On Wednesday, Stanford men’s basketball defeated Virginia Tech at home by a final score of 70-59 in their first ACC home game in program history. Stanford center Maxime Raynaud (19 points, 14 rebounds, & 1 block), guard Oziyah Sellers (19 points), and guard Jaylen Blakes (17 points & 6 assists) led the way for the Cardinal while Virginia Tech forward Ben Burnham (18 points & 4 rebounds) was the top performer for the Hokies. Stanford improves to 10-5 overall and 2-2 in the ACC while Virginia Tech falls to 6-9 overall and 1-3 in the ACC.

VIDEO: Stanford MBB Postgame Press Conference: Virginia Tech

VIDEO: Virginia Tech MBB Postgame Press Conference: Stanford

BOX SCORE: Virginia Tech at Stanford-Wednesday, January 8th

“Yeah, that was a really good win for our program as far as obviously coming in here off the tough road trip, lost three in a row,” Stanford head coach Kyle Smith said after the game. “But everyone, you know, I’m getting all the sympathy telling you doing alright? I’m like, I’ve been doing great. This team's got a really good attitude. They believe in one another. They’re still growing. They’re still getting better and I was really proud of them tonight because I thought we had some breakthroughs.

“Obviously off to a tough start. You know, our confidence might have been a little shaken from the road trip and I thought Virginia Tech is a really well coached team. They threw a hard shot at us and that’s great for our program to be able to come from down 12 I think to win by 11 and made a lot of winning plays down the stretch. Like our offensive rebounding down the stretch, saw some guys grow up a little bit. Ryan Agarwal made a couple nice drives and offensive rebounds that really impacted the game down the stretch there where it didn’t get tightened up. And Donavin came off the bench, did good things and really good, nice to get our first ACC home win. That was great.”

Virginia Tech got out to an 8-4 lead with 14:39 to go in the first half. Tobi Lawal had four points for the Hokies, who were shooting 4-6 from the field as a team. Stanford was shooting 2-7 from the field.

Virginia Tech would lead 10-4 with 11:16 to go in the half. Stanford hadn’t scored in the last 6:50 while Virginia Tech hadn’t scored in the last 2:43. It was kind of an ugly game up to this point.

With 9:23 to go in the half, Virginia Tech led 16-4 as Ben Burnham was up to six points. The Hokies were on a 14-0 run. Stanford would then start to wake up a bit offensively as Virginia Tech led 19-12 with 6:22 to go in the half. Jaylen Blakes was up to five points for the Cardinal after a triple while Oziyah Sellers had a hoop plus the foul, making the free throw. As for Burnham, he was up to nine points for the Hokies.

With 3:18 to go in the half, Virginia Tech led 24-15. Burnham was up to 12 points for the Hokies on 4-4 shooting from 3-point range. Blakes was the top scorer for the Cardinal with six points. Others needed to get going for the Cardinal. Especially Maxime Raynaud.

At halftime, Virginia Tech led 30-25. Burnham’s 12 points was still leading the Hokies. As for Stanford, Sellers was leading the way with his nine points. After a rusty start, Stanford had finally woken up.

Stanford got off to a good start in the second half as Virginia Tech led 38-37 with 15:44 to go. Blakes and Raynaud each had 12 points for Stanford. Stanford was outscoring Virginia Tech 12-8 in the second half, trimming the Hokies’ lead to just one point.

Stanford would then lead 44-42 with 11:31 to go. Raynaud was starting to find his groove for the Cardinal with 14 points and eight rebounds while Blakes (12 points) and Sellers (11 points) were also in double figures. Stanford had the momentum, but Virginia Tech was still in it.

Stanford and Virginia Tech would be tied 48-48 with 8:42 to go. Raynaud was up to 16 points and eight rebounds for Stanford while Burnham had 16 points for Virginia Tech. It was a tight one at Maples Pavilion.

