Women's Vball NCAA Round 2 12/1/2007

Stanford 3 Sacramento State 0 (30-23, 30-11, 30-28) While I would have loved to linger on the field after Big Game to soak in the atmosphere, there was a 2nd round NCAA tournament volleyball game to attend. I made it to Maples during player introductions and instantly noticed how small Sacramento's team was compared to us. The crowd wasn't as big as I would have expected but I suspect that people wanted to celebrate/eat after Big Game.

We went early and often to Foluke and after establishing her, distributed it evenly to Alix and Cynthia. My favourite part of going to Foluke early is that it is demoralising for the opponent to have her hammer down devastating kills, and does wonders for our psyche. Sacramento State looked pretty bad in the first, struggling with serve reception and setting. Our block wasn't working well though (maybe it took us a while to adjust to their timing of their attacks) but it wasn't needed at all. With a 29-13, we subbed in Alex for Alix. Sac State went on a huge 10 point scoring run as Gabi had some trouble dealing with serve. After a time out, Duning finally put Alix back in and we won. I felt sorry for Alex because it wasn't entirely her fault.

Any momentum that Sac State might have gotten after staving off 10 game points in the first was quashed in the second which we absolutely dominated. Dunning used what I think will be his tournament rotation of Cassidy in for Erin in the back row with Jessica spelling Alix occasionally. I don't think Gabi will be serving much either. Janet got some playing time in the second and contributed with 3 kills off 3 attempts.

I wasn't too worried about the 3rd but we started making some hitting errors and Sac State was able to get through our block with worrying regularity. They definitely raised their level of play. We traded points back and forth for most of the game but as 30 approached, had a clutch back row kill from Alix. It was a win against an outmatched opponent that fought hard, as we witnessed in the 3rd.

There seem to be several upsets in the tournament with seeds dropping like flies. Washington is out at the hands of BYU and USC was taken to 5 games. We have Cal Poly up next on Friday (a team we swept earlier in the season) and if we win, an all Pac-10 showdown against either Oregon or UCLA on Saturday.

What a day! Big Game and then volleyball. And the weekend was not even close to being over yet. Albert and I were leaving for Oakland airport at 4:30am to catch our 6am flight to Denver for the Colorado men's basketball game. With a Big Game concert featuring Roots (I heard they were great), celebrating in SAE and KA till the wee hours, and a Christmas party turned surprise birthday party for me (thanks guys), it was a busy but amazing night. December 1st - definitely a day to remember!
~ Zhihao

Big Game 12/1/2007

Stanford 20 Cal 13 This was the last chance for me to see us reclaim the axe as an undergraduate. Since freshman year, each Big Game had been progressively better, but with our performance against Notre Dame last week and the 13.5 point spread, I was not optimistic. That being said, Cal was slumping too - losing 5 out of their last 6 games - and was without star wide-out Desean Jackson. This was also the first Big Game in the new stadium. With entry to football games being free for all students this year, there were 2400 allotted seats for students based on a first come first serve basis, with a priority line for students who had attended at least two previous games. I personally felt that students who attended more games should have been rewarded but it is always hard to enforce administratively, as I would find out first hand later.

Since it was pretty easy to qualify for the priority line and it was a first come first serve, a couple of guys camped out the night before so that they could ensure themselves front row seats. Now, that's the spirit that is sorely lacking at Stanford. With kick off at 4pm and doors opening at 2, I got there just before 12 and was dismayed to find a couple of freshmen and their staff ahead of me. Judging from prior experience, this was a sure sign that the rest of the dorm would show up minutes before doors opened and cut in front of me, as was the case. When doors finally did open, they opened up multiple gates and let people behind to jump ahead. It was rather poorly done and many people who arrived early and waited for a couple of hours were frustrated. The students who designed the whole priority system should have regulated the lines better because it wasn't the event staff's job to figure it out.

In any case, I managed to get 3rd row seats and was pleased to see the student section slowly fill up even though it was more than 60 minutes to game time. I thought the band did a pretty good job with the "Big Game" hunting themed field show. Speaking of the half time field show, a Cal student was made to leave the stadium during it. I'm not sure why but I think they were yelling "Take off that Red Shirt" to event staff and someone might have thrown something or gotten out of hand. The drum major's raptor costume made me laugh when I saw it (freshman hall inside joke).

