On Wednesday, Stanford men’s basketball defeated Norfolk State at home by a final score of 70-63. Stanford center Maxime Raynaud led the way for the Cardinal with 20 points & 10 rebounds while guards Jaylen Blakes (18 points & 6 rebounds) and Oziyah Sellers (15 points & 6 rebounds) also scored in double figures. Blakes’ points ties a career high from earlier this season. Norfolk State guard Brian Moore Jr. was the top performer for the Spartans with 24 points. Stanford improves to 5-0 overall while Norfolk State falls to 4-2.
VIDEO: Stanford MBB Postgame Press Conference: Norfolk State
BOX SCORE: Norfolk State at Stanford-Wednesday, November 20th
“Always good to win,” Stanford head coach Kyle Smith said after the game. “Those guys pushed us, stretched us to say the least. Obviously getting off to a 14-2 start and then leading 30-15, we were just not able to handle success and honestly didn’t put the ball in the basket. I thought we got really good shots second half, played with purpose, played the right way, and just credit to Norfolk. They were scrappy, they kept in there, kept fighting, kept competing.
“We held them to five assists. You don’t hear many coaches say that, but idea is that they’re going at us one on one and they got two players that were really good one on one players today and Moore made some really tough shots. Ings did, too. We did our job on the glass, we took care of the ball, but obviously we need to make more shots if we’re gonna beat teams consistently. We’re gonna have to shoot the ball better.”
Stanford got out to a hot start, leading 4-2 with 15:12 to go in the half. Blakes was up to seven points for Stanford while Maxime Raynaud had four points after a couple of slams inside. Stanford was on a 14-0 run over the last 3:56. Norfolk State would get back into the game pretty quickly as it was a 21-13 lead for Stanford with 10:12 to go in the half. Raynaud was up to seven points & three rebounds for Stanford. The Cardinal had made two of their last 10 field goals. They’d gone a bit cold.
Stanford would then balloon their lead back up once more as they led 30-15 with 6:54 to go in the half. Stanford’s offense had revived itself as they’d made five of their last five field goals. Ryan Agarwal was up to six points for the Cardinal on 2-4 shooting from 3-point range.
With 3:52 to go in the half, Stanford led 33-24. Stanford hadn’t made a field goal in the last 4:33. Norfolk State had made four of their last five. A crucial stretch of minutes was coming up to close the half.
At halftime, Stanford led 38-33. Maxime Raynaud’s 12 points & 6 rebounds led the way for the Cardinal. Brian Moore Jr. had the Spartans hanging around with 10 points. The Cardinal needed to get rolling offensively.
To start the second half, Norfolk State immediately narrowed the gap with Stanford as it was a 39-38 lead for Stanford with 17:09 to go. Stanford was on a 2:27 scoring drought while Moore was up to 12 points on 5-10 shooting from the field and & 2-3 shooting from the foul line for Norfolk State. Stanford called for time.
Norfolk State would take the lead 40-39 with 15:15 to go. The Spartans were on a 7-0 run while Stanford hadn’t scored in the last 4:21. Stanford was 5-26 from 3-point range. If you’re gonna jack up that many threes, you gotta make more than 19.2%.
“You know, we will, we’ll adjust it,” Smith said of their poor shooting. “I don’t know, I just think it’s one of those things that you gotta play your way through it a little bit. I mean, it’s the same team that was throwing in bombs. It might have been to our detriment a little bit. We were making everything against NAU and it seemed easy. We’re shooting long ones, shooting from the logo, and it’s hard to handle success a little bit and you’re gonna get scouted, you’re gonna get some things, so I think we’ll play our way through that and we’re playing a little bit not to lose. Not disrespect anyone. We get up big and teams are gonna come match in and we gotta respond, but you gotta keep putting it in the basket.”
“I think they played a lot of zone,” Raynaud said of their 3-point shooting. “So naturally, like an easier shot. We tried to take a three because we swing it around and we’ve got a lot of threes. We have a ton of good shooters, so I think any shot we take really is a good shot. Today they didn’t go in and I think we had to rely a little bit more on getting fouled. I mean, JB [Jaylen Blakes] being 10 for 12 from the line, Oziyah was six for nine from the line, I think is what kept us in the game. We’ll have some good shooting days; we’ll have some bad shooting days. Regardless, what matters is that we keep our confidence up and we stay together as a team, really.”
