Cardinal in Cancun

No. 11 Stanford (3-1)
at the Cancun Challenge
Thursday, Nov. 24 – Saturday, Nov. 26
Hard Rock Hotel Riviera Maya • Cancun, Mexico
Complete Release (PDF)
Live Stream • Northeastern • Wichita State • Purdue
Live Statistics •Northeastern • Wichita State • Purdue

THE GAMESNo. 11 Stanford is on the road for the first time this season when it travels to Mexico for the Cancun Challenge from Nov. 24-26 at the Hard Rock Hotel Riviera Maya where it will play Northeastern, Wichita State and Purdue.

THE RUNDOWNStanford is coming off a 88-54 rout of CSUN on Sunday ... Stanford's overall record since its first varsity season in 1975 is 1,007-313 (.763) ... The Cardinal is the nation's seventh-winningest program by victories and fourth by percentage ... Entering her 31st season on the bench at Stanford, Hall of Famer Tara VanDerveer has accumulated a 983-226 record in her 37+ years as a collegiate head coach and is 17 victories away from joining Pat Summitt as the only NCAA women's basketball coaches with 1,000 career wins ... Stanford is No. 11 in the Associated Press women's basketball poll and has appeared in 289 straight ... Stanford is 5-1 all-time outside the 50 U.S. states and 51-13 (.797) at neutral sites the last 10 years ... Brittany McPhee is the ninth-best shooting guard among Power 5 conference players in the country with a field goal percentage of .563 ... Since the start of 2015-16, Erica McCall is one of two players in the country averaging 15+ points, 9+ rebounds and 2+ blocks while shooting better than 50.0 percent ... Karlie Samuelson is the active NCAA leader in career 3-point field goal percentage (.419) ... Stanford signed the nation's fifth-ranked recruiting class on Nov. 9, including three top-50 recruits ... Marta Sniezek is averaging 4.9 assists with a 2.47 assist-to-turnover ratio in her last 19 games ... The Cardinal is 17th in the nation in field goal percentage (.483), 17th in assists (73) and 18th in blocked shots (24).

VS. THE FIELDStanford has never faced Northeastern, is 0-1 against Wichita State and 8-3 against Purdue. The Cardinal's only other meeting with the Shockers came on December 4, 1980, a 71-68 loss at New Mexico State's Roadrunner Classic. Stanford has won three straight over the Boilermakers, including last November's 71-65 overtime victory to claim the Gulf Coast Showcase title in Estero, Fla. Briana Roberson had a career-high 26 points in the win and Erica McCall added a 12-point, 11-rebound double-double. The Cardinal also beat the Boilermakers in its last visit to Mexico. Stanford opened up the Hardwood Tournament of Hope in Puerto Vallarta with a 86-69 win over Purdue on Nov. 26, 2013 in what was Tara VanDerveer's 899th career victory as a collegiate head coach.

