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Saturday, Jan. 15 4:00pm ET
Cardinal overcome 26-point deficit | |||||
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RECAP
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BOX SCORE
STANFORD, Calif. (AP) -- Tara VanDerveer has been around the basketball block a few times, but she had never experienced a comeback like her Stanford Cardinal had Saturday against Oregon (No. 24 ESPN/USA Today, No. 23 AP). "I haven't seen anything like this in the 20 years I've been coaching, and I don't need to see it again," the longtime Stanford and 1996 U.S. Olympic coach said after her team upset the Ducks 78-62. She was referring to the huge turnaround Stanford had in transforming a 36-10 first-half deficit into a 16-point victory. Stanford sports information staff scrambled but couldn't find anything near the 42-point turnaround in the record books, so Saturday's game will go down in history. Stanford's women's basketball team first began competition in the AIAW in 1976 and joined the NCAA in 1982. "It all points to the fact that it's a 40-minute game. I looked at their (Oregon's) bench and saw that they were all happy (when the Ducks were up by 26 points), and that made me kind of mad. We showed some mettle out there. I was proud of our players," VanDerveer said. The game boiled down to the fact that Oregon owned the first 16 minutes, and Stanford owned the remaining 24. And Cardinal forward Lauren St. Clair owned most of those all by herself. St. Clair was all over the floor, hitting six of nine 3-pointers, pulling down a team-high nine rebounds, passing for four assists, making four steals and blocking a shot. It was her 3-pointer with 13:26 left in the game that put Stanford into the lead for the first time since the opening minute at 50-49. Stanford moved to 10-4 overall and 3-1 in the Pac-10 Conference. The defending conference champion Ducks fell to 2-1 and 11-4. The Cardinal, who couldn't do anything right for most of the first half, missed 19 of their first 21 shots, made nine turnovers and trailed 36-10 with 4:15 left in the period. But St. Clair hit a 3-pointer, was fouled and sank the free throw. VanDerveer then went to the press, and Stanford was suddenly off to a 22-8 scoring run to get back into the game. The press seemed to throw the Ducks completely out of rhythm, and the Cardinal took full advantage from there on. But Oregon coach Jody Runge downplayed its influence. "It wasn't the press itself that gave us problems, because we know how to deal with it, but we just didn't do what we were supposed to do," she said. "Our transition offense got thrown off, and we got fatigued out there. We couldn't run our offense because we got tired." Guard Jamie Carey scored 16 points was four of seven from 3-point range to help enable the previously inept Stanford offense. Oregon, led by forward Angelina Wolvert, who also scored 16 points and guard Shaquala Williams, owned a 12-point lead at halftime. But Stanford, still using the press, stormed to a 35-11 scoring run, finally taking the lead on St. Clair's key 3-pointer. Carolyn Moos was instrumental for Stanford in the second half, scoring 16 of her 20 points. The 6-foot-6 center had six points during a key 9-0 scoring run that lengthened Stanford's 58-55 lead to 67-55 with 6:15 left. Jamie Craighead, who was five for eight from 3-point range, added 15 points for Oregon. Williams had 11 for the Ducks. | ALSO SEE Womens College Basketball Scoreboard
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