Stanford Begins With BuckeyesStanford Begins With Buckeyes
Women's Basketball

Stanford Begins With Buckeyes

No. 10 Stanford (0-0)
at No. 5 Ohio State (0-0)
Friday, Nov. 10 • 6 p.m. ET/3 p.m. PT
St. John Arena • Columbus, Ohio
Tickets
Television • Big Ten Network
Radio •GoStanford.com
Live Statistics •OhioStateBuckeyes.com
Complete Release (PDF)
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THE GAME: No. 10 Stanford starts its 2017-18 campaign on the road against a ranked team for the first time in six years when it plays at No. 5 Ohio State on Friday, Nov. 10 at 6 p.m. ET/ 3 p.m. PT.
 
THE RUNDOWN: The Cardinal returns 10 letterwinners, but just two starters to a team coming off its seventh Final Four in the past 10 seasons ... Stanford is 32-11 all-time in season openers and has won the last 16 in a row ... No. 5 Ohio State is the highest-ranked team the Cardinal has played in a season opener since 1996 ... Stanford is 71-34 (.676) against AP ranked opponents since 2007-08, fifth in the country in such wins over that span and fourth in percentage ... Stanford is 1-1 all-time against the Buckeyes, but VanDerveer is 2-0 in the series ... She coached the Buckeyes to their win on over the Cardinal on Dec. 28, 1984 and was running the show at Stanford when it beat OSU in the 2009 Sweet Sixteen ... Friday will be the first college game since March 12, 1980 that Tara VanDerveer will coach without Amy Tucker involved as either a player or assistant ... Alanna Smith had a strong finish to her sophomore season, averaging a team-high 14.1 points, 6.9 rebounds and 2.1 blocks in the final 15 games of 2016-17 ... Brittany McPhee is the team's leading returning scorer (13.3 ppg) ... She averaged a team-high 16.8 points per game and made 44.4 percent from behind the arc in the NCAA Tournament ... McPhee (USA), Smith (Australia) and freshman Alyssa Jerome (Canada) all represented their countries this summer at tournaments around the globe ...  Stanford is 13-4 against the Big Ten since 2000 and has won nine straight.

VS. OHIO STATE: Stanford is 1-1 all-time against the Buckeyes, winning once at St. John Arena and once in the Sweet Sixteen in Berkeley, Calif. The Cardinal was victorious in that most recent NCAA Tournament meeting on March 28, 2009, 84-66, behind 25 points and 11 rebounds from Jayne Appel, 16 points from Jillian Harmon, 15 from Nneka Ogwumike and 10 from Ros Gold-Onwude. Stanford would advance to the national championship game that season before losing to Sunday's opponent, Connecticut, 83-64 in St. Louis, Mo.

WHAT'S BACK, WHAT'S NOT »

  • The Cardinal returns 10 letterwinners, but just two starters to a team coming off its seventh Final Four in the past 10 seasons.
  • Stanford posted a 32-6 overall record last season and a 15-3 mark in Pac-12 play. The Cardinal won its 12th Pac-12 Tournament championship and celebrated Tara VanDerveer's 1,000th career victory during the program's 14th 30-win campaign.
  • Gone are Erica McCall, Karlie Samuelson and Briana Roberson, seniors that accounted for 45 percent of Stanford's minutes, 46 percent of its scoring and 35 percent of its rebounds in 2016-17.
  • The Cardinal's young squad has eight underclassmen and just one player on the roster that has average more than 20 minutes per game in her career (Marta Sniezek).
  • New faces include a pair of McDonald's All-Americans in forward Maya Dodson and point guard Kiana Williams. Both were also Jordan Brand Classic All-Americans and Williams was named MVP of the West Team after soring a game-high 20 points on 8-of-13 shooting.

