Stanford (Lovingly) Beats USF

What to say about the Stanford Women’s Basketball team’s 29th time in the NCAA tournament? Fans all said what a shame we had to play USF, coached by the beloved Stanford alum who started it all, Jennifer Azzi. Well, you can say head coach Tara VanDerveer likes to win. Heck, Tara said it herself after her team handed Jennifer’s team their worst loss of the season (85-58): “I love Jennifer but I love winning more.”


Tara VanDerveer and Jennifer Azzi share a lot of history
Photo: Marcio Jose Sanchez, AP.
First some context. Before the game, Jennifer Azzi sat alone on the opposing team’s bench at Maples, a very different view than one she was used to, in a place where she has so many memories. In her line of sight was a list of two National Champions. The team she led in 1990 when she was a senior was listed first. Winning a national championship must hold special memories for a player. To build a program from 12 fans and no NCAA appearances, in Jennifer’s freshmen year, to a national championship with sold out crowds in her senior year, well, let’s just say not many players can claim that sort of impact. And here she sat getting ready to face the woman who got here there, perhaps the biggest influence in her life, the woman who thought so much of her that she asked her to be her emotional captain on the 1996 Olympic team that won Gold in Atlanta.

How weird was it for Azzi, coaching her first NCAA game? She said she was unsettled that her parents were at this game, not in their usual Stanford gear, but in yellow USF shirts. She and Tara shared a long and sincere hug at midcourt during player introductions. Don’t think Tara would hug Geno for that long…or at all. Afterwards, Tara’s mom, Rita, was crying for Jennifer. Even Tara had enough of the sentimentality, scolding her mom, “But I’m blood!”

About the game, Jennifer said they were not used to that level of physicality, and the rest of the NCAA field might have politely snickered, as Stanford is usually known as “the Good Girls.” Do keep in mind this is Jennifer’s first NCAA game, so if she keeps up the success and comes back, she will need to know her players will face this level of physical play, or more, in subsequent years.
And they don’t call them Trees for nothing. When USF’s 6-3 center went to the bench with foul trouble, they didn’t have anyone on the floor over 6 feet. Stanford had Erica McCall, Kailee Johnson and Alanna Smith, all 6’3. At one point Stanford had more rebounds (43) than USF had points. The rebounding total was doubled in Stanford’s favor, 49-24.

Stanford accolades:
Lili Thompson scored 17 points, Erica McCall had 14 points and 10 rebounds for a double-double, plus a three-pointer for the big! Karlee Samuelson had 11, on 2-4 shooting beyond the arc, her specialty. Starter Kaylee Johnson was more aggressive going to the rim and scored 13. Add in her 9 boards and she almost got herself a double-double. Stanford will need her to score in double digits every night to advance in the tournament. It was good to see bench players Marta Sniezek and Aussie Alana Smith score as well, eight and nine points respectively. Marta had a game, giving out nine assists and hitting her first collegiate three! She’s only a freshman! Throw in Brittany McPhee’s eight and you have everyone contributing.

Speaking of our Aussie player, we thought we were hot stuff having our first international recruit from down under. Well, here Jennifer has beaten her former coach. She has seven players on her roster representing five different foreign countries: Canada, Denmark, Finland, Slovakia and Sweden.


See all the pretty Stanford assists!
Next game for Stanford is Monday night at 6PM, against the upstart #12 seed South Dakota State’s Jack Rabbits. They beat #5 Miami 74-71. C and R only caught the last 5 minutes of the game, but from what we saw, Miami played listless and with no energy, compared to SDS intensity. It didn’t hurt that they had a whole section of fans right next to the court action and were very rabid. C and R are worried those fans will be louder than the polite Stanford fans. So please get off work and come on out!

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VanDerveer Gets Win Number 800, Beating USF 100-45

The day dawned glorious before us: we had tickets to the exclusive, only-museum-in North-America hosting the post-impressionists from Paris (yes, we have other interests beside basketball, too), dinner in SF and a Stanford basketball game where head coach Tara VanDerveer was hoping to make history by wining number 800. What could be better?