As kick off approached, the student section and stadium as a whole swelled. I still feel that that more Notre Dame than Cal fans showed up at our respective games, which is an impressive achievement on Notre Dame's part. The honoring of seniors on senior day is always one of my favourite moments as they are joined on the field/court by their parents to recognise their contribution to the program. Today was no different. By kickoff, the student section was packed. The first few rows of my section were doubled up and more people were streaming in (I don't think they really capped student entry at 3400).

When our defense forced on a fumble on Cal's first possession and TC found Bradford wide open on a crossing route for the easy score, I was pumped and it crossed my mind that today might be one of those days where things would go our way. The game was also broadcast on Versus. The last game that was on Versus was the USC game and we all know how that turned out. Cal responded with a score but we held them during their next possession after our intercepted trick play. Nevertheless, I liked the creativity, and according to Albert, the double reverse Bradford to Moore throw worked a lot more effectively when they ran it on the practice fields. During warmups, my eye was on Belch and he looked significantly better than during warmups against Notre Dame (and we all know how that turned out). He came through with two field goals in the first half that really made the difference from a strategy point of view. Full credit to him for bouncing week after last week's debacle and playing through his injury.

Offensively, I liked how we were able to sustain drives and keep the defense off the field in the first half. I also liked how we rotated our QBs with 2 series for TC and 1 for Tavita to keep the Cal defense off balance. I didn't even realise when Tavita was inserted for the first time, until we pulled out the naked bootleg that TC would never run. I don't think Cal was ready for him either although they adjusted much better as the game went on. Our O-line did a phenomenal job for the whole game (picking up blitzes superbly) despite playing without two original starters Fletcher and Mattran. If I'm not wrong, they only gave up 1 sack (which was a coverage sack). McBride and Phillips, who took their place really stepped up. TC played really well too and I liked how we played to his strengths by focusing on a short passing game (and avoiding sacks). The receivers also made key catches to sustain drives (except for Sherman although he did draw that crucial pass interference) instead of dropping the ball as they have been prone to do. Tyrone was huge for us with Kimble out. His ability to catch out of the backfield and turn the corner was crucial although I cringed every time he was hit. Finally, I loved the play-calling, especially the play action roll out at the goaline which was set up by Tyrone's run (that was the play that USC used against us last year to much success).

Our defense won us the game in the second when our offense stalled thanks to the adjustments made to defending screens and two great picks by Sanchez. They struggled somewhat against the run and were bailed out by several drops, but they wrapped up pretty well at the line of scrimmage (Snyder was a stud) and did just enough to slow down the offensive player when they missed, allowing the rest of defense that was in pursuit to catch up. Maynor had some huge hits on Longshore which shook him up enough to throw him off in the 2nd half. I also liked the fact that we committed so few penalties while Cal seemed to get a holding or personal foul every other series (I also felt that they were holding much more than was called). Their ill disciplined plays and drops were definitely keys to our victory. When time expired. the rushing of the field was a foregone conclusion. We had finally reclaimed the axe.And it wasn't just that. During the critical last few minutes of the 4th quarter, when we were on defense after Stewart's fumble, the whole stadium was rocking. It wasn't just the student section (an achievement in itself) and the people on our side of the stadium, but the "old people" on the far side too. I had never experienced such noise from our own fans. I think Albert sometimes wishes that he had gone to a football school in the SCC, but for one game, one critical juncture, we were a football school. The atmosphere was electrifying. As the fans and players celebrated on the field, I saw the joy on players' faces and felt especially happy for the seniors like TC, Bradford, Evan and the list goes on, who underwent 3 coaches, 5 losing seasons and futility against Cal. I can't even being to imagine what having this as the last game of their college careers means to them. I'm glad they did.

Thank you seniors and Jim Harbaugh's coaching staff. Harbaugh has definitely grown with the team, improving alongside them. He's far from perfect but I really feel that the program is about to take off under the Harbaugh era. At the beginning of our odyssey, I wrote: "In Harbaugh I trust". In my wildest dreams, I never imagined wins against USC and Cal. 4-8 never felt this good.
~ Zhihao

Women's Vball NCAA Round 1 11/30/2007

Stanford 3 Santa Clara 0 (30-22, 30-28, 30-27)To paraphrase gostanford.com, the road to Sacramento began tonight. Thanks to our tough wins and strength of schedule, we secured the overall #1 seed in the NCAA tournament and received a pretty good draw. If the seeds hold, we'll face UCLA in the Elite 8 and Texas in the Final 4, which is definitely better (in my mind) than USC, Washington or even Cal in the Elite 8 and Nebraska or Penn State in the Final 4. But as I mentioned previously, we need to take it one game at a time.

