On Sunday at 12:00 PM PT on The CW, Stanford women’s basketball will welcome No. 15 North Carolina to Maples Pavilion. Stanford comes in at 11-9 overall and 3-6 in the ACC while North Carolina comes in at 19-4 overall and 7-3 in the ACC.
Last time out: Stanford defeated Pittsburgh at home on Thursday by a final score of 58-46. Elena Bosgana and Chloe Clardy each had 14 points for Stanford.
RECAP: Stanford WBB powers past Pitt
On North Carolina: The Tarheels are having a strong season, coming off a 65-52 win at No. 19 Cal on Wednesday. Their top win of the season is a 53-46 overtime victory over Duke, who is now ranked No. 10 after being ranked No. 14 at the time of their meeting. The most impressive stat of all is the Tarheels are a perfect 5-0 in true road games. They’re not fazed by having to go on the road.
The top two scorers for the Tarheels are graduate student guard/forward Alyssa Ustby (11.4 points & 9.4 rebounds) and senior forward/center Maria Gakdeng (10.9 points & 6.8 rebounds). They’re the only two players scoring in double figures for the Tarheels, but there’s a lot of depth with four additional players scoring 7+ points per game.
When looking at the stats, it’s clear the Tarheels are a defensive oriented team as they hold opponents to 54.7 points per game on 34.8% shooting from the field, 27.7% shooting from 3-point range, and 69.3% shooting from the foul line. They do a great job playing defense both on the perimeter and inside.
As for their offensive stats, the Tarheels average 73.3 points per game on 43.8% shooting from the field, 34.1% shooting from 3-point range, and 65.4% shooting from the foul line. So they do a nice job of scoring efficiently. As for the rest of their stats, the Tarheels average 39.7 rebounds, 15.6 assists, 8.8 steals, 4.5 blocks, and 12.7 turnovers per game. They also average a +3.4 rebounding margin and a +5.7 turnover margin per game.
Keys to the game: For Stanford, the first thing they need to do is take care of the ball. North Carolina makes a living forcing turnovers and making teams pay on the other end. If Stanford can avoid turning the ball over too much, that more than anything will help them win this game.
The second thing Stanford needs to do is find a way to get some threes to fall. They were shooting bricks against Pittsburgh and were lucky that Pittsburgh is not a good team. Stanford has to find a way to get some threes to fall if they are to win this game.
Finally, Stanford needs to feed off the home crowd energy. One thing they are lucky about is they are facing North Carolina on Sunday at noon as opposed to when Cal faced them, which was on Thursday night. Sunday afternoon crowds are always strong and energetic. Stanford needs to feed off that energy and use that to their advantage. This of course means getting off to a good start. If Stanford can win the first quarter, maybe they make this interesting. If they are down big at the end of the first quarter, this one will likely go the Tarheels’ way.
Prediction: I see Stanford putting up a real fight but falling short. North Carolina 68 Stanford 58 is how I see this one going.
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