Yes, the score will show a final of 68-63, however it was more of a beat down than that. Stanford was up 41-25 at the half. Yes, you read the right.
Baylor has two bigs, 6-7 Kalani Brown and also very tall Lauren Cox. What if we told you they held Lauren to TWO total points, and Kalani Brown to five? Lauren and Kalani each had two in the first half!
I will say this, give Tara VanDerveer enough time, in this case about two weeks, to prepare for a team, and she will figure out how to beat them with lesser players (no offense, Stanford starting five!). She will key on your two best players, Brown and Cox, and make you beat them with your third or fourth option. This disruption to the super stars who are used to scoring is usually hard for teams to handle, as Baylor witnessed this game. Baylor did get a nice game out of NaLyssa Smith and Chloe Jackson, each with 15 points, but it was not enough.
Photo courtesy of Stanford Women's Basketball
Then came Coffee
We have to give major props to Senior Shannon Coffee, for my home town of Dayton, Ohio!! She has been a bench player and was called on this afternoon to guard Kalani Brown, due to her 6’5 size. And she did a good job on the the afore mentioned five points of Brown. However Shannon is not known for her offense. However again, she made three 3-pointers, chipping in nine points to the cause. They were especially timely in the fourth, when Baylor mounted a comeback from that disastrous first half, and got within seven.
Tara-ism at its best:
"Shannon has been someone that has been a role player for our team and a lot of times she's led the cheers on the bench," VanDerveer said. "Today people were cheering for her. She made some big shots. Her defense was really good. It was really exciting for her to have such a big game in a big game."
Some fun facts:
- Our two tallest players, Allan Smith (lead Stanford scorer with 21) and Shannon Coffee were 8-of-13 from deep.
- Seven of Shannon’s 12 career 3-pointers have come against Baylor, including three this Saturday!
- Baylor had more turnovers (15) than assists (13)
- Brown had a season-low five points on 2-of-7 shooting
- Stanford was 9-21 at the free throw line. Maybe with all that scheming, Tara forgets to have the team practice free throws?
More Stanford Goodies at the original C and R's Stanford Women's Basketball Blog