CATCHING YOU UP• No. 11 Stanford bounced back from its first defeat of the season and improved to 3-1 with an 88-54 nonconference rout of CSUN on Nov. 20.
• Eleven Cardinal scored, led by Erica McCall's game-high 17. Brittany McPhee notched 14 points and freshman Nadia Fingall contributed as many off the bench on 7-of-8 shooting.
• The win was the 983rd in Tara VanDerveer's Hall of Fame career. She is 17 away from joining Pat Summitt as the only NCAA women's basketball coaches with 1,000 career wins.
• Stanford still has not lost back-to-back games in the month of November since 2006 and hasn't been beaten by unranked teams in back-to-back games since 2008.AMONG THE BEST EVER• Stanford's victory over Oregon State on Feb. 26, 2016 was the 1,000th in program history. With 1,007 wins, the Cardinal is the seventh-winningest program in women's college basketball history. The country's other 1,000-victory programs are Tennessee (1,302), Louisiana Tech (1,074), Connecticut (1,050), James Madison (1,047), Old Dominion (1,015), Texas (1,013) and Stephen F. Austin (1,006).
• The Cardinal's overall record since its first varsity season in 1975 is 1,007-313 (.763) and 831-175 (.826) with Tara VanDerveer at the helm.
• Stanford's .763 winning percentage is fourth all-time in Division I, trailing Tennessee (.813) and Louisiana Tech (.783) and Connecticut (.780).SETTING THE STAGE• Stanford is 5-1 all-time outside the 50 U.S. states and has won five straight. It's only loss came to No. 2 Connecticut at the Paradise Jam in St. Thomas, U.S.V.I. on Nov. 22, 2007 (66-54).
• The Cardinal then beat Old Dominion (69-61) and Temple (63-54) to close out the Paradise Jam and swept through the Hardwood Tournament of Hope in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico in 2013 with wins over Purdue (86-69), Florida Gulf Coast (83-59) and South Dakota State (80-60). The FGCU victory was the 900th in Tara VanDerveer's career.
• Stanford is 51-13 (.797) at neutral sites the last 10 years, fourth in the country in both wins and winning percentage.
• The Cardinal is 17th in the nation in field goal percentage (.483), 17th in assists (73) and 18th in blocked shots (24).
• Stanford is averaging 18.3 assists per game, better than all but two years this millennium. Stanford averaged 19.2 in 2001-02 and 18.8 in 2008-09.MORE MILESTONES ON THE HORIZON FOR TARA• Entering her 31st season on the bench at Stanford, Hall of Famer Tara VanDerveer has accumulated a 983-226 record in her 37+ years as a collegiate head coach and an 831-175 mark on The Farm. Her teams have won 20 or more games 31 times, including each of the last 15 seasons.
• In November 2013, VanDerveer became just the fifth college women's basketball coach to win 900 career games and is 17 victories shy of joining Pat Summitt as the only NCAA women's basketball coaches with 1,000 career wins.

Winningest Coaches (By Victories)

• Summitt (1,098) along with Mike Krzyzewski at Duke (1,047) and Herb Magee at Philadelphia University (1,035) on the men's side are the only college basketball coaches with 1,000 wins.
• In March 2015 she won her 800th game at Stanford, becoming the 10th college basketball coach – men's or women's – with that many victories at a single Division I school.McPHIRE• Brittany McPhee torched No. 8 Texas for a career-high 28 points on 11-of-15 shooting (.733) and followed that up with 22 points against Gonzaga for the first back-to-back 20-point games of her career.
• Her performance from the floor against the Longhorns was the most efficient for a Stanford guard against a ranked opponent with records dating back to 1999-00 (minimum 10 field goals made).
• Four-time All-American Candice Wiggins is second on that list, converting 55.6 percent in games against No. 16 Minnesota on Nov. 20, 2005 (10-of-18) and No. 23 UTEP on March 24, 2008 (15-of-27).
• Including McPhee, Stanford guards have made 10 field goals in a game against top-25 teams nine times since 1999-00. Wiggins has seven of them.
• The junior is averaging 18.5 points per game, good for sixth in the Pac-12, and is the ninth-best shooting guard among Power 5 conference players in the country with a field goal percentage of .563.BIRD SOARING• Since the start of her junior year, Erica McCall is averaging 15.1 points on 50.8 percent shooting, 9.1 rebounds and 2.0 blocks.
• McCall and Utah's Emily Potter are the only players in the country averaging 15+ points, 9+ rebounds and 2+ blocks while converting more than half of their shots since the beginning of last season.
• McCall closed 2015-16 by averaging 20.3 points, 9.2 rebounds and 2.0 blocks in Stanford's last 10.
• Her 66 blocks last season tied for third in Stanford single-season history and her 147 career blocks rank sixth at Stanford behind Jayne Appel (278), Chiney Ogwumike (202), Val Whiting (201), Kristen Newlin (163) and Joslyn Tinkle (150).
• She is 29th in the nation averaging 2.75 blocks per game thus far in 2016-17.
• McCall's 21 career double-doubles are tied for 18th among active NCAA players. Among those active players, only Lexi Martins of George Washington (24), Alaina Coates of South Carolina (23) and Nia Coffey (20) of Northwestern have had more than McCall's 19 double-doubles since the start of last season.
• On Nov. 3, McCall was named to the five-person preseason All-Pac-12 Team by the league's media and she also checked in at No. 23 in espnW's preseason list of the best women's college basketball players in 2016-17.TAKE AIM• Karlie Samuelson was 80-of-169 from behind the arc in 2015-16 and checked in at third in the nation in 3-point field goal percentage (.473). She is second in Stanford single-season history in 3-point field goal percentage behind Jennifer Azzi (.495; 1988-89) and ninth in 3-point makes (80).
• The senior is the active NCAA leader in career 3-point field goal percentage (.419).
• In her last 25 games, Samuelson is 57-of-113 on 3-pointers (.504).

