Stanford University Athletics

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THE GAME: Back following a two-week break for final exams, No. 18 Stanford (5-4) hosts UNLV (5-3) on Saturday, Dec. 16 at 2 p.m. PT. Tim Swartz has the call on Stanford's live stream and Kevin Danna will bring fans the radio broadcast on GoStanford.com.
 
THE RUNDOWN: Stanford returns 10 letterwinners, but just two starters to a team coming off its seventh Final Four in the past 10 seasons ... Marta Sniezek is the only player on the roster that has averaged over 20 minutes per game in her career ... Stanford is the only school in the nation that has played four AP top-10 opponents and will add a fifth when it plays No. 7 Tennessee next Thursday night ... Nine of the Cardinal's last 15 games have been against ranked foes ... Stanford's 15 3-point makes at San Francisco on Nov. 29 are tied for third in program history ... Alanna Smith had the country's first 30-point, 15-rebound double-double against a top-10 team since 2013 on Nov. 25 against Ohio State ... Also against the Buckeyes, Anna Wilson became the 10th player in Stanford history to make seven 3-pointers in a game ... DiJonai Carrington pulled down 22 rebounds on Nov. 17 against UC Riverside, tied for the third-most in school history ... Of Brittany McPhee's 10 career 20-point games, four have come against ranked teams ... Kaylee Johnson is 10th in program history in rebounds (787) ... McPhee (USA), Smith (Australia) and Alyssa Jerome (Canada) represented their countries this summer at tournaments around the globe ... McPhee (Ann Meyers Drysdale Award/Wooden Award/Naismith Trophy) and Smith (Lisa Leslie Award) are the Cardinal's representatives on major preseason watch lists.
 
VS. UNLV: Stanford is 5-2 all-time against UNLV, but the two teams haven't met since Dec. 30, 1993, when the Cardinal won 94-73 at home. The Lady Rebels won the first two games in the series in 1982 (69-68) and 1983 (80-55) before Stanford reeled off five in a row beginning in Dec. 1985 (62-59) and culminating with that 1993 victory in Maples. The 62-59 win on Dec. 14, 1985 came in Tara VanDerveer's second home game as head coach at Stanford and was her first victory over a ranked team leading the Cardinal. UNLV was No. 16 in the AP poll at the time.
 
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 averaged more than 20 minutes per game in her career (Marta Sniezek - 22.3).
• 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, who is from San Antonio, was named MVP of the West Team after scoring a game-high 20 points on 8-of-13 shooting.

CATCHING YOU UP »

• The Cardinal is coming off an 81-57 loss at No. 9 Baylor on Dec. 3. Shannon Coffee scored a career-high 14 points and was 4-of-8 from behind the arc in defeat.
• Stanford's center became the first player in the nation at least 6-foot-5 to hit four 3-pointers in a game since Delaware's Elena Delle Donne made the same number against Georgia State on March 6, 2013. Delle Donne made four or more 3-pointers 15 times in her career.
• Down four at halftime, Stanford scored 62 second-half points and made 15-of-31 3-pointers to beat San Francisco on the road on Nov. 29, 86-66.
• Stanford came in second place at the Play4Kay Showcase in Las Vegas over Thanksgiving, beating Kent State (79-54) and Belmont (74-53) before falling in overtime to No. 9 Ohio State, 94-82.
• It was the Cardinal's second defeat to the Buckeyes in as many weeks. Stanford began its season with an 85-64 loss in Columbus on Nov. 10.
• Stanford was much improved in its second meeting with OSU and led by as many as 12 in the second half, but was unable to hang on against an experienced group of five seniors and two redshirt juniors.
• Alanna Smith and Anna Wilson were named to the all-tournament team after some big performances in the title game. Smith, who also had a 23-point, 11-rebound double-double against Belmont on Nov. 24, went for 33 and 16 against Ohio State, while Wilson poured in a career-high 21 points on 7-of-8 shooting from 3-point range.
• DiJonai Carrington collected her second double-double of the season with 24 points and 10 rebounds in the Play4Kay opener against Kent State on Nov. 23.
• Senior Brittany McPhee, Stanford's leading scorer (16.5 ppg), has missed the past seven games with a right foot injury.

BAPTISM BY FIRE »

• Stanford leads the nation with four games against top-10 teams already this season and the Cardinal will add a fifth when it hosts No. 7 Tennessee next Thursday night. No other school has more than two.
• As difficult an opening weekend as Tara VanDerveer has put together for her team in some time, Stanford played ranked teams in the first two games of its season for the first time since Nov. 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.
• Dating back to last season, nine of Stanford's past 15 games have been against ranked opponents, including seven in the top 10 and four in the top five.
• Before playing UC Riverside on Nov. 17, Stanford had played six ranked teams in a row, tying a program record last done in 1998-99 when it played six top 25 opponents to begin the season.