It was only slightly misting when C and R made their way to the De Young Museum, and C especially enjoyed the Seurats, and that Van Gogh is some sort of crazy genius, both and separately, kinda like us. When it came time for dinner in the most cuisine friendly City by the Bay, we asked the trusted ol’ GPS and what did we pick? Mel’s Diner with burgers, fries and shakes. Walking back up the hill to USF, bloated, we see the Stanford bus and C waves like the bloomin’ idiot that she is, and that’s why you, dear reader, read us because we sure don’t get bogged down in things like facts or statistics of the Stanford games, now do we?

So C and R have finagled a press pass from USF, and if they are reading this post, I am sure they have morning-after regret. Plenty of back story on this game. Tara coaching against her two former and favorite players, USF head coach Jennifer Azzi, and assistant coach Katy Steding. Tara going for win number 800. Stanford dropping two on the road definitely need a “fix” of an easy win. The venue practically being a home game due to the proximity of Stanford. But we’re just happy to be here.

We get inside plenty early and chat with Tara VanDerveer’s mom, a delightful woman. She regaled us with stories, and said how happy she was to share this game with Tara.

We see Jennifer Azzi, still looking like she could play college ball, take a few minutes to address the young ladies and gentleman from Oakland Parks and Rec, who were here to see the game and get a taste of college life. She asked how many planned on attending college and just about all the young players raised their hands. Very cool.

R hits my shoulder, and good thing it was not the other way around as she is still nursing major surgery to hers, and says, “Chiney is wearing injured black.” We learn later in the post game press conference (yes, they let us in, hee hee) that Chiney turned it in practice and it is not major and should play the next game.

The starting line up is again juggled, with veterans Jeanette Pohlen, Necka Oqumike and Kayla Pedersen, Tinkle and Lindy. Tara alluded in the post game conference that this is the fifth starting line up she has experimented with and they need consistency and need to know what works down the road if they expect to compete.

Even though the house is not sold out, about 3,600 show up, a lot of it is Stanford faithful. We all expect a victory, and win number 800. So it is with dismay we see USF take the lead at the 14 minute mark, pulling ahead 11-10. Stanford looks ragged and slow on defense. The teams exchange leads several times, then something clicks. Stanford tightens up their D and they stop USF from scoring. Kayla looks like her old self before the head injury, and drives down the middle. We start hitting threes, including two by freshmen Sara James. USF gets stuck on 21, and go about 7 minutes without scoring until the half comes, and the half ends 21-48. Although, did you see the old inbounding-the-ball-off-the-opponents-backside-for-a-score-trick Tinkle did. Only a coach’s daughter could get away with that!

The second half opens and you can tell Nneka is feeling good. WE don’t let USF score until17-minute mark in the second half. A lot more of the second string get to play, for valuable experience, and perhaps not to embarrass her former player, Azzi. Sara James gets more playing time and she got the ball stolen a few times and showed she still can get rattled. Even with the bench players in, Stanford breaks 100 points and the final score ends up 100-45.

USF hands out Cardinal read signs that say “800” and “Congratulations Tara”. Jennifer gives Tara a warm hug, and some flowers and the game ball at center court. Tara returned the favor and spoke to the USF players after the game and told them to keep focusing on little things, which made Azzi happy because that’s what she tells her players every day.

At the post game conference, several reports asked Tara to reflect back on winnng 800, and she said, “I don’t even remember win number 700.” But that this was special and ironic to win it against Jennifer Azzi, the player that put Stanford on the map. She also appreciated winning it with “family” around to witness it, whether it be her sister and mother, or her extended family of former and current players and fans.

One thing Tara said to Kayla and Nneka as they were leaving the press area was, “See ya on Sunday.” Christmas day is Saturday. No rest for a team trying to find itself and resurrect a season in what is arguable their two toughest opponents in a two-day span.

And, oh, Azzi had to buy dinner for Tara.

Limited Seats Left for Stanford at USF

Tonight’s game at USF has limited tickets left. Reserved seating is sold out, but general tickets remain, so get there early if you need tickets! Game time is 6:30. Having Stanford, with its large following show up, coupled with the chance for head coach Tara VanDerveer going for win number 800 makes for good ticket sales for USF. Add to that it is USF’s annual "Pack the House Challenge" contest. Each year colleges compete to see who can get the most people to come to their gym on a certain night, and it seems like making the Stanford game the one is a little like cheating, or good business sense.

