers, and we seized a 7 point lead and never really looked back.  Toni was out of this game again, but Alex Greene made an appearance late–the first since her injuries hobbled her a year and a half ago. We should not forget that she started over Amber and Jasmine when the "sixpack" arrived on campus, so as she improves her health and her experience she may be a very positive addition to the team. 

During the game, Bonnie had a terrific offensive outing.  She was 5/11 from three, and given that the team was 5/20 from three it is easy to see her importance.  For the second game in a row, though, Bonnie was not one dimensional.  She made a two on a breakaway layup, a couple of free throws, and even had a steal.  She seems to be maturing, and just in time for tournament season.

Chiney was terrific again, and displayed her ebullient, charming, funny persona after the game.  Statistically she was 10/14 with 14 rebounds for her umpteenth double/double in a row.  It seemed to me that in the first half she took and made quite a few short jumpers, which is a very good sign.  In the second half we were able to feed more passes to her in low, and she did her usual acrobatic job.  Chiney can and probably always will score 20 points, but the overall success of the team depends upon her getting her points with the fewest possible attempts.  As her percent goes up, so goes the team’s fortunes.  Otherwise she has to use up all the team’s offensive opportunities to score the same amount–as happened with Connecticut and Cal.

Joslyn had a solid day with 13 points.  She has gone cold from three where she was 0/4.  But now she is heating up inside.  She was 6/9 on the rest of her shots, and chipped in 11 rebounds and 4 blocks.  This is the Jos we really need--a second inside presence on offense and defense.

Mikaela Ruef had a good general-purpose day, with 5 points, a couple of assists, and some more aggression going to the basket, leading to 3/4 free throws.  Sara James was quiet in her 16 minutes, with no points but one excellent assist.  Taylor Greenfield also had a couple of assists but no points in her 13 minutes.

That leaves Amber and Jasmine to talk about.  Amber played for 25 minutes, and in Toni’s absence Jasmine played for 14.  They both had to deal with some trapping, and they both seemed to overcome it bringing the ball up the floor.  Tara mentioned after that Amber is more experienced and stronger, and likes to go into traffic, while she emphasized Jasmine’s speed.  Neither scored a lot–Amber had 4 (two on a wonderful drive to the basket) and Jasmine 2–but Jasmine should get credit for 4 assists and no turnovers.  Above all, those two helped us keep the turnovers down to only 8--a brobdingnagian improvement over Friday, and one of the lowest all season.  Clearly, with Toni’s issues, it is good to see Jasmine getting some experience and developing.  More points out of each of them would be icing on the cake, but they were not needed today.  Jasmine's shot, by the way, is very high--perhaps the highest arc of any of our players.  Unique to watch.

Perhaps the biggest news came after when Tara talked to the crowd.  She said they would like to keep Ruef for her final year of eligibility.  She sounded as if they would attempt to do so, but noted that it would be a “little bit convoluted.”  That is the most positive thing yet I have heard about the prospects for Ruef coming back.  As expected, both she and Chiney refused to answer questions about Toni.  In other news, she mentioned that incoming players Karlie and Erica had both been selected for the WBCA All-America game.  We have a terrific class on the way.

One last thing.  Before the game, I saw Tara come out early and walk over to the band.  The band had started playing a piece and Tara waited patiently for several minutes before they were done.  Then she said a few words to the band leader and returned to the locker room.  My guess is that she had taken some time to go thank them.  They do add a lot to the atmosphere–the one game we had without the band was very flat.  In any case, I thought what Tara did was very classy.

I enjoyed the Band after the game more than I did during the game!  One of the Dollies grabbed the baton and led the band, while the leader joined the Dollies and did a pretty good job of keeping up with their choreography.  Hidden talents!  Parts of the band split off and journeyed to various parts of Maples to play to each other across the space.  Very nice.  They certainly looked like they were having fun.

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - CompSci87 - 02-10-2013

One nitpick: Alex was behind both Jasmine and Amber as a freshman, not ahead. She was regarded as raw but with a lot of speed and potential. I know the AP story called her a former starter, but that was an error.

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - 81alum - 02-11-2013

(02-10-2013, 09:37 PM)CompSci87 link Wrote:One nitpick: Alex was behind both Jasmine and Amber as a freshman, not ahead. She was regarded as raw but with a lot of speed and potential. I know the AP story called her a former starter, but that was an error.

