SETTING THE SCENE
After college basketball’s first game at a Major League Baseball stadium since 2015, Stanford returns home to Maples Pavilion for a 6 p.m. tilt with No. 19/20 San Diego State on Tuesday, Nov. 18 on Pac-12 Network.
THE OPENING TIP
• Stanford went 16-16 last season, which featured Stanford’s first win over an AP top-five opponent since 2007 and its first road ranked win since 2014. The Cardinal opened the 2022-23 campaign on Monday, Nov. 7 at home with an 88-78 win over Pacific.
• Spencer Jones led last year’s team with 12.0 points per game, Harrison Ingram paced the squad with 6.7 rebounds per night, and Michael O’Connell dished a team-leading 3.6 assists per game.
• Ingram, who was Stanford’s first Pac-12 Freshman of the Year since Casey Jacobsen in 2000, withdrew his name from the 2022 NBA Draft to return to The Farm for his sophomore campaign.
• The Cardinal returns eight of its top nine rotation players from a year ago, while also bringing in the program’s first transfer in 12 years and the first graduate transfer in program history in Michael Jones (Davidson). Jones had a debut to remember in the season opener, with his 31 points the most by a Stanford player in his team debut on record. The 31 points were a career-high.
• Stanford returns home following a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to play a college basketball game at American Family Field, home of the Milwaukee Brewers, against Wisconsin. Stanford fell, 60-50, despite 14 points from Brandon Angel and a strong defensive effort.
THROUGH TWO GAMES
Michael Jones co-leads the Pac-12 in scoring at 20.0 points per game, joining Arizona forward Azuolas Tubelis. Jones had a career-high 31 points in the opener, marking the most in a Stanford debut on record. No other player league-wide has had more than 25 in a game this season. Maxime Raynaud had a career-high 22 points in the opener over Pacific, and he joins Brandon Angel (12.5) in averaging double figures early on. The win over Pacific was Stanford’s 13th straight in a season opener, with thee Cardinal shooting 60.4% from the floor as a team, which was Stanford’s top mark since Dec. 15, 2020 against CSUN. The Cardinal currently ranks in the top-20 nationally in 2-point percentage (64.9%).