Recap: Stanford MBB bumbles opportunity in Berkeley
On Friday, Stanford men’s basketball fell to Cal on the road in Berkeley by a final score of 73-71. Cal guard Jaylon Tyson led the way for the Golden Bears with 14 points and six rebounds despite leaving the game early due to an undisclosed injury while center Fardaws Aimaq finished with 13 points and 12 rebounds. Stanford forward Spencer Jones was the top scorer for the Cardinal with 13 points and three rebounds while guard Kanaan Carlyle and forward Brandon Angel had 12 points. Cal improves to 8-12 overall and 4-5 in the Pac-12 while Stanford falls to 10-9 overall and 5-4 in the Pac-12.
BOX SCORE: Stanford at Cal-Friday, January 26th
“That was a high level basketball game,” Stanford head coach Jerod Haase said after the game. “Two teams that were playing their hearts out and lot of pride for their universities. The game where I anticipated it was gonna come down to the stretch in the end and our team expected that as well. So that certainly was not a surprise. At the end of the day they did a nice job making enough plays, making enough free throws, we didn’t finish the plays that we needed to down the stretch to get the job done. But it was a fantastic college basketball game and unfortunately those are the ones that tend to sting a little bit, too."
Stanford went up 9-4 with 16:24 to go in the first half. They were off to a strong start as Spencer Jones was up to seven points. He was in a nice groove.
Cal would then close the gap as Stanford led 16-13 with 11:44 to go in the half. Spencer Jones’ eight points led Stanford while Jaylon Tyson’s six points led Cal. Stanford was shooting 7-12 from the field while Cal was shooting 5-12.
With 7:00 to go in the half, Stanford led 25-21. Both teams were playing with a great energy. Stanford was shooting 1-7 from 3-point range while Cal was shooting 4-11. At the foul line, Stanford was shooting 6-8 while Cal was shooting 1-2.
Stanford would lead 33-27 with 3:28 to go in the half. Michael Jones was up to eight points for the Cardinal after making a pair of threes. Those were huge. Carlyle had a nice bucket in transition and was up to four points. Tyson’s 10 points led Cal.
Stanford would lead 40-36 at halftime. Kanaan Carlyle, Spencer Jones, and Michael Jones each had eight points for the Cardinal while Tyson was still at 10 points to lead Cal. Stanford was doing a solid job of responding to every Cal punch.
“Yeah, he’s been so much fun to coach,” Haase said of Carlyle. “He weren’t perfect. He weren’t perfect. He played his tail off and he responded every time. You know, he’s making a mistake, he looks over, we talk about it, or he knows what he’s supposed to do and does his best to get it right the next time. I’m leaving here and I’ll watch the tape, I’m excited because I think there’s some tangible things that I can talk to him, coach him; I think he can make some improvements and needless to say he’s been playing at a pretty high level. He wasn’t perfect, he knows that, but he also impacted the game in a positive way.”
In the first half, Stanford guard Jared Bynum hit a nice corner three to respond to a Cal bucket only to get called for a technical foul after saying something to the Cal bench and giving them a kind of stare down. Cal made both technical foul shots. That ended up coming back to haunt Stanford when you look at the final score.
With 14:42 to go, Stanford led 50-46. Stanford called for time as Cal was on a 6-0 run. Spencer Jones was up to 11 points for the Cardinal while Carlyle had 10 points. Tyson was up to 12 points for Cal.
Stanford would lead 52-50 with 12:00 to go. Jalen Cone had a nice bucket for Cal that was called a three but changed to a two upon review. He was up to 10 points. Andrej Stojakovic was up to five points for Stanford after cutting to the hole and making a basket inside. At this point, Cal guard Jaylon Tyson went out with what appeared to be cramps.
Stanford stayed in front by two points 60-58 with 7:50 to go. It had been a while since Spencer Jones got a bucket. He was still at 11 points. Stanford needed to get him going. As for Tyson, he had checked back in only to check back out once more due to his injury.
With 4:30 to go, it was tied 64-64. Both teams were battling really hard. Stanford was trying to hang on while Cal was hoping to finally pull ahead. Maxime Raynaud and Spencer Jones both knocked down some clutch foul shots.
Cal would pull ahead to lead 70-68 with 1:39 to go. Stanford had the ball as Raynaud would go to the foul line. This one was going down to the wire. It was impressive Cal was still in it considering Tyson appeared to be done for the night due to his injury.
Cal would lead 72-71 with 24.2 to go. Cal had the ball, calling for time. Brandon Angel (Stanford) and Jalen Celestine (Cal) traded foul shots. Out of the time out, Cone would attempt a 3-pointer only for it to clang off the rim. Michael Jones got a defensive rebound for Stanford and threw a pass to Raynaud who was open under the basket. Raynaud unfortunately had a tough time catching the pass as it was a bit too high and wasn’t able to gather his feet. This resulted in a travel.
Upon getting the ball back, Celestine would get fouled and make one of two foul shots. This gave Stanford one more chance to force overtime or win the game as they were down by two points. On their final possession, Stanford would not get a good look as Carlyle attempted a wild layup inside. Raynaud got a rebound off the missed layup and attempted a difficult shot to tie the game, but it wouldn’t have counted. Cal escaped with a 73-71 victory.