The game remained close as Stanford led 56-54 with 6:00 to go. Raynaud was up to 19 points and 10 rebounds for Stanford while Sellers was up to 16 points after a corner three thanks to a nice assist by Ryan Agarwal. Stanford had the edge, but Virginia Tech wouldn’t go away.

Over the next couple of minutes, Stanford would finally gain the separation they needed, leading 63-56 with 3:43 to go. Sellers had a huge 3-pointer off an assist by Blakes while Agarwal hit a couple of clutch free throws.

“Oziyah has turned into a really good player, to be honest,” Smith said of Sellers. “A two way player and that’s the goal is try to get these guys to be two way players. He’s done that and he played really well against Clemson and he played a good first half against Pitt and that game got away from us a little bit and I probably tried to wrestle, but he’s just so consistent. He cares so much. Obviously our big three delivered at home and you know, Donavin and Ryan stepped up and made some big plays, too. The better they get; I think it’s easier for everyone to kind of follow that lead.”

Agarwal’s offensive rebounding was making a real difference as he gave the Cardinal a few extra possessions that they were able to take advantage of. Another difference maker for the Cardinal was Donavin Young, who would finish with seven points and three rebounds. He was bringing great energy and had a huge dunk that gave Stanford some energy in response to a Virginia Tech dunk.

“You know, he’s been injured a lot of the season and he came back after Christmas and missed some time with a cold or flu or whatever,” Smith said of Young. “And so it wasn’t, he really didn’t get any practice time going back east and he played in the Oregon game, I think some people saw him and knows that he’s just our best front court athlete really is what he is and he can give us as much anything and all those guys are very similar in talent…he’s got the quickest feet and best defender, I think and athlete. So, that’s something we can use. Another front court athlete out there on the glass and defending and he just made a lot of winning plays.”

From there, Stanford would win by a final score of 70-59. Virginia Tech gave Stanford a good fight, but in the end the Cardinal came out on top as expected.

“Just staying locked in,” Sellers said of the key to their second half success. “We trust everyone on the team. So, teams are going to go on runs, us and other teams, they’re both gonna go on runs. So, just staying focused on the main goal, controlling what we can control, then at the end it’ll all play out.”

For Stanford, this is a much-needed win. Virginia Tech is not a good team and so in that vein this really was a game Stanford had to have. That said, coming in on a three game losing skid, Stanford should still feel good that they didn’t let negative momentum affect them in this one. Especially with it being their ACC home opener.

“It’s special,” Raynaud said of playing in the first home ACC game in Stanford men’s basketball history. “I’m a big, I don’t know if I can say that, but Pac-12 guy I guess, because we’ve been in the Pac-12 for a couple years. What I told them, before we go on the court, I always give a little speech, and we really had to set the tone not for us, but for the years to come because that was really Maples’ first ACC games and obviously we had two, actually three on the road because we got to include Cal, and so that was the first time we got some fans back in the building.

“Felt amazing. Obviously it’s a good team, the whole conference is very competitive, so it felt great to start off with a good win and once again, I just love the resilience we showed. Being down by almost 10 and then coming back and winning by 11 is really big for our program.”

As for Virginia Tech, obviously not the way they wanted this one to go. They battled hard the entire game, but in the end just didn’t have the weapons. They’ll look to bounce back on Saturday at Cal.

“I thought we did a great job on Raynaud in the first half and really admire his game,” Virginia Tech head coach Mike Young said of his team’s performance. “I thought Raynaud really wanted to post it and to draw the double team and throw it back to the other side, and I thought we negated that pretty well in the first half.

“Now he can take you out on the perimeter, which he’s very good at, he’s got really nice feet, really good hands and he made a couple of shots as good as he is. I didn’t think he would, gotta get him moving. We got that on a couple of occasions. He still got us, still got that down. So, they got three guys that they need to score. Blakes needs to score, 4 [Sellers] needs to score, and 42 [Raynaud]. Unfortunately for my team, that’s exactly what they got.”

Up next for Stanford is a home game against Virginia on Saturday, January 11th. Tipoff is set for 1:00 PM PT on ESPNU.

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