SEASON OPENERS »

  • Stanford is 32-11 all-time in season openers and has won the last 16 in a row. Its last loss came at Saint Mary's on Nov. 17, 2000 (75-64).
  • The Cardinal will be opening on the road against a ranked opponent for the first time since beating No. 24 Texas in Austin, 72-59, on Nov. 11, 2011.
  • As difficult an opening weekend as Tara VanDerveer has put together for her team in some time, Stanford, which plays No. 1 Connecticut on Sunday, is playing ranked teams in the first two games of its season for the first time since November 1998 when it lost to No. 18 Arkansas (76-71) and No. 4 Duke (77-57) at the Nike Four in the Fall in San Jose, Calif.
  • No. 5 Ohio State is the highest-ranked team the Cardinal has played in a season opener since beating No. 2 Alabama at home on Nov. 17, 1996 (74-65).

BUCKEYE CONNECTIONS »

  • For the first time since heading to The Farm, Tara VanDerveer will be playing against her former team in Columbus. She led Ohio State to a 110-37 record and three NCAA Tournaments from 1981-85, including the Elite Eight in her final season, before making the admittedly difficult decision to take the job at Stanford. VanDerveer was twice named Big Ten Coach of the Year (1984, 1985).
  • VanDerveer actually orchestrated Ohio State's win against Stanford on Dec. 28, 1984, 79-47.
  • A star for the Buckeyes from 1979-82 who played her junior and senior seasons for VanDerveer, former Stanford associate head coach Amy Tucker is one of the best talents to come out of the state. As a player, she led the Buckeyes to a 72-51 record and twice paced the team in scoring, finishing her career second on Ohio State's all-time scoring list with 1,629 points.
  • Through the end of the 2016-17 campaign, Tucker's career scoring output continues to hold a place in Ohio State lore, ranking 13th in Buckeye women's basketball history. She also finished her career atop the school's all-time list for games played with 123, a mark that stood for 14 years.
  • As a senior in 1981-82, Tucker was named Ohio State's captain and led the squad to the Big Ten Tournament title and an appearance in the inaugural edition of the NCAA Tournament.
  • In May 2012 Tucker was inducted into the Ohio Basketball Hall of Fame. Tucker was previously recognized for her achievements by being inducted into the Ohio State Sports Hall of Fame in 1994.

EXHIBITION RECAP »

  • All 14 players on the roster saw action and the No. 10 Cardinal beat UC San Diego in an exhibition in Maples Pavilion on Nov. 4, 60-46.
  • Alanna Smith led the way for Stanford with 13 points on 5-of-8 shooting. Alexa Romano started and scored 11, making three of her six attempts from behind the arc, while Brittany McPhee scored her 10 points in just 13 minutes on the floor.
  • The Tritons are led by Tara VanDerveer's younger sister, sixth-year head coach Heidi. It was the third time in the past four seasons the VanDerveers have faced off as head coaches in an exhibition at Maples Pavilion. Prior to 2014, the VanDerveer sisters had only faced each other once, when Heidi was an assistant at San Francisco in 2004.

AGAINST RANKED »

  • The Cardinal was 8-4 against ranked teams last season, 6-2 in road and neutral-site games and 4-2 against the top 10. Stanford has won six of its last eight against top-10 opponents.
  • Stanford has won multiple games against top 25 opponents for each of the last 15 seasons.
  • The Cardinal has won six of its last eight against top-10 opponents, beating No. 7 Oregon State (Feb. 26, 2016), No. 2 Notre Dame (March 25, 2016), No. 8 Texas (Nov. 14, 2016), No. 7 Washington (Jan. 29, 2017), No. 6 Oregon State (March 5, 2017) and No. 2 Notre Dame (March 26, 2017) around a road loss to the No. 10 Beavers (Feb. 24, 2017) and a a Final Four defeat to No. 3 South Carolina (March 31, 2017).
  • Stanford is 71-34 (.676) against AP ranked opponents since 2007-08, fifth in the country in such wins over that span and fourth in percentage.
  • Connecticut (.899), Baylor (.758), Notre Dame (.722), Stanford (.676), Tennessee (.615), Duke (.559), Maryland (.542) and Texas A&M (.509) have winning records against ranked teams the past decade.

