SETTING THE SCENE
Stanford returns home for the first of three straight games at home, welcoming Miami to Maples Pavilion on Wednesday, Jan. 22 at 8 p.m. The action will be broadcast on ESPNU.
THE STARTING FIVE
• The Cardinal is off to a 12-6 start (4-3 ACC), including conference wins over North Carolina, California, Virginia Tech and Virginia, and a quadrant one NET win over Santa Clara and the Tar Heels. The Cardinal is 9-1 at home this season and 2-0 in ACC play.
• Stanford’s roster holds an exciting mix of returning players, transfers and freshmen, led by one of the premier centers in the country, Maxime Raynaud. The Pac-12 Most Improved Player last season, Raynaud is 10th nationally in scoring at 20.8 points per game and third in rebounding with 11.6per night. He leads the ACC in scoring and rebounding, and his 15 double-doubles this season pace the nation. No other player in the country has more than 13 and no other major conference player has more than 10.
• Three players are averaging double figures, paced by Raynaud but also including Jaylen Blakes (14.8) and Oziyah Sellers (14.1). Both players are posting career-best numbers by a comfortable margin.
• Stanford opened ACC action with an 89-81 victory Dec. 7 on the road over California. The triumph was the first for Stanford at Haas since 2021 and its third straight overall in the series. Stanford added to the conference tally with a home sweep of Virginia Tech and Virginia from Jan. 8-11 and a win at North Carolina on Jan. 18 after a last-second jumper from Blakes.
• Kyle Smith joined the Cardinal from Washington State as the reigning Pac-12 Coach of the Year, where he led the Cougars to 25 wins and the second round of the NCAA Tournament in 2023-24.
SOUTH BEACH TO THE BAY
The meeting with Miami will be the fifth in program history and the first as ACC rivals. The Cardinal last faced Miami at the 2016 Advocare Invitational in Orlando (L, 67-53), but it defeated the Hurricanes in the 2015 NIT Championship game, led by 25 points from Chasson Randle and the game-winning free throws with 3.4 seconds to play. Kyle Smith is 9-3 vs. Bill Courtney-coached teams, with all 12 matchups in the Ivy League.
BIG SHOT BLAKES
Jaylen Blakes has led Stanford to a pair of quadrant one wins on the road this season, scoring in the closing seconds to secure wins at Santa Clara (Nov. 23) and at North Carolina (Jan. 18). Stanford rallied from an eight-point deficit in the final four minutes to defeat Santa Clara, 71-69, with Blakes scoring the game-winning basket from 18 feet with two seconds to go, fading away from the elbow and sinking a jump shot. The heroics continued at the Dean Smith Center in Chapel Hill, as Blakes received the ball with just over seven seconds to play before driving coast-to-coast and hitting a fadeaway 12-foot jumper to give Stanford a 72-71 win over the Tar Heels.
Blakes scored 20 points with seven assists against North Carolina while having eight points and a career-best 10 assists against Santa Clara.