On Friday, December 13th, Stanford women’s basketball fell to Cal on the road in Berkeley by a final score of 83-63. Cal forward Marta Suárez (21 points, 7 rebounds, & 6 assists), guard Lulu Twidale (20 points, 7 rebounds, & 4 assists), and guard Ioanna Krimili (20 points & 6 rebounds) led the way for the Golden Bears while Stanford forward Brooke Demetre (18 points & 6 rebounds) was the top performer for the Cardinal.
This was the largest margin of victory for Cal women’s basketball since 1982, which was before college basketball introduced the shot clock. Cal also set a program record with 18 made threes in a game. Cal improves to 10-1 overall and 1-0 in the ACC while Stanford falls to 7-3 overall and 0-1 in the ACC.
VIDEO: Cal WBB Postgame Press Conference: Stanford
AUDIO: Stanford WBB Postgame Press Conference: Cal
BOX SCORE: Stanford at Cal-Friday, December 13th
“Cal obviously played a great game,” Stanford head coach Kate Paye said after the game. “They shot the ball extremely well, but I think it was more than that. I think they flat out wanted it more. I thought we were outcoached. I thought we were outplayed. You saw a team, a Cal team that was highly motivated and they played extremely hard. They rebounded the ball well, they were very aggressive on defense, they took us out of a lot of stuff, and the basket obviously got really big for them, and credit to them.”
From the opening tip, Cal came out with more energy and fire as they led 10-3 with 6:29 to go in the 1st quarter. Krimili already had four points for the Bears with a couple of buckets inside. Stanford would wake up to get back in the game, outscoring Cal 9-4 the rest of the quarter to make it a 14-12 lead for the Bears at the end of the 1st quarter. Nunu Agara and Demetre each had five points for the Cardinal while Suarez was up to six points for the Bears.
In the 2nd quarter, things were initially close as it was a 19-16 lead for Cal with 5:31 to go in the half after Agara got a bucket inside for the Cardinal. But then, Cal went on a 12-2 run to lead 31-18 with 2:19 to go in the half. All 12 of those points for Cal came off 3-pointers: Two from Twidale, one from Kayla Williams, and one from Krimili.
Stanford would go on a 6-0 run thanks to back-to-back threes from Chloe Clardy and Elena Bosgana to make it 31-24. That would be the closest Stanford would get as Cal would get one more bucket to lead 33-24 at halftime as Krimili had a driving layup inside to beat the buzzer. Twidale’s 11 points was leading Cal while Agara’s nine points was leading Stanford.
The 3rd quarter was all Cal as a 3-pointer by Twidale set the tone within the first 15 seconds of the quarter. After another 3-pointer by Twidale and a 3-pointer by Suarez, Cal was up big with a 44-26 lead with 7:40 to go in the 3rd quarter. Stanford kept fighting, but it just wasn’t their night. A 3-pointer by Suarez to beat the buzzer from almost half court out ended the 3rd quarter, giving Cal a 63-40 lead. It was that kind of night for the Bears.
“They just got really hot,” Paye said of Cal’s 3rd quarter performance. “I mean, the basket got really big and I guess maybe it’s a little ironic. We’ve made 18 threes in a game this season, too and set our own program record. So we’ve been on the other end of it. The basket just got big. It got really big and you know, Suarez hit the shot in and the end of the third quarter I think it was and it’s game of runs. But I thought our team battled and came back and stayed with it in the fourth quarter. Just, we dug ourselves too deep of a hole.”
After Cal dominated Stanford 30-16 in the 3rd quarter, Stanford would actually outscore Cal in the 4th quarter 23-20, but it wasn’t nearly enough. The damage had been done by the Bears as they simply outplayed the Cardinal on both ends of the floor. They won the rebounding battle 43-38 and also had 20 assists and nine turnovers while the Cardinal had nine assists and 12 turnovers.
To give Stanford some credit, they played all the way until the final whistle sounded as freshman point guard Shay Ijiwoye nearly got a steal at the very end of the game. But as I said, this game was pretty much over at the end of the 3rd quarter. 83-63 Cal would be the final score.
For Cal this is a huge win. While Stanford isn’t the same team they’ve been in the past, they’re still a solid team who was receiving votes in the AP Top 25 Poll coming into the game. Cal was receiving a few more votes than Stanford, but they were viewed as equals going into the game with Stanford being a slight favorite. After the way this one played out, Cal showed that as of now, they’re the better team and that it’s Stanford that has more work to do.
What makes this win so special for Cal is the fact that Stanford has routinely had their number over the years as one of the premier programs in women’s college basketball. To beat Stanford so soundly sends a message that Cal women’s basketball is a program that people need to start taking more seriously. If this doesn’t finally get the Bears ranked, I don’t know what will.
“I just felt that their team was better prepared to play,” Paye said of Cal. “They played harder and that’s just one of the many things I’ve learned from Tara. It starts at the top. So, you know, the things that we need to do better and you know our coaching staff, we start with ourselves. How can we help our team more, what can we do differently to help prepare?
“And, you know, I love our team. We have great young women on our team. They’re working extremely hard, they’re totally bought in, and I have total confidence that we’re gonna improve and continue to get better over the course of the season.”
What of course adds to the importance of this win for Cal is the fact that their head coach Charmin Smith is a Stanford alum and a former teammate of Stanford head coach Kate Paye. You could tell this one meant a lot to Smith personally and that she’s taken a great deal of pride in building her own program across The Bay from where she played her college ball.
“Charmin is a teammate of mine. Obviously Charmin went to Stanford,” Paye said. “She’s a great friend and obviously I’m always cheering for Charmin except when she’s playing Stanford. This Stanford-Cal rivalry has always been a great one and it helps us to play great competition and again as painful as this is, this will help us improve. And you know, again, I’m always cheering for Charmin except when we’re playing each other.”
As for Stanford, this loss stings given they got drubbed by their rival in a way that they simply aren’t used to. It was an historic margin of defeat for the Cardinal. While the fact that Cal is on the verge of being ranked softens this loss for Stanford, what makes it sting is the way they lost. Had it been a single digit loss that went down to the wire, I think Stanford could have felt more comfortable tipping their cap to Cal and feeling like they’ll get even with them on The Farm. But to get blown out like this indicates to Stanford that they have to fix some things. Most notably their perimeter defense.
“Well, you gave up way too many threes,” Paye said of what she’ll tell her team during film. “I think kind of it just was the tenor of the game more than anything, you know? I kind of told our team at halftime, they just came out and they punched us right in the mouth and again, I think they were highly motivated and our team can learn a lot from this.
“It’s very unusual to be playing a conference game this early. Usually you’re used to kind of having your preseason and then getting going with conference play. It’s unusual this is ACC game playing Cal. These are two teams that know each other and have a real history. You know, they have very experienced players, they have two and three graduate seniors and they played like it was really important to them and we have a young team in the sense that we got a lot of new players who are stepping into larger roles. I think we’ve improved a lot since the beginning of the season, but this was a totally different environment.
“Obviously we played on the road before, but playing against a team that you have a history with and that is highly motivated. I think it was a very painful experience, but hopefully one that our team can learn from.”
Up next for Stanford is a home game against UTSA on Monday, December 16th at 12:00 PM PT on ACCNX. They’ll hope to have point guard Talana Lepolo back, who was unable to go against Cal but from what Paye said after the game, it sounds like her status for Monday is up-in-the-air:
“Talana is working to get healthy and we hope that she’ll get healthy soon.”
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