SUPER SUB NOW A STARTER »

  • The first international recruit in program history, Australian Alanna Smith closed her sophomore season in incredible fashion.
  • In her last 15 games of 2016-17, Smith averaged a team-high 14.1 points, 6.9 rebounds and 2.1 blocks in over 25 minutes off the bench.
  • Those numbers were even better in the NCAA Tournament, where Smith was second on the team in scoring (15.4) and rebounding (8.8) and first in blocks (2.4). She shot a team-high 52.5 percent from the floor (32-of-61) in the postseason.
  • Of her 22 career games in double figures scoring, 13 have come since the start of Stanford's conference slate last year, including in each of the past six games of the season.
  • In the season's first 23 games, Smith averaged just 5.9 points, 4.5 rebounds and 1.3 blocks.
  • She accounted for 38 percent of Stanford's points in the Pac-12 Tournament title game against Oregon State and was named to the league's all-tournament team after averaging 10.3 points in Seattle.

McPHIRE »

  • Senior Brittany McPhee had a breakout junior campaign and was named All-Pac-12 and to the Lexington Regional All-Tournament Team as a result. She was second on the team in scoring at 13.3 points per game and improved her scoring average by 6.8 points over her sophomore season.
  • A candidate for this year's Ann Meyers Drysdale Award, McPhee scored in double figures 25 times, had seven 20-point efforts and led Stanford offensively in its run to the program's 13th Final Four, averaging a team-high 16.8 points per game and making 44.4 percent from behind the arc in the NCAA Tournament.
  • Among a number of memorable performances, she scored 19 of her game-high 27 in the second half of the Cardinal's 16-point comeback win against No. 2 Notre Dame in the Elite Eight.
  • A human biology major with a 3.73 cumulative GPA, McPhee was also honored at the 2017 Final Four as women's basketball's Elite 90 award winner, which is presented to the student-athlete with the highest cumulative grade-point average participating at the finals site for each of the NCAA's 90 championships.
  • In her first 33 games of last season, McPhee shot 24.2 percent on 3-pointers (23-of-95). In the final four games against Kansas State, Texas, Notre Dame, and South Carolina she was 12-of-22 from deep (.545).
  • McPhee made her USA Basketball debut this summer at the U24 Four Nations Tournament in Tokyo. She averaged 9.3 points on 61.1 percent shooting (11-of-18) and 4.0 rebounds in 15.7 minutes per game and the United States swept its three games against Australia, Canada and Japan over the last four days.
  • McPhee made the 12-person roster from a group of 36 hopefuls following a week of camp at the United States Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colo. Athletes eligible were U.S. citizens, 23 years old or younger and were freshmen, sophomores or juniors during the 2016-17 collegiate season.

SO INTERNATIONAL »

  • Prior to Alanna Smith's arrival in 2015, Stanford had not recruited an international prospect to The Farm and now has three on its 2017-18 roster in Smith and a pair of Canadians (Mikaela Brewer and Alyssa Jerome).
  • This summer, Smith was a late add as an injury replacement to the Opals' roster, Australia's senior national team, for the FIBA Asia Cup in Bangalore, India. She showed well at the program's selection camp in Phoenix in late June and didn't disappoint in her first action at the senior level, finishing second on the team in scoring and field goal percentage and third in rebounding.
  • One of two Opals to score in double figures for the tournament, Smith averaged 10.8 points on 58.3 percent shooting and 5.3 rebounds. Australia took home silver and qualified for the 2018 FIBA World Cup by virtue of its top-four finish.
  • Jerome captained Canada to bronze at the U19 World Cup in Udine and Cividale del Friuli, Italy, its first podium finish at the event. In her fourth FIBA tournament, Jerome averaged 7.6 points, 6.0 rebounds and 2.0 assists in 26.3 minutes per game.
  • Brewer was invited to Canada's U19 National Team tryouts in July 2017 for the FIBA U19 World Cup, but elected to remain on campus to prepare for her sophomore season.