SETTING THE STAGE »

• Saturday's matchup with UNLV is Stanford's first game following its annual two-week break for final exams. Since first taking a two-week break during the season for exams in 1999-2000, Stanford is 14-4 in its first game back from the hiatus.
• Stanford is 151-10 (.938) at home the last 11 years and one of 11 schools to have more than 150 home wins during that span.
• Its .938 home winning percentage since 2007-08 is third behind Connecticut (.973) and Baylor (.959).
• Stanford's 5-4 start is its worst record through nine games since 2000-01 when it also had four losses.

SHARP SHOOTING »

• Stanford entered the Nov. 29 game at San Francisco still struggling to replace the 3-point prowess of the departed Karlie Samuelson, who shot 44.3 percent for her career (20th in NCAA history).
• In its first seven games, the Cardinal was 46-of-166 (.277) from behind the arc and is 25-of-69 (.362) in the past two.
• Against the Dons, Stanford was 4-of-10 on triples in the first half and then exploded in the second, going 11-of-21 across the third and fourth quarters.
• The 11 3-point makes in the second half are the most in a half in program history and the 15 total makes on 31 attempts (.484) are tied for third at the school all-time behind a pair of 16 3-point efforts at UCLA (Feb. 24, 2002) and at Washington (Feb. 24, 2001).
• Freshman Kiana Williams, who had made four of her first 15 career 3-point attempts, led the charge by going 5-of-9 from deep. Alanna Smith, DiJonai Carrington and Alexa Romano each made three and Anna Wilson added the other.
• Sophomore Anna Wilson, who battled injures as a freshman and only played 48 total minutes in six games, came off the bench against Ohio State on Nov. 25 and poured in 21 points in 19 minutes, making 7-of-8 from behind the arc.
• Wilson became the 10th Stanford player to make seven 3-pointers in a game and the first since Bonnie Samuelson dropped in eight against UCLA on Feb. 15, 2015.
• The school record for 3-point makes in a game is nine shared by Lindsey Yamasaki (Feb. 24, 2001 at Washington) and Molly Goodenbour (Dec. 21, 1993 at Tennessee).

FROM DOWN UNDER »

• A candidate for this year's Lisa Leslie Award, Alanna Smith was named Pac-12 Player of the Week for the first time on Nov. 27 following her three games in Vegas. She averaged a double-double of 23.7 points and 11.7 rebounds in Stanford's 2-1 week, shot 64.6 percent from the field (31-of-48), 40 percent from deep and also averaged 2.0 blocks per game.
• Smith's 33-point, 16-rebound performance against No. 9 Ohio State was the nation's first 30-point, 15-rebound double-double against an AP top-10 team since Stanford's Chiney Ogwumike went for 32 points and 20 boards against No. 3 Tennessee on Dec. 21, 2013.
• Earlier this week, Mississippi State's Teaira McCowan also did it with a 35-point, 19-rebound effort as part of a 90-79 Bulldog win at No. 9 Oregon on Dec. 13.
• Smith's is just the fourth by a Pac-12 player against a top-10 team since 2000 and the others are all Cardinal. In addition to Ogwumike's in 2013, Nneka Ogwumike had 42 points and 17 rebounds against No. 6 Tennessee on Dec. 20, 2011 and Nicole Powell put up 32 points and 16 rebounds against No. 2 Tennessee on Dec. 14, 2003.
• Smith's point total is the second-highest single-game effort in the Pac-12 this season and the most at Stanford since Chiney Ogwumike dropped in 37 against Washington State on March 1, 2014.
• In her last 24 games, Smith is averaging 14.5 points, 7.4 rebounds and 2.0 blocks in just over 26 minutes of action.
• In her first 57 career appearances, the first international recruit in program history averaged just 5.6 points, 3.2 rebounds and 0.9 blocks 13 minutes per game.
• Smith has put together double-doubles in three of her last four games and is averaging 21.5 points on 59.6 percent shooting and 10.8 rebounds since Thanksgiving.

