On Thursday, Stanford men’s basketball fell to Washington State at home by a final score of 89-75. Washington State guard Myles Rice led the Cougars with 35 points and eight assists while forward Isaac Jones finished with 24 points and five rebounds. Stanford point guard Kanaan Carlyle scored a program freshman single-game record 31 points while center Maxime Raynaud finished with 22 points and 10 rebounds. Washington State improves to 13-5 overall and 4-3 in the Pac-12 while Stanford falls to 9-8 overall and 4-3 in the Pac-12.
VIDEO: Stanford MBB Postgame Press Conference | Washington State
BOX SCORE: Washington State at Stanford-Thursday, January 18th
“Washington State’s an excellent basketball team,” Stanford head coach Jerod Haase said after the game. “Obviously they’re on a roll right now, playing well. I thought a lot of guys on their team played well, but with Rice and Jones in particular, they had big big-time nights and at the end of the day, big-time players make big-time plays and in big games, conference games like this.
“Defensively, I feel like I failed the team in not being able to give them a game plan that they were able to execute and we tried a variety of things defensively. Needless to say for the most part, it was ineffective.
“Offensively, in the first half, the turnovers led to transition baskets, which is a little bit unlike us and I think some of the turnovers were avoidable, but it did lead to some struggles with transition defense. The overall physicality of the game, it was a net negative for us. I think we have to be able to play through contact better than we did tonight.”
Prior to tip-off, it was learned that Stanford would be getting Max Murrell back while Spencer Jones (wrist), Jared Bynum (lower body), and Jaylen Thompson (head) were out. The absence of Jones, especially for his defensive energy proved to loom large in this one.
“Yeah, wanted to get him some minutes and just get in the flow of the game,” Haase said of getting Murrell back after missing almost a month of action. “I was hoping to get a spark of some kind. He’s a guy that I think can give some rim protection. Ideally he’s going to be a rebounder for us and we think he’s a big time shooter. It’s hard when you’ve been out that long, but I’m pleased we were able to get him in the game and get him out there. But, for all of our guys, at the end of the day, the expectation is, the goal is to impact winning and we believe he’s gonna be able to help us do that. But it was awfully good for him to be out there.”
Washington State jumped out to an early 4-0 lead with 17:19 to go in the first half. Stanford called for time hoping to get things going in a positive direction.
With 14:42 to go in the half, Washington State led 12-7. Jones was up to eight points for the Cougars. Stanford needed to contain him much better. Angel was on the board for the Cardinal with a nice three.
Washington State would led 16-13 with 11:05 to go in the half as they were shooting 8-18 from the field. Stanford was shooting 5-12. Carlyle was starting to come alive for Stanford with six points on 3-4 shooting from the field.
With 9:47 to go in the half, Washington State led 17-15. Jones was up to nine points for the Cougars while Carlyle was up to eight points for the Cardinal. Both guys were balling out. Stanford also was holding their own on the glass with a 12-9 rebounding advantage.
With 7:11 to go in the half, Washington State led 23-18. Stanford had nine turnovers while Washington State had three turnovers. Stanford was lucky to not be down by more. Benny Gealer had a nice deep three for the Cardinal to make up for an errant turnover in which he didn’t turn his head to see an easy pass coming his way.
Washington State then went on a 13-0 run to lead 34-18 with 4:16 to go in the half. Jones was up to 13 points for the Cougars while Rice had 12 points. Both guys were playing excellent. Stanford looked like they needed to slow things down as they appeared to be getting sped up too much.
At halftime, Washington State led 42-29. Their 13-0 run really made a difference. Were it not for basket interference being called on Oscar Cluff inside, they would have led 44-29. The Cardinal got a bit of a break there. Rice (16 points) and Jones (15 points) were in double figures for the Cougars. Carlyle (11 points) was in double figures for the Cardinal. He was doing his part.