The first 75 students got in for free tonight although I'm not quite sure that all the tickets were used up. It was understandable though, with the final night of Gaieties coinciding with the game. Gaieties is an annual production that runs the 3 nights before Big Game. Alex is on the Board of Directors and this year, the Lopez twins were in it too although I hear that Robin didn't perform tonight, probably because of the trip to Colorado.

While we may have been the overall #1 seed in the tournament, Santa Clara is definitely not the 64th team in the nation (for volleyball, they seed the top 16 teams and then figure out other match-ups based on location). They definitely made us work in games 2 and 3. We started out the match really strongly, looking very fluid on offense and winning the long rallies with scrambling defense. It looked like we would waltz to a very comfortable victory.

In games 2 and 3 especially, we seemed to go away from Foluke. Even when Bryn received a good pass, she didn't set to Foluke in the middle, instead choosing to go to Alix or Cynthia outside. Santa Clara adjusted to this and while we still scored our fair share of points, it seemed like they managed to get some digs and touches (I might just be quibbling too much because based on the hitting percentage from box scores, we actually did a better job in 2 and 3). Sitting directly behind the players as opposed to midcourt, I was able to appreciate the amount of movement that certain serves have. I guess I'm more understanding now about serve reception, but still, it was iffy in parts and we especially struggled with #1's serve, which moved quite a bit in the air. I also noticed that Santa Clara didn't have that many service errors - one reason they were able to keep in the game.

But at the end of the day, we responded to the challenge with a monster game from Alix, who had 3 consecutive solo blocks in the 3rd to swing the close game in our favour. We face Sacramento State, who upset Minnesota earlier today, tomorrow after Big Game. 1 win down, 5 more to go (but really 1 more tomorrow and then we'll worry about the next one). As a side note, I can't believe that tomorrow will be my last Big Game as an undergraduate. Let's Beat Cal!
~ Zhihao

Women's Basketball vs USF 11/28/2007

Stanford 96 USF 61

Having played a string of 6 games on the road, I'm sure the girls must have been happy to be back in the friendly confines of Maples for their first regular season home game. The overall turnout wasn't that great and I find it rather unfortunate that our women's team, despite consistently being one of the top teams in the nation, does not get much support from the students. That being said, the marketing team, could definitely do a better job promoting the Brickyard Club. I also shouldn't be one to talk since I will be missing most of the Pac-10 games because of my travels to the men's basketball away games.

This was the first time I'd seen us in action and it was a lot of fun even if USF wasn't that great competition. In the first half, most of our baskets came off layups, putbacks and the occasional short jumper. We would feed our posts who'd either make a strong move to the hole or hit whoever was open for an easy bucket when they were double teamed. We also made a concerted effort to push the ball whenever we got a defensive rebound and out ran USF down the floor several times for layups. Last year, one of my frustrations was free throw shooting. We've been shooting pretty well from the line this season and were 13-14 tonight! Our men's team could definitely learn from their counterparts at the charity stripe as well as passing on the fast break.

In tonight's putting contest, Maple witnessed another successful half court putt. A friend of mine who clearly learned from my ugly previous attempt, calmly slow rolled the ball straight down the middle for a cool $500. Since hardly any other students were in attendance to witness it, I'll post it as proof that it actually happened.

In the second half, we shot more jumpers. I think it was partly a concerted effort to test our outside shot rather than USF taking away our post play. We struggled from the 3 point line which judging from previous games, is going to be an issue this season. I'll fondly remember the days when we had Rap draining 3 after 3. On the whole, I was pleased with the play of our freshman. Kayla was the dominant force I had been reading about and waiting to see in action. Donaghe and Pohlen looked good and hit a 3 pointer each. Hopefully they'll develop into reliable shooters from behind the arc. The upperclassmen were solid. Jillian especially stood out - getting boards and always in the right position for a lay up.

We definitely need all the help we can get from our freshmen this year with Melanie and Michelle done for the season. Hopefully everyone else will stay healthy and this will be the season where we finally get over the Elite 8 hump.
~ Zhihao

Men's Basketball vs Sacramento St. 11/27/2007

Stanford 84 Sacramento State 58 Even though the 6th Man Committee was giving out pizza at the door, I decided to have my pre-game dinner at the Alumni Cafe where they are serving hot meals 2 hours before tip off of selected home basketball games. Dinner was great and I was able to catch the second half of the Indiana-Georgia Tech basketball game. Not having a TV this year, I've definitely missed watching college basketball. It's probably a good thing though, since there's no way I could cope with everything I have going on if I could watch basketball on TV every night. Indiana went on a run as I finished up my meal and one thing that I noticed was that the refs allowed quite a bit of contact and didn't call cheap fouls (just like our game against Colorado State). How ironic that we got our favourite, whistle happy Pac-10 ref, Libby, for this game.