Speaking of good business sense, C and R had a hard time navigating the USF website. Couldn’t find the roster, current record, schedule in visible links. We had to dig deep. We thought we saw the Dons were 1-13, now we get a press release they are 2-9. Not that we want to short-change anyone a win, when so desperately needed, but someone needs to redo the website. C and R were sent a press kit for tonight’s game and they list Tara VanDerveer’s alma mater as Southern Utah (!) and that she graduated in 1994. Wow, how did she rack up 799 wins? They list her career record as 799-197, and her Stanford record as the same. No, she coached at Idaho and Ohio State and got some of those wins at those places. We’re just sayin’… someone needs to check their facts, and this from two people who routinely say whatever we think without fact checking.

Anyway, see you at the game.

Footnote:
Congratulations to UConn for… CONTINUING  THE STREAK of wins in women’s college basketball with win number 89. Some people have been comparing it to the UCLA men’s streak of 88, which is not the same game, just ask Geno Auriemma. Maya Moore was unbelievable, scoring a career high 41 points, and they beat FSU by 31. Got to see an interview of Tara VanDerveer as the last coach to beat UConn.

Come See Tara VanDerveer Make History at USF

If there is one silver lining to the fact Stanford Women’ Basketball Coach Tara VanDerveer is stuck on number 799 and could not get win number 800 in two tries on the road it is that she comes back to the Bay Area to try in what amounts to a home game up the hill at USF. And it would be against her first favorite ex-player, Jennifer Azzi. The game is on Wednesday, December 22.

Lots of people have been eyeing Azzi, to see if the former great player can translate her success unto others, and so far her team sits at 1-13. In all fairness, these are not the players she recruited. Hopefully she can turn it around if not this year, then next.

Game time is 6:30 if you want to get front row seats on a piece of history, as everyone is expecting Tara to get win 800 Wednesday. C and R will be there, crashing the interview area. Plenty of tickets left, and the game time is not 7:00, as we saw listed on an old schedule some place, make sure you are there before 6:30.

Stanford Loses Two in a Row, This Time to Tennessee in OT

So faithful readers of the C and R’s Stanford Women’s Basketball blog will know C and R often give advice to 2-time national championship and Olympic gold medallist coach Tara VanDerveer. Never mind that we have never won a gold medal or a college basketball game or well, anything: we just feel qualified to give advice to the coach that has won 799 college games (and holding).

So our advice the last few years has been to stop taking out a player when they commit a foul. The trend seemed to start with Jayne Appel in her freshmen year. If she fouled, she came out of the game. It is a negative reward, the stick instead of the carrot, if you will, to teach her not to foul. Since Jayne has graduated, Tara, if we may call her by her first name, has kept the traditional alive this year.

In the game Stanford lost to DePaul on Thursday night, Stanford fouled a lot (Sarah Boothe fouled out in 17 minutes, which has to be some sort of record) and with the constant subbing, they never found thier offensive rhythm. And C and R scream and yell and rant and write not to take the starters out and lo and behold, in Sunday’s game against Tennessee Tara listened. (Yes C and R flatter themselves into believing Tara VanDerveer even pays attention to this blog!)

So, back to Tennessee, Tara left her starting five in when they fouled to give them a chance at unity and cohesiveness and then it came back to bite her in the behind when two players fouled out in overtime (note to Tara, never listen to C and R!) In fact, three of the starting five players had four fouls in the final minutes of regulation, and one was at three fouls, so it was inevitable we were going to get in trouble.

Unfortunately, it was Jeannette Pohlen who fouled out first early in the overtime period and it sunk us. Stanford self destructed in OT (sticky post it note to Tara all over her office, never, ever listen to C and R and always take out players when they foul to save them for the end). To be fair to C and R, the refs were up to some home cookin’ by calling ticky-tacky fouls against Stanford then letting Tennessee knock us to the ground for non-calls. We thought the game was horribly called.

