Jan 11, 2002
CORVALLIS, Ore. (AP) - Casey Jacobsen was on his way toward another horriblegame, and Stanford was staring at a possible second straight road loss.
In came freshman Josh Childress to cover Jacobsen's back and help theCardinal pull away for a victory.
Childress scored 19 points, including seven straight during a second-halfrun, and Jacobsen recovered his shot after that to lift the 14th-rankedCardinal past Oregon State 67-50 Thursday night.
"We need him every night," said Jacobsen, who scored 12 of his 15 pointsin the second half. "We don't need him just once every while."
Childress came off the bench in the first half to spell Jacobsen, who pickedup his third foul with 12:52 left. Childress endured his own jittery start,missing six of his first seven shots, but he shot 7-of-8 after that.
"He missed a couple shots and looked nervous," Stanford coach MikeMontgomery said. "Once he found out he was going to stay in and was going tocontinue to take shots, he found a way to get more aggressive and made someplays."
Curtis Borchardt added 17 points and 18 rebounds for Stanford (9-3, 2-1Pac-10), which trailed by four with 14:18 left before going on a 23-5 run.Childress and Jacobsen each scored nine points during the spurt.
Philip Ricci scored 14 points and Brian Jackson had 12 to lead the Beavers(8-7, 1-4), who have lost nine of 10 to Stanford. The Beavers, who missed 12 oftheir last 16 shots, have led in the second half in all but one game thisseason.
"I don't know what it is," guard Jimmie Haywood said. "We're just givingthe game up. We've got to be mentally tough. We can play with anybody in theleague, we've just got to stay mentally focused."
Consecutive jumpers by Floyd North III and Joe See put the Beavers ahead36-32, but Childress responded with a nice driving bank shot, a 3-pointer and alayup on a dish from Borchardt.
"We let him get going by knocking down the 3," Oregon State coach RitchieMcKay said. "From there on, he was very tough to guard."
The longer Childress was on the floor, the more his confidence grew. He camein shooting just 29 percent over his previous seven games after a strong start.
Stanford shot a season-low 32 percent in Sunday's 68-54 loss at Cal, and wasin danger of falling to 0-2 on the road in the conference. Last season, theCardinal went 9-0, the first Pac-10 team to sweep on the road since OregonState in 1980-81.
"We hadn't shot the ball well. That doesn't last forever," Childress said."We have to learn to grind things out and come out with a victory."
With Stanford leading just 41-40, Jacobsen sank a 3-pointer to start a 14-1burst. Jacobsen dunked on a pass from Julius Barnes, who then hit a 3-pointer.A putback by Childress, followed by another Barnes-to-Jacobsen dunk and aturnaround jumper by Jacobsen made it 55-41 with 5:17 to play.
Both teams committed silly turnovers and missed badly on shots in the firsthalf.
Oregon State fell behind 11-2 after 7{ minutes, and of the Beavers' first 14possessions, seven ended with missed shots and six with turnovers.
Jacobsen made his first basket 6{ minutes in, but 39 seconds later he wasout of the game. It appeared that Jackson ran into his own teammate, butJacobsen was whistled for the foul.
Without him, the Cardinal couldn't make anything from outside, and they shot33 percent during the half. Oregon State got within 25-24, and a bank shot byChildress gave Stanford a three-point halftime lead.
The Beavers put freshman J.S. Nash on Jacobsen, and although the 6-foot-1Nash gave away five inches, he succeeded in annoying Jacobsen enough that thejunior tried to force his game.
After Oregon State took the lead for the first time at 32-31, Jacobsenlaunched a 3-pointer from the top with plenty of time left on the shot clock.It barely caught iron.
A few minutes later, Childress came to his rescue again with his seven-pointflurry.
By LANDON HALL
AP Sports Writer