The 6th Man Section had a decent turnout for the game tonight. It wasn't fantastic but I guess my expectations have been tempered by previous games. As I mentioned in my last post, Sacramento State isn't that good. We were favoured to win by 30 and quickly showed why. Even though we weren't hitting our long range shots and missing some easy close range shots, we cleaned up on the offensive boards and got lots of put backs. We were also able to break their press with reasonable success and scored on some easy layups. That being said and it might be me being overly critical, but somehow, I never quite feel comfortable when we have numbers and are attacking the basket. Our rate of success seems lower than one would expect.

In any case, I liked our defense today. Mitch who I've definitely picked on in the past, stayed with his man and played scrappy, bothering defense. The Sac State ball handlers were really sloppy too and we recorded what I believe should be a season high 9 steals (5 by Fred). We had some great rejections too. Robin and Fred (who redeemed himself after a turnover) had two especially vicious swats that were rightfully named as "Plays of the Half". The 6'8 guy Robin was matched up against (#40) seemed intent on posting up and trying to take it to the hole. He got Robin to bite on a pump fake once for an easy bucket but Robin quickly learned and didn't leave his feet when challenging him. That led to about 4 more blocks. Who needs to jump went you're that much taller and longer? It kind of reminded me of the USC game last year when they were taking it to Brook over and over again.

Offensively, we definitely had some sloppy passes and could have ended up with several more turnovers if the ball hadn't bounced our way, but on the whole, I thought we dealt pretty reasonably with Sac State's aggressive trapping defense. We improved in the second half/they didn't press as much. Mitch made some nice dishes throughout the game. He did have one pass straight to the defender but I can live with that. We didn't shoot a great percentage from the 3 in the first but when they started zoning in the second, we showed that we could make hard passes, get people open and hit 3s. That was somewhat comforting after seeing us lob the ball around and struggle with the zone in previous games.

Robin had another solid outing. There was a play when he figured out that he had several inches over the next tallest Sac State player and made a nice hook leaning towards the basket. Yay for not fading away. Josh Owens got some minutes and had a nice fast break dunk. He's definitely a fan favourite among the 6th Man Section and everyone is excited about his potential. Goods also found his stroke tonight and was draining 3s. Let's hope it carries over to Colorado. Finally, Taj was scrappy as usual. He got boards, made put backs and ran the floor well for a nice catch and finish off a sweet Goods pass.

It's sometimes hard to tell how well we're performing when playing against an over-matched opponent. Nevertheless, I was pretty happy with the game tonight (just need to work on the free throw shooting). Let's hope we don't lose our baggage like last time against Sienna and bring our A-game against Colorado this Sunday. I'm not looking forward to the cold and potential snow, but excited about the game. We need the Pac-10 to have a good showing against the Big 12 in the Pac-10 Big 12 challenge. All these out of conference losses (even to good teams) aren't helping the Pac-10's RPI.
~ Zhihao

Men's Basketball vs Colorado St. 11/24/2007

Stanford 73 Colorado State 53 After the miserable football game, there's nothing like watching some basketball to cheer you up. The game was never really in doubt after the first 10 minutes or so when the second team came in and incited some scrappiness and defense, but it was nice to see only 5 turnovers and Robin do well against another 7-footer (#30 Stuart Creason). Brook and Daveed got a huge kick out of Robin's 3 pointer to get us on the board and the 6th Man Section loved his tenacious defense which included a couple of nasty swats of Stuart.

Speaking of Stuart, he apparently played on a 4th grade YMCA basketball team with a guy in the 6th Man Section. They exchanged greetings during warmups and Stuart told him that his dad, who coached the team, was behind the visitor's bench. 6th Man guy promptly went to say hi to his former coach and they had an extended chat. Meanwhile, we talked to Stuart and found out that he wore New Balance instead of Nikes because he had surgery on both his feet (which might explain why he was pretty slow) and New Balance provided greater support. He also said he wished he remembered 6th Man guy's name but definitely recognised him from elementary school. Seemed like a nice kid.

Back to the game, it was nice to see one where the referees weren't calling every single touch foul or bump as Pac-10 referees like to do. They might have slightly favoured Colorado State in the latter stages but that was only after the game was a blow out. In the opening few minutes, they were pretty consistent with the non-calls. I'm sure if Pac-10 refs were calling the game, Robin would have picked up some early fouls for his aggressive defense.