Thanks, CompSci, I double checked and you are right.  She played in only three games, and in all of them Amber and Jasmine had more minutes, and none of the three started in those games.

I saw the AP story and thought it jogged a vague memory, but it was probably of Jasmine starting games 5, 6, 7 and 8 last year--before injuring her foot right before the Tennessee game.  We are so used to Amber now that we could forget that Jasmine started 4 games before Amber started any.

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - M T - 02-11-2013

Another warm, bright Sunday afternoon inside Maples pavilion today.  A good sized crowd of 4500, many of whom wore pink.

The game was never in doubt, which allows the fans to just enjoy the game (and, for me, not to pick on too many flaws).  Stanford never trailed and Stanford just kept pulling away.  I believe ASU made consecutive FG's (without an intervening Stanford score) only once in the game.  Against the lower-performing teams, when our 3s are anything above abysmal, a zone defense doesn't really stop us.  We weren't that great with the 3s at 25%, but Bonnie's 5 of 11 gave us excuses to cheer.

Like 81alum, I am impressed with Bonnie's improvement during the season.  To be honest, I thought that she wouldn't contribute much beyond being a designated 3pt shooter.  But she's showing decent hands, and a willingness to play tough.  She still doesn't have the upper body strength, but she's definitely contributing.

Jos came on late with her scoring.  Did you notice we had two double-doubles in the game?  Again?  Friday it was Chiney & Mikaela.  Sunday it was Chiney and Jos.

As I look across the stats, it seems it was a little less offense than average.  The game was relatively slowly paced (108 FGA vs average of 118).  We took more 3s than average (20 vs average of 14) but with only an average number(5) made. Our 3pt attempts were 36% of our FGA (avg is 24%).  3PT% was only 25% (vs 32%).  Because of Bonnie, we had more bench points than usual (21 vs 15).  Our second chance points were 21 (avg of 12).  While we had 7 TO (vs avg of 12), they only had 10 TO (vs avg of 12). ASU's Assist/FG ratio (56%) was above average (43%) and above Stanford's (48%).

It was good to see Charli Turner-Thorne again, but she seems more mellow.  Maybe that has something to do with her time away from coaching? 

In the last 4 games, our opponents scored 62, 45, 43, and 45 points resulting in wins by 24, 20, 30, and 24 points.  That 62 points is fourth highest of the year, still keeping opponents under 70.  Clearly defense is our strong suit, but it is hard to assign defensive stats to individual players.

I combined the last 4 easy-win games together for this table.  There are some distortions in it from playing patterns.  For example, I don't think this should be construed to imply that the other 4 teams would (collectively) outscore our first string if it weren't for Chiney.  Instead, I think that when Chiney is out, we tend to put in all subs, who get outscored.

The table is complicated enough, but it struck me that one could add another column of total points scored per 40min game (OP/g + DP/g) while a player is in, to indicate the pace of the game.  For instance, Sara's number for that would be 129.2 while Taylor's would be 115.9.

Tara was informed correctly: If we win out, we get the first seed at the PAC-12 tournament by the third tiebreaker, won-loss percentage against all Division 1 opponents.  We will have one more win than C.al.  Where that will matter is in the semi-final game, where we might play UCLA or Colorado.

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C.al squeaks by again, by 5 points.  Arizona outshot them (50% to 47% FG%, 38% to 26% 3PT%, 91% to 57% FT%) but lost the battle of the PF (27 vs 17) and FT (22 vs 42) and rebounds (30 vs 41) and TO (21 vs 13).  Arizona doubled their point production from when they played us (86 vs 43).

This was C.al's 6th PAC-12 game where at the end of regulation, they were 5 points or fewer ahead.  Other than C.al, Stanford's least victory was 9 points against USC (where we had been up by 19, but let it get as close as 5).

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An interesting statistic from the U.S.C game - M T - 02-11-2013

I was looking back at the U.S.C game and noticed a quirk I hadn't seen before:

U.S.C. TOTAL FG% 1st Half:  8-24 33.3%  2nd Half: 17-29 58.6%  Game: 47.2%
Stanford  TOTAL FG% 1st Half: 12-34 35.3%  2nd Half: 18-30 60.0%  Game: 46.9%

We outshot them in each half, but they outshot us for the game!  How is that for weird!