CARRINGTON EMERGES »

• After averaging 2.5 points and 2.3 rebounds as a freshman, DiJonai Carrington has emerged as Stanford's third-leading scorer (11.7 ppg) and its second-best rebounder (7.7 rpg) this season.
• She dropped in 21 points against No. 1 UConn on Nov. 12 and pulled down a career-high 22 rebounds one game later against UC Riverside on Nov. 17.
• The 5-foot-11 guard's rebound total is now tied for third in school history with Kaylee Johnson and Mikaela Ruef. Johnson grabbed as many twice during her freshman season against New Mexico on Nov. 24, 2014 and Santa Clara on Dec. 14, 2014. Ruef had her 22-rebound performance at Washington on Feb. 9, 2014.
• Chiney Ogwumike, who totaled a school-record 24 rebounds against Oregon on Feb. 24, 2013, and Nneka Ogwumike, who had 23 at Oregon on Jan. 23, 201, are the only Cardinal players with more boards in a game.
• No player under 6-feet has had more rebounds in a game in the country since Texas A&M's 5-foot-11 Anriel Howard grabbed 27 in March 19, 2016 against Missouri State.
• Carrington scored a career-high 24 points and had 10 rebounds for her second double-double of the season in Stanford's 79-54 win over Kent State on Nov. 23.
• Carrington's brother Darren is a senior wide receiver at Utah and was second team All-Pac-12 in 2015 while at Oregon. Her father, also Darren, played football at Northern Arizona and was a fifth-round draft pick of the Denver Broncos in the 1989 NFL Draft. He appeared in Super Bowl XXIV with the Broncos and Super Bowl XXIX with the Chargers.
• Carrington herself played two years of tackle football in middle school with the Clairemont Hawks in San Diego.

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 and John R. Wooden 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.
• In the season opener at No. 5 Ohio State, McPhee poured in 24 points on 11-of-21 shooting. Of her 10 career 20-point games, four have come against ranked teams.
• 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 grade point average participating at the finals site for each of the NCAA's 90 championships.
• In her first 33 games of 2016-17, 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.
• 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.

GETTING ON THE GLASS »

• Kaylee Johnson pulled down 14 rebounds on Nov. 29 at San Francisco, her highest total since Feb. 2, 2016 against Cal (16) and followed that up with another 10 at Baylor on Dec. 3.
• With 787, the senior has moved into 10th in program history. Next on the list is Katy Steding, who grabbed 864 from 1986-90.
• Johnson's 787 rebounds are third among active Pac-12 players behind UCLA's Monique Billings (905) and Utah's Emily Potter (872).
• Her 7.3 career rebounds per game average would be eighth in Stanford history. Johnson has pulled down 10 or more 34 times in 108 career games and owns a pair of 22-rebounds performances as a freshman.

THE ART OF THE ASSIST »

• Marta Sniezek, who has handed out five or more assists in 31 of her 82 career appearances, averaged 4.4 assists per game as a sophomore and is at 4.2 apg this season.
• Sniezek, also scoring 4.6 points per game and grabbing 4.8 rebounds per game, is one of seven players in the Pac-12 averaging 4.0 points, 4.0 rebounds and 4.0 assists per game (Sabrina Ionescu - Oregon; Minyon Moore - USC; Jordin Canada - UCLA; Mikayla Pivec - Oregon State; Katie McWillians - Oregon State; Mikayla Cowling - Cal).
• 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 than Sniezek did last year. 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 113 assists against 50 turnovers in her last 25 games, a 2.26 assist-to-turnover ratio.

WATCH WILLIAMS »

• Freshman Kiana Williams has been Stanford's leading scorer in its past two games, averaging 15.0 points on 40-percent shooting from behind the arc (8-of-20).
• Williams, who was averaging 3.1 points and shooting just over 20 percent in her first seven collegiate games, played a career-high 34 minutes at Baylor on Dec. 3 and scored Stanford's first 10 points.
• A five-star talent, rated as the eighth best player in the country according to ESPN HoopGurlz, Williams was the Cardinal's first top-10 recruit since Chiney Ogwumike signed as the top player in the country in Nov. 2009.

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 (Brewer/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.

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.
• The season opener at Ohio State was the first college game since March 12, 1980 that Tara VanDerveer coached 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 1,017-235 record in her 38+ years as a collegiate head coach and an 865-184 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 (1,082) and Herb Magee at Philadelphia University (1,061) on the men's side are the only college basketball coaches with 1,000 wins.
• Connecticut's Geno Auriemma has 999 career wins and his first opportunity to notch No. 1,000 is on Tuesday against Oklahoma.
• North Carolina's Sylvia Hatchell is at 998 and will have two chances before Auriemma to join the 1,000-win club. Carolina faces Washington on Sunday at 4 p.m. ET, and Grambling State on Tuesday at 2 p.m. ET, in Myrtle Beach, S.C.
• VanDerveer has more career wins than 341 of the country's 349 Division I programs.

PROGNOSTICATIONS »

• Stanford is No. 18 in the Associated Press women's basketball poll released on Monday.
• It has been ranked 520 times out of 735 total polls since 1977 (70.7 percent), with an average positioning of 7.2. It's been in the past 311 polls, the second-longest active streak behind Connecticut (456).
• The Cardinal's 520 all-time appearances in the AP top 25 are fourth behind Tennessee (703), Texas (526) and Georgia (522).
• 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.