The second half was very much back and forth. Stanford played much better, but the issue was they got down by too much in the first half. As long as they were trading baskets, that was ok for Washington State.
With 15:53 to go, it was a 52-37 lead for Washington State. Jones (19 points) and Rice (18 points & 5 assists) continued to lead the Cougars. Carlyle (15 points) and Raynaud (12 points & 7 rebounds) were trying to keep the Cardinal afloat. Stanford was not doing a good enough job on their interior defense. With Spencer Jones out, they needed others to step up and so far nobody was doing well enough in that realm.
Washington State continued to lead 61-45 with 11:50 to go. Jones (21 points) and Rice (20 points) continued to do their thing for the Cougars while Carlyle (21 points) was trying to will the Cardinal back into the game. He came to play.
Washington State led 70-54 with 7:59 to go. Washington State was edging Stanford 28-25 in the second half. It was a much more competitive half than the first but once again, Stanford got down by too much in the first half. Rice was up to 27 points and seven assists for Washington State while Carlyle was up to 26 points for Stanford.
Stanford would go on a 6-0 run to make it 70-60 with 5:07 to go. Stanford was trying to get back in this one. Carlyle was up to 29 points after a triple while Raynaud was up to 17 points and eight rebounds.
Over the next few minutes both teams traded baskets as it was an 80-70 lead for Washington State with 2:50 to go. Both teams had started to heat up from deep. Raynaud and Gealer each nailed a 3-pointer for the Cardinal. Stanford was looking much better than they did in the first half. Really too bad for them they weren’t able to play better out of the gates.
In the end, Washington State would win by a final score of 89-75. Washington State played the better game start to finish. While Stanford was short-handed for this one, they didn’t want to use that as an excuse for why they lost. They were quick to acknowledge that they needed to play tougher inside and do a better job of matching Washington State’s physicality.
“The physicality,” Haase said of why his team turned the ball over 17 times. “They were physical on the basketball and we have to be able to play through that better and they really push out to the shooters and dare us to play one-on-one. With that, it was nothing that was surprising to us. I felt like we educated our guys. We were prepared and knowing what we were going to see. But at the end of the day, when we are out there, we have to be strong and we have to be able to make those plays without turning it over.”
Obviously for Stanford, this is a disappointing loss. They were hoping to win their third straight game in a row. That said, they can’t let this loss affect their performance on Saturday against Washington. There is plenty of basketball to be played. They just have to bounce back from this one and make sure one loss doesn’t turn into a losing streak.
Quickly addressing the performance of Carlyle, for him to set a Stanford freshman record for most points in a game is pretty amazing. Even though this was a loss for the Cardinal, Carlyle shined in this one and showed why he was such a big recruit for them to sign for this season.
“Yeah, it’s an impressive record to say the least,” Haase said of Carlyle’s performance. “It’s something he can and should be proud of. But, I think he feels the same way I do is that the individual accolades are great, but at the end of the day, we’re chasing victories and the individual stuff tends to be a little bit hollow until you get the team victory.”
“It was just me being in attack mode,” Carlyle said of his performance. “I feel like my coaches been on me about being in attack mode, getting downhill, and being able to make plays whether that’s for myself or for my teammates. So I feel like it was just me being in attack mode and the coaches and teammates just saying they got a lot of confidence in me to do that…I feel like it was a great accomplishment, but unfortunately we did take the loss today, so just ready to get back in the gym tomorrow and figure it all out and let’s get back at it on Saturday against Washington.”
As for Washington State, they should feel really good about this win. Even with Stanford being short-handed, they’re a talented and dangerous team. Stanford is not a team you can expect to beat without playing well. Especially on The Farm. For Washington State, this is definitely one of their better wins of the season.
Stanford’s game on Saturday against Washington will tip-off at 6:00 PM PT on Pac-12 Networks.
Note: Jared Bynum, Spencer Jones, and Jaylen Thompson remain day-to-day going into Saturday.
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