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For some reason, the TV, KZSU, and someone in the FBC mentioned the number of conference wins for WBB for Stanford.  That lead me to this thought:

Here's another math puzzler (in a theoretical context, of course)...  Starting now, if Stanford doesn't win another WBB conference championship until another team has won as many as Stanford has, and the other 11 teams in the conference evenly split the championships (no more than 1 champion in any one year, each team wins one championship every 11 years), what year will it be when another team catches up to Stanford's WBB conference wins? 


Highlight below for the answer:
It will be the last year of the 22nd century.

But, we still have to take our hats off to men's swimming.  31 conference championships in a row in a conference with vastly better competition than we've seen in WBB.

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45- Mikaela Ruef - SControl - 02-12-2013

(02-10-2013, 08:22 PM)81alum link Wrote:Perhaps the biggest news came after when Tara talked to the crowd.  She said they would like to keep Ruef for her final year of eligibility.  She sounded as if they would attempt to do so, but noted that it would be a “little bit convoluted.”  That is the most positive thing yet I have heard about the prospects for Ruef coming back.  As expected, both she and Chiney refused to answer questions about Toni.  In other news, she mentioned that incoming players Karlie and Erica had both been selected for the WBCA All-America game.  We have a terrific class on the way.

Let me start off by saying what a great rebound the ladies have done since the UCONN/C.al slump. Hoping for the best for Toni and very excited about Bonnie's performance last game.

I remember next season's roster being mentioned on here a couple months ago. I have forgotten who exactly is on scholarship (I think I remember Kiran receiving a scholarship this year). But if Mikaela were to stay we would 19 players on our roster.. Im sure NCAA has some sort of cap to players on a roster (scholarship and walk-ons included). If my memory serves me correctly this is what next years roster would be with Mikaela:

Mikaela (RS SR)
Chiney (SR)
Sara (SR)
Toni (SR)

Taylor (JR)
Bonnie (JR)
Erica P (JR)
Jasmine (JR)
Amber (JR)
Alex (JR)

Tess (SO)
Kiran (SO)
Denia (SO)

Aly (RS FR)
Erica M (FR)
Karlie (FR)
Kailee (FR)
Briana (FR)
Khaliya (FR)

Are Briana and Khaliya walk-ons? If so, would we have a total of four walk-ons (assuming Kiran will be a walk-on next season) and fifteen scholarship players? Also something to note, besides having two Ericas  ;), is the Sophomore class. Since Aly would still have four years of eligibility, Tess would be the only scholarship player of that class which gives great chances to our loaded 2013 class later in the road. I know this season is looking great at this point in time and I am very excited about the rest of the Pac12 ride and eventually the big dance, but these next few years are looking stellar as well.

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - CompSci87 - 02-12-2013

Hi, SControl. I posted about next year's roster here: http://thecardboard.org/board/index.php/topic,7468.msg58159.html#msg58159, including a more detailed list than yours.

Relative to your post: Khaliya (Lili) signed a letter of intent and will be a scholarship player. There is a limit of 15 scholarship players. There is no limit on the number of walk-ons, but (Bobk says) there is a limit of 15 players on the traveling squad to away games. It does not have to be the same 15 every time, though.

It's unclear how Ruef could come back. Seems either she would have to come back as a walk-on, or another player who was expected to have a scholarship next year would have to give it up.

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - 81alum - 02-12-2013

Tara did say it would be "convoluted" and she also said "we just ran out of scholarships." 

Here is a for instance:  perhaps Ruef is seeking an academic scholarship for a graduate program.  Decisions at Stanford are usually April 1.  Or maybe it is a giant swapping game as scholarships and walk-on status gets switched around among the players according to some "convoluted" plan. 

It will be interesting to see what is possible under the rules and what Tara comes up with.

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - BobK - 02-13-2013

Good tread but Alex and Jasmine redshirted with injuries and are frosh

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - M T - 02-13-2013

Excuse my ignorance, but if a scholarship player redshirts, is the student still allowed his/her scholarship and that scholarship counts against the limit?  I presume so (esp. in the case of a medical redshirt that happens after the competition starts).  Or can a school strong-arm an athlete into dropping their scholarship at least for a year?  ("I'm sorry, Hal, but I'm afraid you're not big/quick/talented enough. [ie, we've got a high school senior that looks better than you.]  You can stay at the school, but we're not paying for you.  If you work really hard on your own next year, we'll reconsider you in a year.")

I have concerns that if Mikaela came back and was given some other kind of aid (academic scholarship), I would imagine the NCAA would look at it quite closely.  It may well be legit, just as with many first year grad students.