It also seems like we are going to be a team that lives and dies with the 3, especially when teams zone us and double Robin as Colorado State did. Even on fastbreaks, Goods was pulling up for 3 pointers instead of driving to the hole. He did break out of his slump but was still only 3-9 from 3 point land. We took less 3s in the second half, and I guess it's fine when we're hitting them, but there are days (especially on the road) when we won't and give up transition baskets off long rebounds. I also feel that we utilise the pull up jumper on fast breaks too much. Sure, there are times when the defender is clearly backing off but there are other times when the pass and maybe pass back results in an easy bucket. Finally, it seems to me that we'll always have trouble guarding the opposing point guard. #43 was quicker and stronger than Mitch and blew by him with ease. I was surprised that Colorado State didn't isolate him, let him create off the dribble and kick to open shooters when we collapsed. That's going to be our weak link come Pac-10 play and hopefully we have some sort of defensive scheme in mind.

At the end of the day, it was a win against a not very good team. But hey, I'll take it especially after the football debacle. There were also several entertaining moments like when Prowitt air-balled the ugliest looking free throw I've ever seen and neither the 6th Man Section nor Coach Robinson could contain their laughter; or when someone in the 6th Man Section started heckling Colorado State's #22 during a dead ball situation in the silent arena, causing several Colorado State players to laugh and promptly allow Taj to get the inbounds pass under the basket for an easy lay up; or when Taj had a crazy inadvertent tip of Drew Shiller's 2nd missed free throw (come on Drew, you got to make those).

Sacramento State on Tuesday should be another easy win and then it's off to Colorado for the Big 12 challenge, against a team that is probably better than people initially thought. They have Air Force's old coach who might run some version of the Princeton Offense that we've struggled with in the past. It'll be a good challenge and one that we need to overcome if we expect to compete on the road.

~ Zhihao

Football vs Notre Dame 11/24/2007

Stanford 14 Notre Dame 21 Wow, what a frustrating game. I feel bad for TC. It was finally his chance to shine and he made two perfect throws in crunch time while nursing a hand injury. His receivers let him down. End of story. The defense missed some tackles but they did force 4 turnovers and numerous punts, and were on the field way too long, oftentimes in bad field position. Derek didn't warm up well and missed 4 field goals. I know he's been hurt and has struggled recently. Should another kicker (Zagory) have been dressed?

What made the loss even worse was that it was on ESPN. So much for the recruiting image that the USC win helped restore. There were also numerous recruits in the stands. I found it amusing that the volleyball girls had to sit with them. I was also pretty impressed with the Notre Dame crowd. They showed up in full force despite a terrible season (although maybe they felt they had a shot at this game) and were extremely loud. It definitely felt as if they outnumbered us.

Even though we should have sent the game into OT and made a few more of our field goals, it's debatable whether we really deserved to win the game. Maybe our defense did but we definitely dodged a bullet with the hail mary interception turned The Play II, thanks to a personal foul and it really looked like the TD that was reversed was good, although I guess they had a better view from the replay. In any case, Moore and especially Sherman who cost us another 7 points with his drop turned interception in the 1st quarter, should have made their catches in the end zone. We might not necessarily have won it in OT and ESPN would have probably switched to the Kansas vs Missouri game, but that's would a halfway decent offense would have done.

With the injuries that our O Line sustained (Mattran and Fletch) and how our whole team has played, I'm not too optimistic about Big Game. Fletch looked like he could have come back so he might be probable but Mattran didn't look too good. I also don't know what the deal with Tavita is. TC did look good out there today, standing in the pocket and making a quick throw before the one blitz that they threw at him came (and then hurting his hand). At least Cal isn't looking that hot either. Good thing I have the basketball game tonight to look forward to.
~ Zhihao

Women's Soccer vs UConn 11/23/2007

Stanford 0 UConn 2
Initially I had planned to fly back from home Friday morning with the intention of watching the final regular season volleyball game of the year against Cal, but then the soccer team beat Cal and had their game scheduled for the exact same time on the exact same day. Since Zhihao said he’d rather go to volleyball, I went to soccer. Unfortunately, we did not play our best and UConn came in with a strategy to shut us down and a brick wall named Stephanie Labbe(#0 GK).