THE ART OF THE ASSIST »

  • Marta Sniezek, who has handed out five or more assists in 27 of her 73 career appearances, averaged 4.4 assists per game as a sophomore.
  • In the last 20 years, only Nicole Powell, Milena Flores, Jeanette Pohlen and Amber Orrange have averaged more assists for Stanford over the course of a season. Powell averaged 6.3 in 2001-02 and 4.7 in 2000-01. Flores averaged 7.3 in 1998-99, 6.1 in 1997-98 and 5.9 in 1999-00, Pohlen averaged 4.8 in 2010-11 and 4.5 in 2009-10 and Orrange averaged 4.5 in 2013-14.
  • She played at least 20 minutes without committing a turnover five times and handed out 75 assists against just 28 turnovers in the final 16 games of the year.
  • Her 2.68 assist to turnover ratio from Feb. 1 to the end of the season was 12th nationally.

NEW LOOK ON THE BENCH »

  • On April 13, Amy Tucker stepped away from coaching following an illustrious career spanning more than 30 years at Stanford. She remains with the program in an administrative role.
  • Tucker arrived on The Farm with Tara VanDerveer in 1985-86 and helped guide the Cardinal to an 889-183 (.829) overall record. She was promoted to associate head coach prior to the 1996-97 season. When VanDerveer was tabbed to lead the USA Basketball National Team during the 1995-96 campaign and for the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta, Tucker was named interim head coach. Stanford's 29-3 season, which included the program's fifth NCAA Final Four appearance of the 1990's, earned Tucker UPI (United Press International) National Coach of the Year and Pac-12 Coach of the Year honors.
  • Tucker began coaching soon after completing her successful playing career at Ohio State. She joined VanDerveer on Ohio State's bench as a graduate assistant in 1983-84 and a year later was promoted to assistant coach.
  • Friday will be the first college game since March 12, 1980 that Tara VanDerveer will coach without Tucker involved as either a player or assistant. Cal State LA beat VanDerveer's Idaho team that day, 84-81, in the AIAW Tournament.
  • Stanford hired alumna Lindy La Rocque to fill Tucker's coaching role. La Rocque, who spent the past two seasons on staff at Belmont, played in 138 career games for Stanford, the eighth most in program history. She was instrumental in helping the Cardinal compile a 137-12 record during her four years, including a 71-1 mark in conference. Stanford appeared in the Final Four each season during her undergraduate career and advanced to the national title game in 2010.

#TARA1K »

  • In her 32nd season on the bench at Stanford, Hall of Famer Tara VanDerveer has accumulated a 1,012-231 record in her 38 years as a collegiate head coach and an 860-180 mark on The Farm.
  • Her teams have won 20 or more games 32 times and collected at least 30 victories 14 times. Pat Summitt (36) and C. Vivian Stringer (34) are the only coaches to lead their teams to more 20-win seasons.
  • In November 2013, VanDerveer became just the fifth college women's basketball coach to win 900 career games and on Feb. 3, 2017 she joined her good friend Pat Summitt as the only NCAA women's basketball coaches with 1,000 career wins.
  • Summitt (1,098) along with Mike Krzyzewski at Duke (1,071) and Herb Magee at Philadelphia University (1,053) on the men's side are the only college basketball coaches with 1,000 wins.
  • VanDerveer has more career wins than 341 of the country's 349 Division I programs.

PRESEASON PROGNOSTICATIONS »

  • On Nov. 2, Stanford came in at No. 10 in the Associated Press women's basketball poll, the 18th consecutive preseason appearance for the Cardinal.
  • It has been ranked 515 times out of 730 total polls since 1977 (70.5 percent), with an average positioning of 7.1. It's been in the past 306 polls, the second-longest active streak behind Connecticut (451). The Cardinal's 515 all-time appearances in the AP top 25 are fourth behind Tennessee (698), Georgia (522) and Texas (521).
  • Stanford was picked to finish in a tie for second in the Pac-12 when the conference announced the results of the preseason coaches' poll on Oct. 20. It's the third 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 108 points and garnered two first-place votes. Oregon also collected 108 points, including three first-place votes. UCLA was the leading vote getter for the second consecutive year, receiving seven first-place votes and 115 points.