An interesting opportunity would be if one of the other players took the year off to, say, study in Europe, and was not on an athletic scholarship, freeing up the scholarship for Mikaela.  If an athlete would benefit from a redshirt year, I could see it being to both the individual's and team's benefit for that girl to pursue other interests for a year.  Naturally, the student couldn't be given anything that was not offered to other students, and would need to compete for, say, scholarships to pursue a year abroad on even with other candidates.    Possibly the student might want to do a year abroad, or go work for the Peace Corps, or do a LDS mission, or be with an ailing relative, etc., in any case & might chose to pursue it even in the absence of a (non-athletic) scholarship (you might say a "walk off").  The school would still give 4 years of scholarship to the athlete so she could get her 4 years of college education, while on the team for 4 years.

While this might be fine as a rare occurrence, I could see such an approach being abused.  But, in other cases, it seems very credible.  The Stanford Women's Water Polo team has 2 or 3 players that took last year off (for the Olympics).  I presume that counted as a redshirt year for the NCAA.

Another approach, much more likely to be against NCAA rules, would be if an athlete continued to attend the school, did not play basketball, but did play another sport and received a scholarship for that other sport.    That just doesn't sound appropriate to me.  If that were legal, I'd expect you'd see some BCS schools with powerful rugby teams.

Sometimes "athletic scholarship" is an oxymoron.  I have never seen a Stanford student in that category.

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - CompSci87 - 02-13-2013

(02-13-2013, 01:44 PM)MT link Wrote:Excuse my ignorance, but if a scholarship player redshirts, is the student still allowed his/her scholarship and that scholarship counts against the limit? I presume so (esp. in the case of a medical redshirt that happens after the competition starts).

Generally yes.

Quote:Or can a school strong-arm an athlete into dropping their scholarship at least for a year?  ("I'm sorry, Hal, but I'm afraid you're not big/quick/talented enough. [ie, we've got a high school senior that looks better than you.]  You can stay at the school, but we're not paying for you.  If you work really hard on your own next year, we'll reconsider you in a year.")

Athletic scholarships are technically year to year, not guaranteed for 4+ years. So yes, the school can say "Your scholarship is not renewed for next year, but we will give you a chance to earn it back again in a later year." But that is not normally done. Normally when a student athlete is recruited and signs a letter of intent, there's a non-binding understanding that their scholarship will be continued for at least 4 years as long as the student athlete continues to participate on their team (or work on their injury rehab) in good faith. Other times, of course, a student who might have walked onto the team otherwise will be given an open scholarship just for one year at a time.

Quote:I have concerns that if Mikaela came back and was given some other kind of aid (academic scholarship), I would imagine the NCAA would look at it quite closely.  It may well be legit, just as with many first year grad students.

I'd think so too.

Quote:An interesting opportunity would be if one of the other players took the year off to, say, study in Europe, and was not on an athletic scholarship, freeing up the scholarship for Mikaela.  If an athlete would benefit from a redshirt year, I could see it being to both the individual's and team's benefit for that girl to pursue other interests for a year.  Naturally, the student couldn't be given anything that was not offered to other students, and would need to compete for, say, scholarships to pursue a year abroad on even with other candidates.    Possibly the student might want to do a year abroad, or go work for the Peace Corps, or do a LDS mission, or be with an ailing relative, etc., in any case & might chose to pursue it even in the absence of a (non-athletic) scholarship (you might say a "walk off").  The school would still give 4 years of scholarship to the athlete so she could get her 4 years of college education, while on the team for 4 years.

While this might be fine as a rare occurrence, I could see such an approach being abused.  But, in other cases, it seems very credible.  The Stanford Women's Water Polo team has 2 or 3 players that took last year off (for the Olympics).  I presume that counted as a redshirt year for the NCAA.

Yes, a player could either leave the team for a year and pay for school some other way, or stop out of school for a year. Either way would free up their scholarship. I understand Stanford is very liberal about letting all students stop out and come back later, provided they were in good academic standing at the time they stopped out.

Quote:Another approach, much more likely to be against NCAA rules, would be if an athlete continued to attend the school, did not play basketball, but did play another sport and received a scholarship for that other sport.    That just doesn't sound appropriate to me.

I believe that is legal. Eligibility in different sports is separate, but you do (unless granted a special hardship wavier due to multiple years of injury) have to use your eligibility in a sport within 5 years of enrolling in classes. I remember hearing of a recent example where someone played 4 years of women's basketball, then played volleyball in her 5th year.

