Stanford’s trip to the Bahamas finally paid dividends on Saturday afternoon, as the Cardinal pulled away from Northern Iowa 66-50 behind sophomore guard Chasson Randle’s second consecutive 20-point performance.
A career-high 18 points on 8-of-10 shooting by junior forward Josh Huestis paced Stanford (3-0) to a 69-51 win over Alcorn State (1-2), making for the Cardinal’s eighth straight win over the last two seasons.
The last game the Stanford men’s basketball team played that counted was during NIT Finals in New York’s Madison Square Garden. Seven months after winning that tournament, the Cardinal will open its 2012-13 campaign with another matchup in an NBA venue when it meets San Francisco tonight at Oracle Arena in Oakland.
Former Stanford forward Peter Sauer died Sunday night after a recreational basketball game in White Plains, N.Y. when the 35-year-old collapsed suddenly on a concrete court.
For several years, there has really been no comparison between Stanford men’s basketball and women’s basketball. While the men have struggled to get over .500, the women have been blowing out their opposition left and right. The men haven’t been able to sniff NCAA tournament contention, whereas the women are locks to be national title contenders year after year.
In Stanford’s biggest game of the season, the Cardinal was able to beat rival Cal and deny the Golden Bears a share of the Pac-12 regular season title. The victory secured Stanford’s first 20-win season since 2007-08 and gave the squad plenty of momentum going into the season-ending conference tournament.
For the first time in several years, Maples Pavilion on Sunday resembled the Maples Pavilion of old as the Stanford men’s basketball team held off archrival Cal on Senior Day.
After demolishing Colorado in Boulder Thursday night, the Stanford men’s basketball team traveled to face conference bottom-feeder Utah on Saturday. In what was a back-and-forth game from start to finish, the Cardinal was unable to pull off a victory, dropping a heartbreaker to the Utes, 58-57.