I was surprised at the large turnout for the game considering that it was the day after Thanksgiving, but at the same time soccer is one of those sports (like volleyball and softball) that is a good draw with the local girls’ soccer leagues and their parents. The student presence was negligible, but I think the announced crowd was in the 1500s which is fairly close to selling out LCQ.

In the first half, I was sure that we would get a tough, but comfortable, victory. We controlled possession and outplayed UConn throughout the half and basically were in control of the game. It was a little sloppy, but Buehler, Kirby, and Marissa were controlling the back line as usual and not letting much through. #11 on UConn (MF Megan Schnur) was the only player who consistently gave us trouble as she seemed to almost be toying with and then blowing by April Wall on the right side of our D at will (foreshadowing). They got a couple of chances in the first half this way, but Buehler was around to clean up the mess. We had 3 great shots, but each time the keeper would punch it over the bar. Out of all of the goalies I’ve seen this year, she was the most confident and steady in the box. All crosses were snuffed out, and it seemed like it was going to take something extraordinary to beat her. UConn’s strategy seemed to be to sag back a little up top and keep Press, Riley, O’Hara, etc. from getting the ball and making the runs that they usually make. Then they would counter attack off of that and use their speed on the wings to try and make plays from there. #3 and #11 had some serious speed and today was the first time I could remember someone being able to outrun Marisa for balls on the left side.

UConn got their first goal about 5 min into the 2nd half off of a counterattack headed by #11 down their left side(our right). She got by April pretty easily and when Buehler came over to help, someone else made a run right down the middle and it was an easy finish. For some reason, everything we had been doing went to hell after that goal even though there were still 35 minutes left, and we were only down by one goal. We immediately lost our composure and seemed to be in a hurry. Instead of trying any build up, we resorted to long passes up field from the back; however, this didn’t work because of UConn sitting back to prevent that specific thing. We had no flow to our offense after that first goal, and after the second UConn score, the writing was on the wall.

I was sitting in front of a couple of ladies who had played college soccer recently, one I believe for Stanford (or she was really good friends with the team) and the other from Northwestern. From listening to them, they were impressed with UConn’s #11 and their keeper as well. They also felt like Press was not in the game. She never really seemed to impose herself on the game like I’ve seen her do before. They wondered why Ratcliffe never subbed Lizzy for Christen like he’s done before. My only guess can be that once we got down two goals, we needed Christen’s ability to make something from nothing more than Lizzy’s steady, physicality, but I definitely would have given her a chance earlier in the game. (Sidenote: My favorite Lizzy story is hearing her tell a story about how she broke her HS boyfriend’s nose in front of his friends after hearing that he cheated on her. Apparently she throws a mean right.) One last thing that they kept coming back to was our inability to string anything together offensively. We had bad first touches, passes to no one in particular, and missed passes. Surprisingly we seemed far less composed than we should have been. Our attack never really got untracked, and the difference in the game was their ability to counterattack on the wings and convert the couple of chances they got. All in all in was a good year, but I’d bet that the girls are a little more than pissed that it ended the way they did. We played nowhere near our best and UConn came out, executed, and took advantage of the chances they were given.
~Albert

Women's Vball vs Cal 11/23/2007

Stanford 3 Cal 2 (30-32, 30-19, 23-30, 30-22, 16-14) With the women's soccer Sweet 16 match against U Conn and the volleyball game both at the same time, Albert decided to go for soccer and I chose volleyball. While soccer was more important, I kind of liked being indoors and it's always fun to go up against Cal, especially with the out-right Pac-10 title and a #1 seed on the line. It was also senior night for Bryn and Franci.

The turnout for the game was tremendous and I saw a couple of signs that said "Will you marry me #10 (Alix)" and "I love you #8 (Cassidy)". They screened a little tribute for the seniors, who were accompanied by their parents onto the court where they received their fair share of hugs from team mates and coaches. Franci was holding back tears and I laughed when they announced that she would be working for Goldman in New York after graduation. That's what a Stanford education gets you! There were also numerous Cal fans (who ruined the national anthem, as usual) in attendance. I thought it was classy that Coach Dunning gave their two seniors flowers as well.

We started slow out of the gate in Game 1 but got it together and managed to get out to a nice 4-5 point lead. With the team playing on the road and our travels to Chicago and Albany for basketball, it's been a while since I last saw us play in person. I noticed that Gabi wasn't serving and Cassidy had entered our main rotation, with Jessica coming in for Alix occasionally. Cassidy had some shaky moments today but I'm all for it, although I have to say that tonight, Jessica was really solid whenever she came in.

