SETTING THE SCENE
Looking for its second Evergreen State sweep in the past three seasons, Stanford (17-9, 6-7 Pac-12) will trek to Washington State (14-13, 5-9 Pac-12) in the second meeting between the programs this season. The action will air on ESPNU.
THE OPENING TIP
• Stanford rolled past the Cougars in the teams’ first meeting, 88-62, on Jan. 11 at Maples Pavilion.
• Junior Oscar da Silva leads the team with 15.9 points per game, a mark which ranks 10th in the conference. He also holds the 24th-best national mark in field goal percentage (58.8), and was the Pac-12 Player of the Week for Jan. 27-Feb. 2.\
• Stanford held 12 of its 13 non-conference opponents below 70 points and has limited its Pac-12 foes to an average of 64.7 points per game, which ranks third in the league. The program boasts the best overall scoring defense in the Pac-12 (61.7), and the 16th-best nationally. As of Feb. 22, KenPom rates the Cardinal defense as the seventh-most efficient in the country.
• Despite Stanford’s 6-7 conference mark, the Cardinal holds the Pac-12’s third-best scoring margin in conference play (plus-3.2 points per game). Each of the conference losses came by single digits, while the team has recorded double-digit wins over Cal, Washington State, UCLA and Oregon.
• Stanford has won seven straight contests over the Cougars, including wins by 48 and 26 points over the last two meetings. Over the seven-game stretch, the average margin of victory has been 24.1 points per night. The last Cardinal road sweep of Washington and Washington State came in 2017-18, with both wins coming by nine points. The Cardinal won in Seattle on Thursday over the Huskies, 72-64.
MAKING AN INTRODUCTION
Stanford’s most consistent starting five of Tyrell Terry, Daejon Davis, Bryce Wills, Spencer Jones and Oscar da Silva have started 21 games together, and have outscored opponents when on the floor together by 82 points over 228 minutes. In Pac-12 play, the unit has outscored its opponents by 33 points over 118 minutes, for an average of 11.1 points per 40 minutes.