STANFORD, Calif. - Stanford has its first game action of the 2024-25 season when it hosts Cal State LA in an exhibition on Wednesday, Oct. 30 at 7 p.m.
FOLLOW » Live stats will be available on GoStanford.com via StatBroadcast and Tim Swartz will have the radio call on GoStanford.com, the Stanford Athletics app and Learfield's Varsity Network.
THE TEAM » First-year head coach Kate Paye will lead Stanford into its inaugural ACC campaign with a roster that returns two starters (Elena Bosgana, Talana Lepolo) and nine letterwinners to a squad that went 30-6 last season and finished ranked ninth in the country.
In addition to its nine returners, the Cardinal adds five newcomers, three nationally-ranked freshmen in Shay Ijiwoye (ESPN HoopGurlz No. 53), Harper Peterson (No. 87) and Kennedy Umeh (No. 44), and a pair of transfers in Tess Heal, the 2023 West Coast Conference Newcomer of the Year at Santa Clara, and Mary Ashley Stevenson, the 2024 Big Ten Media Freshman of the Year at Purdue.
Heal and Stevenson are just the second and third undergraduate transfers in program history.
NEW CHAPTER » A two-time WBCA Assistant Coach of the Year during 17 seasons on Tara VanDerveer’s staff, Paye was hired to lead her alma mater on April 16. The 50-year-old Paye has been part of two of Stanford’s three national championships – as a player on the 1992 team and an associate head coach for the 2021 squad.
NEW LEAGUE » Stanford will play in a different league for the first time since VanDerveer’s first Cardinal squad played in the Pac-West in 1985-86. Stanford is 28-12 all-time against current ACC members (not including Cal). In 38 seasons of Pac-12 women's basketball, Stanford won 27 Pac-12 regular-season championships, 15 Pac-12 Tournament titles and posted a 594-90 (.868) league record.
OUTLOOK » Heading in 2024-25, Stanford is looking to replace 59.8 percent of its scoring, 54.4 percent of its rebounding and 42.8 percent of its minutes played from a season ago.
The Cardinal was picked seventh in the ACC preseason poll and is outside the preseason AP Top 25 for the first time since 1999-2000. Stanford had been ranked in 123 consecutive AP polls since Jan. 29, 2018, which was the third-longest active streak in the country (UConn - 585; South Carolina - 227) and since appearing in its first rankings on Nov. 23, 1987, Stanford had appeared in the preseason Top 25 each season except one (1999-00).