On Thursday, Stanford women’s basketball fell to No. 22 Cal at home by a final score of 75-72. Cal guard Kayla Williams led the Golden Bears with 18 points while guard Ioanna Krimili had 17 points. Stanford guard Chloe Clardy was the top performer for the Cardinal with 22 points while forward Nunu Agara had 19 points and six rebounds. Cal improves to 18-3 overall and 6-2 in the ACC while Stanford falls to 10-9 overall and 2-6 in the ACC.
VIDEO: Stanford WBB Postgame Press Conference: Cal
BOX SCORE: Cal at Stanford-Thursday, January 23rd
“Credit to Cal, they have a much improved team this year,” Stanford head coach Kate Paye said after the game. “They have a six-year senior, three fifth-year seniors, a very improved sophomore, having one of their best seasons in a long time. I’m extremely proud of our team the way we fought back and gave ourselves an opportunity to really win the game. This is a career-high for Chloe. I think she is really coming into her own. I thought she played great at Duke as well. And you know Shay, what she’s doing as a freshman, on the incredible energy she’s giving us on both sides of the ball, just a fearless competitor. This one hurts.”
Cal got off to a nice start, leading 12-9 with 4:35 to go in the 1st quarter. Marta Suarez was up to six points for Cal while Nunu Agara had four points for Stanford. Stanford was shooting 4-9 from the field while Cal was shooting 5-6.
Cal would turn on the jets to lead 23-13 at the end of the 1st quarter. Ugonne Onyiah was doing work inside for the Bears with eight points. Cal was shooting 9-13 from the field while Stanford was shooting 4-11.
Cal would continue to lead 32-21 with 4:57 to go in the 2nd quarter. Stanford had settled in a bit as Chloe Clardy was up to eight points. The Cardinal needed to go on a run to cut into the Bears’ lead before halftime.
At halftime, Cal led 41-31. Onyiah’s eight points led the Bears on a perfect 4-4 shooting from the field while Clardy was up to 14 points for the Cardinal on 5-8 shooting from the field and 4-4 from the foul line.
Cal got off to a hot 12-4 start in the 3rd quarter, leading 53-35 with 7:18 to go in the quarter. Stanford called for time, looking to regroup.
Stanford would once again settle in, trailing 61-48 at the end of the 3rd quarter. Kayla Williams and Marta Suarez each had 13 points for the Bears while Clardy (16 points) and Agara (10 points & 5 rebounds) were leading the Cardinal. Stanford ended the quarter on a 6-0 run and were looking to carry that into the 4th quarter.
Stanford would open the 4th quarter on a 10-2 run to make it a 63-58 game with 5:32 to go. Stanford freshman guard Shay Ijiwoye was injecting life into the Cardinal team with her eight points, three assists, and three steals. Her defensive activity and ability to attack the basket was literally game-changing.
“Honestly, the energy that I play with is just a love that I have, just for my sisters, for my coaches, for everyone a part of this program,” Ijiwoye said. “It’s really easy to keep going and just do whatever you can to win when you love the people you are doing it with. And then just the faith that I have in The Lord Jesus. Knowing that I’m playing for not only my teammates, but just for the glory of God. You just gotta keep going.”
“We love you Shay,” Paye added with a smile.
Stanford would continue to chip away and thanks to back-to-back threes from Agara, Stanford trailed by just two points 73-71 with 46.4 to go. Cal had the ball and was looking to fend off a fierce Cardinal comeback.
In the end, Stanford’s comeback attempt would fall short as Cal escaped with a 75-72 victory. Stanford got three cracks at a game-tying shot but wasn’t able to get one to drop. It was truly a valiant and inspirational effort.
“Our team is in pain. I thought they played very hard,” Paye said. “This is the one game where in conference play, the way the ACC is set up right now, where you play somebody twice. I think our team has improved a lot since we saw them in December. I think we look a lot different. I was really excited about the contributions from Courtney Ogden coming off the bench, the contributions from MA, Mary Ashley Stevenson coming off the bench. You know, Kennedy Umeh is now in the rotation for us.
“So, we know good things are coming. Again, there are no moral victories. Our team is disappointed, but what I love about coaching this team and what I love about coaching them is they continue to remain positive, upbeat. I know we’re getting in the gym tomorrow; we’ll be practicing, I know we’ll be ready to go.”
The real turning point of this game came after Shay Ijiwoye picked up her fifth foul on the second foul shot of Courtney Ogden, who made both shots. Those foul shots made it a 66-64 game with 2:40 to go. But with Ijiwoye picking up a foul and it being ruled an intentional foul, that sent Ioanna Krimili to the foul line for two foul shots as she was taking the shots for Jayda Noble, who got injured as Ijiwoye fell on her. Krimili made both foul shots, making it a 68-64 game with 2:40 to go. Had that foul on Ijiwoye not been called, perhaps Stanford would have pulled this game out.
“Dug ourselves a hole in the first quarter, we had kinda been getting off to better starts, I know that kind of hurt us maybe earlier in the season, but our team battled back, we cut it to two with about two minutes and forty seconds to go, they call it an intentional foul,” Paye explained. “I watched it. I do not agree with the call at all. That was a game changer. They go down and shoot two free throws and then score the next possession…Nunu hit two big threes to give us an opportunity to be right there in the game. Again, I just felt like we cut it to two, we had it right there and again, I did not agree with the game-changing call. It does not come down to one play. We all know that. Again, just extremely proud of the fight that our team showed in particular in the fourth quarter.”
That all said, Cal still deserved this win. They did a great job of getting up by 18 points and played like the better team, which they are. There’s a reason Cal is ranked. Ranked teams find ways to win games like this and Cal did just that.
For Stanford, this is obviously a disappointing outcome, but they can feel good about not giving up and fighting all the way until the end. This is a game that is a culture-building type of game for Kate Paye’s program. They played with the kind of resiliency and toughness that she wants from her team.
As for Cal, this is an historic win. For the first time since the 1985-86 season, Cal gets the regular season sweep over Stanford. That’s huge. Stanford has been an elite team for so many years and even with it being a down year for them, Stanford is still a team that is tough to beat on their home floor. Cal should be excited to get this sweep and feel confident in their ability to finish the rest of the season strong.
“I’m just really proud of our group,” Cal head coach Charmin Smith said after the game. “You guys can fact check me, but this is the first time since the ’85-86 season? Was that before Tara? It was her first year. So no Jennifer Azzi. It’s just a special group, you know, and I’m really proud of how we held on and fought through of adversity. We have a lot of respect for this program, obviously this is special for me. We knew it wasn’t gonna be 18 threes like it was in Haas and to be able to hold on and fight through a number of mistakes and adversity, to get the win, I’m just really proud of this team.”
Up next for Stanford is a home game against Pittsburgh on Thursday, January 30th. Tipoff will be at 7:00 PM PT on ACCNX.
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