I had been selected to do the full court putt for $1000 (which I missed terribly - trying to aim left in order to compensate for the floor which I thought ran right, but ending up pulling it left) in between Games 1 and 2, and so moved out of the Block Party section to the holding area. That was when we started to collapse. Up 28-22, we ended up losing 30-32 thanks to some terrible serve reception and not so great sets. It was reminiscent of Cal's collapse when we played them in Berkeley.

As Albert who joined me after the soccer game commented, how far we go in the NCAAs is dependent on how we receive serves. He's spot on. In the games that we won (2, 4 and 5), we did a pretty good job. In the ones that we lost, we were terrible, and had great trouble with Cal's float serves. The serve mishandlings also came in streaks, which was especially disheartening as it seemed more mental than anything else. There were also times when the timing was off between Bryn and the attacker or she simply made a bad set. She's absolutely crucial to our team's success. Finally, Alix and Franci had some attack errors. When they get one on one opportunities (as they are likely to have with Foluke and Barboza getting a lot of attention), they simply have to put them away.

Defensively, we couldn't stop Hana on the left side even though we knew the ball was going there. It's definitely a testament to how good she is. Even when we managed to get touches on the block, the ferocity of her shots carried them out of our back row's reach. We did a pretty good job on Pressey who whined way too much about phantom touches, and I liked our scrambling defense which won a few points due to sheer hustle. Even though we didn't record a ton of blocks, we managed to get useful touches on everyone but Hana, and Franci had a great night blocking.

Negatives aside, I loved our team's composure. Down 1-2, I knew that the game was far from over. Erin stepped up big time (something she'll have to do in the NCAAs) and Foluke and Cynthia were solid as usual - getting us kills that were absolutely crucial in preventing Cal from gaining the momentum. Alix had a couple of beautiful finesse kills which showed off her touch and court vision too. We also had quite a bit of success with back row kills which speaks to the quality of our hitters. As I mentioned previously, Jessica did a great job when she subbed in for Alix. I remember her coming in at a critical juncture of the 5th game after sitting out the 4th (I believe) and thinking to myself that Dunning had a lot of faith in her. I've been pretty critical of her previously but tonight, I can't remember a single bad pass.

In the end, with the score knotted at 2-2 and Game 5 going back and forth in dramatic fashion, it came down to which team had the stronger nerves and performed better in the clutch. Down 13-14 (match point), Cynthia made a nice pass in a slightly awkward position, Bryn set it right on the money, and Alix took care of the one-on-one opportunity. Alix then came up with two nice jump serves that took Cal slightly out of position for the set and we were able to dig the first one for a Cynthia kill and block the second one for the match. What a win! Full credit to Cal for a terrific match. They'll be a tough team to beat in the tournament.

Now that we've won the Pac-10 and have a #1 seed, we need to take it one game at a time in Maples. And then hopefully, two road trips to Sacramento will be in the offering.
~ Zhihao

Men's Basketball vs Yale 11/20/2007

Stanford 72 Yale 61

While the East Coast was fun, it's great to be back in sunny California. With Stanford giving us the whole week off for Thanksgiving break, there weren't that many students on campus. I would guess that we had just over 100 people in the 6th Man Section, many who were alums. The first thing I noticed upon entering Maples is that we now have banners for men's and women's basketball as well as women's volleyball, listing NCAA Titles, Pac-10 Titles and for men's basketball, a NIT championship. NIT. Seriously? I sure hope we won't be adding anything in that department. Monty was also doing commentary for FSN.

One thing I noticed is that our shooting during warm ups at home versus at Siena was like night and day. But enough about that game and on to this one. We started out pretty well and there was a concerted effort to push the ball. Mitch made a couple of nice passes down the court and we scored some easy buckets. I definitely see the emphasis on making high risk/high reward passes in transition. It sure looks good when we execute. I also saw an increased effort to feed Robin the ball. It would be nice if he could get better position (and win an opening tip) but his passing out of double teams has definitely improved and he was a monster on defense. Getting him into the game with touches is key to our success. I was also happy to see Kenny Brown come in early. I thought he earned it after his performance at Siena where he was the only one who shot the ball and attacked well in the 2nd half.

There was a point midway in the first when Mitch fell awkwardly. He was grimacing as he got up and I don't know whether I started to pay more attention to him on defense thereafter, but he was absolutely abused by the opposing point guard. He lost him on screens and was taken off the dribble repeatedly. The good thing was that he didn't let it affect him on offense and I thought he ran the team well. The turnovers at the end of the half really frustrated me, especially the one with 8 seconds left, after a time out when they full court pressed us. We had a similar turnover at Siena and it seems that we have much more difficulty inbounding the ball this year - no matter whose basket we are under. Maybe teams are defending us more aggressively after seeing us crumble against Louisville last year.