Stanford would lead 43-42 with 11:58 to go. Stanford hadn’t made a field goal in the last 2:34. Norfolk State hadn’t scored in the last 2:56. Neither team could buy a bucket.
Stanford would increase their lead a bit to go up 52-46 with 7:46 to go. Blakes & Raynaud each had 15 points for Stanford. Blakes had a huge 3-pointer off an offensive rebound and assist from Cameron Grant. Stanford had made three of their last three field goals while Norfolk State had made 1 of their last 8.
“He wasn’t afraid, did a good job,” Smith said of Grant. “He was plus five in his minutes there and he came up with the big offensive rebound and kicked it out to Jaylen, which was one of the biggest plays of the game.”
Stanford would remain up by six points as it was a 57-51 game with 5:11 to go. Stanford needed to finish strong. They were in position to win, but any slip up could easily have let the Spartans right back in the game.
It continued to stay at the same margin as Raynaud hit a 3-pointer for Stanford to give him 20 points while Moore had an old fashioned three-point play inside to give him 20 points as well. As a result, it was a 60-54 lead for Stanford with 3:39 to go.
“Yeah, I mean he’s really aggressive, quicky, shifty,” Blakes said of Moore. “Very good pull up jump shot. I think on the season he’s shooting like some crazy percentage from three, so you have to respect him as a jump shooter and he’s just as fast, so he could get downhill and he’s a very crafty finisher and ability to get fouled at the line, so it was definitely a tough cover for sure.”
In the end, Stanford would win by a final score of 70-63. It was not pretty, but the Cardinal got the win. They found a way to make shots when they really needed to and not allow the Spartans to overtake them despite putting up a valiant effort.
“Yeah, I mean, he was excited,” Blakes said of what Smith’s message to the team was after the game. “A win is a win. We’re 5-0. I don’t know the last time that Stanford has been 5-0. 2019. So you know, it seems like a while ago a little bit, but I think for us it was a great win and I think for us it showed our resiliency. Obviously there’s things that you have to learn, but you know, for us, he just has extreme confidence in us that we were able to win shooting eight for 34 from the three point line.
“I mean, it’s not every day that Benny’s gonna shoot six of seven from the three point line or Ryan’s gonna knock down or Oziyah’s going or Maxime’s gonna shoot five for ten. So it’s like these games that really show your character and show who you’re about and I think for us he was proud of our effort and our ability to come together and finish the game.”
For Stanford, this game was closer than they would have liked, but as I said, a win is a win. They could have allowed this game to go into overtime or heaven forbid actually lost this game. So in that vein, they should be happy to win. And then hey, Norfolk State is consistently one of the top teams in the MEAC. They know how to win basketball games.
“Not all,” Blakes affirmed when asked if they took Norfolk State lightly. “I mean, when you look at their history, they win their conference every single year. And you know, we knew that it was gonna be a battle going in. They’re 4-1. They’re 4-1 for a reason. They beat a good JMU team, you know, they have a lot of good wins, and a couple blowouts and I think for us, we didn’t take them lightly. They just fought and we knew they were going to fight and they did exactly that.”
Up next for Stanford is a road game at Santa Clara on Saturday, November 23rd. Tipoff is set for 7:00 PM PT on ESPN+.
“Really good team, they’ve got really good talent,” Smith said of Santa Clara. “I think they beat Riverside by 40 yesterday. They’re very physical and very well coached. So, it’ll be a big challenge for us to go into someone else’s court. I imagine they’ll have a good turnout. It’ll be fun, I mean, it’s kind of why you play college basketball. Playing in those environments, but their back court is really experienced, really good. Their front court is big, good. It’ll be a good test for us to see if we can compete with someone like that on the road.”
CardinalSportsReport.com on Facebook, IG, Threads, X (Twitter), & Blue Sky: @StanfordRivals
Ben Parker on Facebook, IG, Threads, X (Twitter), & Blue Sky: @slamdunk406
Email: slamdunk406@yahoo.com