To first address Cal and the game they had, the most impressive part of this victory was the fact that they were able to pull through with the Pac-12’s leading scorer Jaylon Tyson missing the final nine minutes of the game. They had six players score in double figures. That’s a true team victory.
“One of our brothers in arms went out,” Cal head coach Mark Madsen said. “Jaylon Tyson went out with something and everyone on the team stepped up. Jalen Celestine, we put the ball in his hands and Jalen Celestine made play after play after play. He’s experienced, he doesn’t get rattled, he’s a guy who really has great body control and he’s able to get angles to the basket where he can score with his left hand. So I was really proud of those guys. I was proud of every single player on our team.
“And you talk about a tough game, this is a rivalry for a reason. Stanford came out and just had our head spinning. They were back cutting us, they were flex cutting us, they were scoring at will on certain sets and so you gotta give them a lot of credit because that’s a great basketball team. Very well coached with great players and look, this was a close game. It went our way tonight, but that’s a really talented basketball team at Stanford.”
The Cal community came out in full force with over 8,000 people to fill Haas Pavilion. It was a great night for their program and one that they should be very happy about. Mark Madsen was very emotional after the win, hugging fans courtside and giving a big thumbs up to the crowd. Lots of emotion from him and lots of happy faces in the stands afterwards.
“We’re not gonna stop until we’re selling this place out consistently,” Madsen said of the crowd. “We’re not stopping. Administration isn’t stopping, the players aren’t stopping, and we’re not stopping as a staff. And we’re gonna continue to build this thing…You just gotta give a huge thank you to our fans and our administration. That number one, the fans were coming out and number two administration for making this a great place to be. An unbelievable venue. Making it fun for everybody.”
“It was great,” Haase said of the atmosphere. “It’s awesome. Look, the student-athlete experience is for me is a big deal. It was so good for me when I was a player and it’s something that is really fun for our guys to be out there tonight and for their guys it’s what’s college basketball is supposed to be. Lot of energy, the crowd was fantastic, and give them a lot of credit and Cal’s team fed off that energy and I think we did, too. It was a hard fought game.”
As for Stanford, really a disappointing game. They got up by as much as 10 points in the second half and ended up coming to a screeching halt. They had no field goals in the final 3:10 and made one of their last 11 field goal attempts. Cal left the door open to win the game all the way until the last second ticked off the clock and Stanford still failed to find one more bucket. The travel on Raynaud at the end really stung and then going back to the first half, that technical foul on Bynum looms very large. Bynum is a graduate student who has played on an NCAA tourney team in Providence. He has to be more mature than that. He’s been in environments like this before. He knows better.
And then just in general, good teams find ways to pull out games like this. Yes it was a hostile road atmosphere, but a good team would have built on that 10 point lead and not allowed Cal to go on a 6-0 run. They would have shut the door on the Bears and sent the fans packing for an early BART ride home. Stanford women’s basketball and women’s volleyball did that when they played at Haas Pavilion. There is no reason to not hold Stanford men’s basketball to the same standard.
“Yeah, we did get it there and I feel like it kind of eroded fairly quickly,” Haase said of blowing a 10 point lead. “They made a couple plays and it wasn’t necessarily there for a long time. Yeah, I’m disappointed. You don’t want to let that lead slip away, but most of the game felt like a really tight, every possession mattered type of a game. The value of each possession is so important. I think that’s gonna be a great lesson for our guys and just valuing each possession. In a 40 minute game, a silly mistake and an avoidable mistake, we need to make sure we avoid and that can make the difference in the game.
“Yeah, disappointed that we let the lead slip on by. I didn’t think it was lack of poise. At times we didn’t make the plays. A few turnovers. Especially early in the second half and I think were not necessarily like us. I think we’ll be able to fix those. So disappointed. I’ll need to look back on the tape and find out the details of what happened.”
From a tactical standpoint, I would have liked to have seen Stanford attempt more threes down the stretch of the game as that is their calling card. Their final three-point attempt came at 5:54 on a miss by Spencer Jones. Granted, they shot 7-24 from deep for the night, but if you are them, you gotta be able to get at least a couple more threes off and see if one can drop. In the last two possessions alone, I would have liked to have seen a three point shot go off. Some of that is a credit to Cal’s defense, but Stanford still has to figure out a way to create some good looks from deep when that is their biggest strength.
Going back to the Maxime Raynaud travel, Michael Jones didn’t have best pass there. With a better pass, Raynaud gathers his feet and scores with ease. I’ve seen him do it many times, but that’s not an easy pass to make. I would have liked Stanford to have just gone for the game winner by creating a better shot. And then out of that final time out, Haase had to draw up a better play. Out of bounds play calls are major strength of Haase, so I don’t want to harp on him too much for that final sequence. But still, their final two possessions did not go the way you would want them to go.
At this point, all that Stanford can do is learn from this game, watch the film, and try to improve. They still have a winning record in league and with the Pac-12 being so wide open, they can’t let this loss fester. They still have an opportunity to make more noise in league and then hey, their final game of league play is at home against Cal. They have to like their chances of getting even at Maples Pavilion come March.
Up next for Stanford is a road game at Arizona State on Thursday, February 1st. Tip-off is set for 6:00 PM PT on ESPN2.
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