Quote:If that were legal, I'd expect you'd see some BCS schools with powerful rugby teams.

Does anyone but Cal even give rugby scholarships?

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - FarmDad.01 - 02-13-2013

Several years back, WBB academic senior -- but redshirt junior -- Michelle Harrison used her final year of eligibility to play for Utah. Does anyone know what scholarship arrangement she had with that school?

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - CompSci87 - 02-13-2013

She had a basketball scholarship, or at least I assume so. Why wouldn't she?

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - M T - 02-13-2013

In  http://leftcoasthoops.com/blog/cardinal-news/tara-talks-utah-uconn-and-other-topics
Tara indicates Michelle got a scholarship at Utah for a year.  It also seems she rationalized this was better for Michelle (in that the second year at Utah was cheaper than if she'd continued her scholarship at Stanford and then had to pay for a year at Stanford).

Quote:Former Stanford wing Michelle Harrison is on the roster at Utah, using her final year of eligibility. Harrison is in the Utes’ starting lineup as a fifth-year senior, her transfer made possible by the NCAA rules that allow a fifth-year senior who wants to pursue graduate studies to transfer without having to sit out a season.

Harrison, a native of Orem, Utah graduated with her undergraduate degree from Stanford.

She is going to graduate school at Utah, VanDerveer explained.

“She wanted to go to a two-year graduate program that Utah had. She could go and get scholarship for one year and pay in-state tuition for the other,” the coach said. “She looked at a similar program at Stanford. But I think it was better for her to pay one-year of in-state tuition at Utah than paying for one year of tuition at Stanford.

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - FarmDad.01 - 02-13-2013

Sorry, but your reply was unclear. Did Ms. Harrison get a full basketball scholarship (one of 15) or some other U. Utah scholarship? I'm nit-picking because I think it matters in the case of Ms. Ruef.

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - CompSci87 - 02-13-2013

Neither MT nor I know more than what we've heard. I haven't seen a quote that is any more clear than the one MT gave. That quote certainly would lead anyone to think that Michelle Harrison was given a basketball scholarship for one year at Utah, not that she played basketball there for a year but had some other kind of one-year scholarship. It would have been legal under NCAA rules for Utah to give her a basketball scholarship as long as they did not go over their 15 scholarship limit in doing so.

Anyway, I can't see what you are driving at -- how do you think it would matter to Ruef?

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Michelle Harrison Utah scholarship status - M T - 02-14-2013

Tara's statement implies she got some scholarship, but it isn't clear the source.  The Media Guide for that year is silent on who has scholarships (except one player who made the transition from walk-on to scholarship).  Since they had only 14 players listed (including Michelle), I'd guess she got a basketball scholarship.  Sorry, that's the best I can find.

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - meos - 02-14-2013

The last few games against easier opponents have allowed supporting team members to consolidate their positive on-court experiences and improved productivity. The next few games against the LA schools will be a good test to see where the team is related to stepping up to tougher competition.  In some ways it should be simpler for them. Against tougher teams, the supporting cast needs to simplify -- think less, react better. If a play or shot is made available to you, make the play or take the shot, right away. Faster hands and faster footwork with tougher opponents means less time to be thinking about what to do; the team instead needs to be more aggressively decisive.

These next two games will become a preview to how well the team will step it up in the soon upcoming tournaments.

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Re: WBB: Stanford 69 ASU 45 - FarmDad.01 - 02-14-2013

1. Down in the City of Angels, I hope that both Bonnie and Taylor see lots of minutes and that Tara gives them both the launch codes. Keeping Bonnie hot would be great. Adding Taylor as a credible deep threat would be a bonus.

2. I worry about Toni, my second favorite Cardinal. I don't think she'd be missed against USC. But if she has to sit out the weekend, I'm curious to see if Amber, Jasmine, and maybe Alex can neutralize the very talented (but in my opinion) quite thuggish Brittany Boyd.

3. I believe East Bay will split its SoCal games. So if Stanford wins both of its contests, PAC-12 top tourney seeding and a jump in RPI are guaranteed -- leaving NCAA seeding up to the results of the PAC-12 finals.

4. In terms of NCAA seeding RPI, UConn plays Baylor on Monday. UConn and South Bend will most likely play each other twice more. Duke will probably play Maryland twice more. And I doubt the various SEC schools can leapfrog Stanford in RPI ro win the No. 4 seed.

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