In the second half, we turned the ball over way too much (I know I sound like a broken tape recorder). Mitch and later Drew, lost their guy too often and Yale starting bombing 3s - a sound strategy with Robin patrolling the paint. They closed the gap to 3 which finally got the 6th Man section into the game. They also played a zone trap near the sidelines which we struggled with the first few times before finally adjusting. Maybe once, just once, we should call a time-out. The good news was that we finally started to feed Law in the post. It's about time especially since I recall him having great success in the post last year. After a few nice baseline moves that resulted in easy buckets and trips to the foul line, he started to catch fire and was our zone buster, hitting his patented high release jumper as he flashed to the high post. It's good to see Law finally break out of his funk, when it was evident that his ankle is still bothering him. It was timely too with Goods falling into one. He was yanked rather early in the 2nd after some turnovers and a blown fast break opportunity.

With Fred in foul trouble, we also tried a line up that I don't think I've seen before: Mitch, Drew, Landry, Law, Robin. I liked it offensively and I think it worked defensively because Yale was jacking up 3s and not really challenging us inside (but I could be wrong). Towards the end, we became overly sloppy and passed straight to a Yale defender several times. The game was pretty much over but it irked me and Law, who was visibly frustrated with himself after 2 straight turnovers.

Even though we didn't blow Yale out as everyone expected us to, I was happy with certain aspects of our play. I liked how we fed both Robin and Law in the post and also how we played against the zone. Hopefully we can continue doing this, especially on the road. Mitch's play on offense was also reassuring. He looked good out there. Hopefully the foot thing isn't serious and was part of the reason why his defense was curtailed today. I know he'll never be a defensive stopper but he should at least be able to fight through screens. We also did a decent job getting to the free throw line and making them. I'll take 8 of 10 from Robin any time! Obviously, we need to make smarter decisions passing the ball, but I'm praying that it will come with time.
~ Zhihao

It was clear two minutes into the game that this was not going to be another Harvard or Northwestern State. For one thing, Yale is much bigger, and they actually look like college students (although whether they looked like basketball players is debatable). Man it would be nice to win an opening tip. Robin is so much massively bigger than their guy, but he's just not anywhere near as physical as Rob Little was. And he's still working on timing. Fortunately he made up for it two possessions later, waiting for his defenders to come down before putting the ball up and into the basket.

The entire first half was really nothing special. Fortunately we were able to build a 9-11 point lead and keep it, but no-one was particularly glowing in their play. There were constant substitutions, trying to find a rhythm but then committing a turnover or not capitalizing on opportunities and then changing it up again.

The second half turned into a real basketball game, which I think was a good experience for the team to have had. Coming into the half with a steady but not great lead, I think Yale showed the guys that they really have to shape up if they want the W. They went on an 11 point run, featuring three threes from three different players. Like Zhihao said, the whole stadium (and especially 6th man) really got into it when we were suddenly down by only 3 points, and the team ramped it up too, with four straight points from Hill, who came up with 14 points in the last 14 minutes of the game for a total career high 25... it was excellent to see Hill back to his normal, quiet but deadly scoring self. As ugly as that win may have been, I'll take career highs from Hill and Robin any day. Let's go do it again.

#22. Eric Flato. What a little brat. He's just one of those players you don't want to succeed because he's so damn sure of himself. Mitch had a lot of trouble defending him, and eventually Shiller came out and was doing really well for a few minutes, before slipping a couple times in a row, long enough for Flato to get his hotshot (and hot shot) rhythm. The sad thing was that since Drew was defending their best player, he couldn't really get a shot off. The only moment in the game when he was open he went for it and swoooosh. It was beautiful.

I also liked the Drew Mitch Landry Law and Robin line up, which gave us a ton of flexibility on offense and a quick enough defense. I found Yale to be fairly predictable- if they couldn't find the open three they'd go for the pull-up and fade away, which Law did a pretty good job of defending (they found it a lot more often in the first half when he was not as productive). I suppose that also implies that our defense on the inside was fairly successful, as they very rarely took it to the basket (Robin's five blocks helped a lot on that count), although when they did it was pretty embarrassing. It ended up being not a bad game, all in all, and I'm really glad the guys stuck it out and adjusted when they needed to. On to Saturday!
~Alex