SETTING THE SCENE
The second week of the college basketball season continues at home, as Stanford men's basketball hosts Montana State on Wednesday, Nov. 12 at 7 p.m. The contest will air on ACC Network Extra.
THE STARTING FIVE
• Stanford is out to a 2-0 start with a pair of Big Sky wins over Portland State and Montana, and it welcomes its third in a row with Montana State on Wednesday.
• Ebuka Okorie ranks third in the country in scoring at 27.5 points per game and first among freshmen.
• The Cardinal posted a successful first season under the leadership of Kyle Smith, winning the program’s most games since 2014-15 (21) and matching a program record for wins on its home court (17). The 2025-26 campaign marks the program’s second in the Atlantic Coast Conference, after Stanford finished seventh in its maiden season.
• Kyle Smith enters his second season as Stanford’s Anne and Tony Joseph Director of Men’s Basketball. The 2024 Pac-12 Coach of the Year led Stanford to 21 wins in its first ACC campaign, the program’s most since 2014-15. He is also the second head coach in program history to win 20 or more games in his first season, while his seven-win improvement from the previous season matched a program record for a first-year head coach. The Cardinal was postseason bound for the first time since 2018, appearing in the NIT. The postseason appearance was the fourth in a row for a Smith-coached program.
• Maxime Raynaud graduated from Stanford in 2025 after posting one of the top seasons in program history, and the All-American was drafted by the Sacramento Kings in June.
MASTERED MONTANA
Stanford earned a 91-68 victory over visiting Montana on Saturday, Nov. 4, led by a career-high 29 points, to go with four rebounds and four steals, from freshman Ebuka Okorie. Benny Gealer scored 13 points while Aidan Cammann and AJ Rohosy scored 12 points each – a career-high for Cammann and a Stanford-high for Rohosy, who also added a game-high eight rebounds. Stanford forced 20 turnovers and recorded 14 steals – it’s most since having 14 against North Carolina on Dec. 1, 2020.
EBUKA EXCELS
Through one week of the season, Ebuka Okorie has dazzled for the Cardinal with averages of 27.5 points, 5.5 rebounds and 3.0 steals per game. Okorie ranks third nationally in scoring, and first among freshmen and players in the ACC. He is joined by Ohio State's Bruce Thornton and Auburn's Keyshawn Hall as high major players with multiple games of at least 25 points this season, and he is the only freshman to accomplish the feat. He became the first Stanford freshman with back-to-back 20-point games since Tyrell Terry from Jan. 11-15, 2020. and he is also the first Stanford player with back-to-back 20-point games to open a season since KZ Okpala in 2018.
Okorie's 55 points over the team's first two games are the most for a Stanford player since at least 2004, joining only Okpala (52, 2018) and Chasson Randle (51, 2013) in scoring more than 50 points over the stretch. The 26 points in Okorie's debut marked the most for a Cardinal true freshman in program history against a Division I opponent - only Mark Pitchford had more, coming against Division II Cal Poly in 1977. He was the first freshman point guard to start the season opener since Tyrell Terry in 2019 and just the third freshman overall to start the opener since 2019, joining Ziaire Williams (2020) and Harrison Ingram (2021).
FUN WITH SMALL SAMPLE SIZES
In addition to Ebuka Okorie leading the ACC In scoring, he joins Benny Gealer in the top-15 in the conference in both free throw percentage (91.7% and 87.5%, respectively) and steals (3.0 and 2.5 per game, respectively. Aidan Cammann, is one of three players in the ACC averaging at least 2.0 steals and 1.0 blocks per game, joining Wake Forest's Tre'Von Spillers and Georgia Tech's Mouhamed Sylla, while Chisom Okpara, who scored a Stanford-high of 21 points against Portland State in the opener, ranks 10th in the ACC in offensive rebounds per game (3.0).
Five players are averaging at least 9.5 points per game: Ebuka Okorie (27.5), Chisom Okpara (14.5), Benny Gealer (12.5), AJ Rohosy (10.0) and Jeremy Dent-Smith (9.5). The Cardinal ranks first in the ACC as a team in turnovers forced per game at 20.5 and third in steals per game with 11.5 and second in turnover margin at 9.5 per night. Stanford is 13th nationally in turnovers forced per game and 15th in turnover margin.
Additionally, Stanford received its first votes in the AP poll since week two of the 2020-21 season.