Active 3-Point FG% Leaders

• She returned to practice on Nov. 8 for the first time in roughly six weeks after she recovered from a hairline fracture in her wrist.SNIEZEK STEPS UP• In her last 19 games, Marta Sniezek is averaging 4.9 assists with a 2.47 assist-to-turnover ratio.
• The sophomore averaged 1.8 assists with an assist-to-turnover ratio of 0.9 in her first 20 career games.
• Last year, Sniezek became the eighth Stanford freshman to reach 100 assists (109) and fourth to tally that many in the past 20 seasons (Amber Orrange, Ros Gold-Onwude, Nicole Powell).
• Against Washington in the Pac-12 Tournament on March 4, she had 13 assists against zero turnovers. Her assist total was a Pac-12 Tournament record and also the most for a Stanford player in a single game since 1991.APPLYING PRESSURE• The Cardinal finished sixth nationally in field goal percentage defense (.338) and ninth in blocks per game (6.0) last year. Its field goal percentage defense was third in Stanford history and its 211 total blocks set a school record.
• The Cardinal is third in the nation in field goal percentage defense the past 10 years, holding its 334 opponents to 34.5 percent shooting (6,993-of-20,268).

FG% Defense Leaders (Since 2007-08)

PROGNOSTICATIONS• Stanford is No. 11 in the AP top 25 and No. 11 in the USA TODAY Coaches Poll.
• It has been ranked 498 times out of 713 total AP polls since 1977 (69.8 percent), with an average positioning of 7.1. It's been in the past 289, the second-longest active streak behind Connecticut (434). Stanford has been in 297 consecutive coaches polls.
• The Cardinal's 498 all-time appearances in the AP top 25 are fourth behind Tennessee (695), Georgia (522) and Texas (504).
• Stanford was picked to finish second in the Pac-12 when the conference announced the results of the preseason coaches' poll. It's the second consecutive season Stanford has come in second in the preseason poll. The Cardinal had topped the rankings for 15 consecutive years beginning in 2000-01.
• The Cardinal totaled 110 points and garnered two first-place votes. UCLA was the leading vote getter, receiving eight first-place votes and collecting 116 points.GLOBETROTTING• Last summer it was Erica McCall with the United States at the 2015 World University Games in South Korea and Alanna Smith with Australia at the FIBA U19 Women's World Championship in Russia. This summer it was Canadian freshman Mikaela Brewer who represented her country abroad.
• Brewer captained Canada to silver at the FIBA Americas U18 Women's Championship in Valdivia, Chile in July, averaging 11.8 points on 49 percent shooting (24-of-49) in five games.
• Brewer had a perfect performance in group play against Chile, scoring 22 on a flawless 9-of-9 shooting in Canada's 88-39 win. She scored a team-high 16 points, made 7-of-12 from the floor and hit both of her 3-point attempts in the championship against the United States.
• Brewer is the second international recruit in program history (Alanna Smith - Australia).CARDINAL FOURTUNE• On Nov. 9, the Cardinal announced the signings of Maya Dodson (Alpharetta, Ga./St. Francis), Alyssa Jerome (Toronto, Ontario, Canada/Harbord Collegiate), Estella Moschkau (Mount Horeb, Wisc./Edgewood) and Kiana Williams (San Antonio, Texas/Karen Wagner), a group collectively rated No. 5 by espnW HoopGurlz.