Rewinding a bit, Kayla Pedersen was back in the line up against Tennessee after suffering headaches from hitting her head taking a charge against Fresno State. They kept saying she didn’t have a concussion because she passed the concussion tests, yet had headaches for days afterward. Isn’t that the definition of a concussion? And Kayla is good at taking tests. Just what were those concussion tests? What day is it? Who’s the current president? Can you solve for X in the polynomial x2 − 4x + 7 using non-negative integer exponents? What’s 2X times 4 where X is your score? (Insider joke for Stanford fans who sit by the band).

C and R cheered when we saw she was back in the line up, the team needed her. But she responded by missing her first seven shots. She was ice cold. Rusty. She would shoot 3-16 from the field, definitely not Kayla-like. And the refs started on some home court advantage in calling fouls and we were down 10 points early in the game.

To Stanford’s credit, near the end of the second half, they started to claw their way back. They did it with the veterans Jeannette Pohlen, Kayla Pedersen and Nneka Ogwumike. They took the ball to the basket in transition before Tennessee was set in defense, and before Stanford would go into that stale half court offense where everyone stands in precise spots (Oops, we are giving free advice to Tara again and we all saw how that worked out). We felt lucky Stanford was only down 31-39 at half time.

Then Nneka showed up for the game (Hello Nneka, welcome to the Summit, now please score a basket) and we even took the lead with 9 minutes left on a Jeannette Pohlen three. She had another 20-some point game, too bad she fouled out. We even put some distance between us and Tennessee, going up by 6. Then Nneka disappeared, and when Stanford tried to make several passes to Nneka down low they were flat out stolen. And Stanford had some defensive lapses and their lead disappeared. After trading leads, Jeanette hit a three with one minute left to go up 70-67, but their freshmen countered and it was tied.

Then suddenly there are 5.1 seconds left in a tied-at-70 game and it is Stanford’s ball and they call time out. The first thing C and R say to each other is, did we set the Tivo to record overtime? Then the second thing we say is, remember that time against Xavier when there was 4.4 seconds left and Jeanette Pohlen raced the length of the floor and made the game wining lay up? But that would be too obvious. Then the third thing we say to each other is give it to freshman speedster Toni Kokenis, and since we know we have a direct ESP link to Tara, that’s exactly what Stanford does. Toni takes it up the court, dribbles behind her back to lose her defender but runs into two or three Tennessee players around the three point line and gets a weak shot off. She may be fast, but she is still a freshman and does not know how to finish like a Jeannette. (The ball hit the bottom of the net, and C and R instantly stood up and thought it had gone through the net, but it didn’t and we had to settle our hearts back down).

So now it is overtime and we have Boothe, Jeanette and Toni with 4 fouls and Nneka with three. Jeanette goes for a steal and fouls, is out of the game around the 4 miute mark and that sunk us. It’s funny, we thought we could play without any player but Kayla, but now we see we need Jeanette, too. Then Boothe loses the ball and fouls in frustration sixteen seconds later and we are just doomed. We lose 72-82 (the only points in OT came on Kayla’s free throws).

Tara will have to wait on win number 800 (and congratulations to Barbara Stevens, the DII coach of Bentley college who got her 800th win today and becomes the fifth college coach to join the 800 win club). If Tara does it Wednesday against USF and her favorite ex-player Jennifer Azzi, she will be the sixth coach.

See everyone up in SF.

Jennifer Azzi on Title IX

-Jennifer Azzi
-Title IX explained that it is not cutting men’s sports but colleges living up to their promise to equal access (to sports, to classes, to a degree) for all college members.
-WNBA
-Cal cutting sports programs
-Jennifer Azzi

What more could you want from a story on Swish Appeal, the women’s sports blog.

How about:
-Jennifer Azzi talking about the WNBA.
-Jennifer Azzi leading a clinic with Sue Bird and Lauren Jackson.

It’s a Jennifer Azzi fest, which is okay with C and R , our favorite ABL player. (google it, we’ll wait… we actually went to Laser games in SJ)

Wait… did we just say Cal cutting sports? Sing with us… One of these things just doesn’t belong here! Jennnefer Azzi fest--happy, cutting sports--sad.