• Dodson is a five-star talent and the No. 11 prospect in the espnW HoopGurlz Top 100, Moschkau is a five-star prospect rated No. 44 and Williams is a five-star point guard and the No. 8 prospect overall.
• Williams is Stanford's first top-10 recruit since Chiney Ogwumike signed as the top player in the country in Nov. 2009.
• Jerome is a veteran of Canada Basketball and represented her country this summer at the both the aforementioned FIBA U17 World Championships in Spain and the FIBA Americas U18 Championships in Valdivia, Chile (alongside Brewer). • Dodson and Williams were named to the 50-person Naismith Trophy High School Girl's Preseason watch list on Nov. 16.FOREVER STANFORD• It was a big summer for Stanford alumnae, headlined by Nneka Ogwumike '12 winning the 2016 WNBA MVP award and hitting the game winner in Game 5 of the WNBA Finals with 3.1 seconds left to lift the Los Angeles Sparks to the championship.
• Ogwumike is Stanford women's basketball's seventh WNBA champion and the third Cardinal to win a league most valuable player award in any sport, joining NFL quarterbacks John Brodie (San Francisco 49ers; 1970) and John Elway (Denver Broncos; 1987).
• On Oct. 17, the 2012 Stanford graduate was voted president of the WNBA players' union executive council, a post she will hold for three years. She will serve alongside her sister Chiney '14, who will serve as the organization's vice president. Jayne Appel Marinelli, who retired this September after a seven-year WNBA career with the San Antonio Stars, will begin her post-playing days as the union's Associate Director of Player Relations.

• Sebnem Kimyacioglu '05, the fifth Stanford alumna to compete in the Olympics, helped Turkey advance to the quarterfinals in the country's second appearance in women's basketball at the Games.
• Kimyacioglu was Turkey's fifth-leading scorer, averaging 4.3 points in 22.2 minutes over the six games and shot 40 percent from behind the 3-point line (8-of-20).
• Kimyacioglu was one of 39 Stanford athletes to compete at the 2016 Summer Olympics. The Cardinal contingent in Rio hailed from 10 countries and spanned 17 varsity sports. The 2016 Rio de Janeiro Games resulted in a school-record 27 medals, the most of any NCAA institution.THAT'S HIM• Those who come to a Stanford practice might recognize a familiar face in two-time All-American Casey Jacobsen, who is a practice player for both the Cardinal women and men. Jacobsen left Stanford after three seasons and was the 22nd overall pick in the 2002 NBA Draft by the Phoenix Suns. He enjoyed a five-year NBA career and also played professionally in Spain and Germany.
• Jacobsen is back on campus finishing his degree in communication, which he will complete in December, and will walk with his class next June.

• He is fourth in Stanford history in points (1,723), sixth in scoring average (18.1) and fourth in 3-pointers made (222).CIVIC ENGAGEMENT PROGRAM• Sophomore guard Alexa Romano was among 40 student-athletes from Stanford and Duke who traveled to one of five countries during the summer for three weeks as part of the Rubenstein-Bing Student-Athlete Civic Engagement Program.
• Romano served as a coaching assistant for sports activities, taught English as a second language courses and promoted computer literacy initiatives for youth at a community center in New Delhi.

• She is in the process of copying her journal from the trip - 50 typed pages on the computer - to a leather-bound version she purchased the Dili Haat open-air craft bazaar in New Delhi.COMMUNICATION IS KEY• VanDerveer is constantly evolving and finding new ways to push herself and do her job well depending on the makeup of her team and communication was the focus this offseason.
• In mid-September, the Cardinal spent just more than an hour in a "Championship Communication" workshop with Betsy Butterick to develop communication techniques.
• Late last spring, Stanford played water polo at the Avery Aquatic Center. The team later had conversations with football coach David Shaw and former Stanford dean Julie Lythcott-Haims, who wrote "How to Raise an Adult: Break Free of the Overparenting Trap and Prepare Your Kid for Success." Stanford also did a Skype session with author Jon Gordon, who wrote "The Energy Bus: 10 Rules to Fuel Your Life, Work, and Team with Positive Energy."
• On Nov. 10, three-time Olympic volleyball champion and current U.S. women's coach Karch Kiraly — who has done his own communication exercises with the Americans through peer evaluations — spoke to the team before he worked TV for the USC-Stanford volleyball match at Maples Pavilion.