Okay, C and R love to kid anything Cal-related, but we are always saddened to hear that college sports need to be cut for whatever reason, such as budget constraints or colleges not compiling with Title IX. Cal has been in the papers out here because they have more sports programs then most colleges and the University itself is facing huge cutbacks on most everything, not just sports, so….

And C and R are always saddened if it is women or men’s sports that are being cut. Sports programs bring in visibility for a college and the important monetary donations, as well as bring a student body together and benefit the student athlete. It contributes to a well-rounded education for player and fan alike.

Read the article, Jennifer says it better than we ever could.

Jennifer Azzi Announces Katy Steding As Assistant Coach at USF

Busy week, C had a birthday, many trips to the beach were planned then abandoned much to C's dismay, Kayla Pedersen threw out the first pitch at a Giants game, one of the junior bloggers got grounded we think, R had the best quarter at work ever, C and R saw "Wicked" in SF and voted it the best musical they had ever seen, C's son has league finals for swimming, Jennifer Azzi hired her old pal Katy Steding to help coach…

Okay, we could write volumes about all those things mentioned, but let's stick to basketball (and boy is it hard not to gush about Wicked, we cried and gave those two witches a standing ovation and C's new favorite color is now green). So basketball, yes, smart move, hiring Katy Steding. C and R got very worried when Jenn took over the USF head coaching job without having any formal coaching experience at any level, but it looks like she is surrounding herself with people who have the skills she needs/lacks and can get along with. Katy Stediing brings a ton of coaching and recruiting experience and had success wherever she went, typically raising an also-ran program into something higher.

Here, read from the press release from our good friends at USF.

During her stint in Portland, Oregon, as the head women’s basketball coach at Warner Pacific College, Steding recorded two 20-plus win seasons, leading the Knights to the NAIA Division II National Tournaments in 2004 and 2006. The 2004 selection to the national tournament was the first postseason appearance in school history for men’s or women’s basketball. In 2005-06, the Knights won their first ever Cascade Collegiate Conference title with a 22-9 record, as Steding was named CCC Coach of the Year. On the recruiting trail, Steding recruited 11 all-conference performers and four Academic All-Americans to Warner Pacific.

In 2008-09, Steding served as an assistant coach for the Atlanta Dream, helping the expansion franchise reach the WNBA playoffs in its inaugural season.

After a year of coaching in the WNBA, Steding returned to the collegiate scene last season, leading Columbia to its best finish in Ivy League and school history. She also played an integral role in landing three of the most highly lauded recruits in program history. Steding’s responsibilities included overseeing student-athlete development, scouting opponents and recruiting in the Western US.

Let’s hope she concentrates on recruiting. Jennifer also added Blair Hardiek, who coached at San Francisco state and is knowledgeable about recruiting out west. C and R are smelling road trip soon to see the Lady Dons (is that what they are called?).

Happy Cinco De Mayo, and on a confidential note, we hope to golf with our good friend, P, soon!

Jennifer Azzi to be Named University of San Francisco Coach!

Ohhh, C and R have an exclusive scoop for you! Our pals at the University of San Francisco invited yours truly to a press conference today. But before it happens, we already know the news. Former Stanford great Jennifer Azzi is to be named the new head coach. Pretty cool, huh? And we reported it before it was official or in any papers. (Well, except for the Daily Palo Alto and the San Francisco Chronicle and the San Jose Mercury…  okay it made the AP wires late last night, but we just saw it today. Oh, the AP story is written by AP writer Janie McCauley, who C and R met while covering the Tennessee-USF game. Small world, isn’t it? She gives a more personalized touch in her srticle).

Azzi will replace former Tennessee player Tanya Haave. She was fired for a 36-86 record over the past four years, including going 5-27 for this year with a record of 1-13 in conference play. Hmmm, Haave was a former standout at the college level, like Azzi, but it didn’t translate into coaching success. Just trying to think back, does Jennifer have any official coaching experience, either at the college level or any other level? Well, we wish her well and C and R will have to take more trips to San Francisco now.

Hope she and Tara can schedule a few friendlies.