Saturday afternoon, with Oregon facing No. 3 Stanford — the Pac-12 Conference’s perennial powerhouse — expectations were low. Regardless, the Ducks underwhelmed with a disappointing performance against the Cardinal at Matthew Knight Arena, falling by a score of 81-46.
Stanford used its size advantage in the post to dominate on offense, constantly feeding the ball to its top interior players, sisters Nnemkadi and Chiney Ogwumike. Chiney bulldozed her way to 14 points and nine rebounds, while Nnemkadi (who averages 21.9 and 10.7 rebounds per game for the season) had a relative off day, totaling 12 points, 10 rebounds and three assists for the Cardinal in 23 minutes of play. @@http://www.gostanford.com/sports/w-baskbl/mtt/stan-w-baskbl-mtt.html@@ @@http://www.goducks.com/downloads2/447301.htm?ATCLID=205382591&SPSID=4307&SPID=236&DB_LANG=C&DB_OEM_ID=500@@ @@http://www.pac-12.org/portals/7/images/wbasketball/2011-12-Stats/HTML/CONFLDRS.HTM@@
“I try to ignore (Nnemkadi) as much as I can,” Oregon head coach Paul Westhead said after the game. “And walking off, shaking hands for the final time, she gave me this big smile … She’s quite the player. She’s evolved, she never was one-dimensional, but she just rebounds on you, she scores inside.”
As good as Stanford was on offense, it was even stingier on defense, holding the Ducks to a season-low in points while tying the team’s worst efforts in field goals (16) and three-pointers made (four). Oregon committed 15 turnovers versus seven assists and failed to have a single player score in double figures.
To compound poor shooting from the field, the Ducks also hurt themselves with a sub-par effort from the free-throw line. The team was 10 of 18 from the charity stripe, the second-consecutive game in which they’ve shot less than 60 percent.
Oregon’s struggles on offense weren’t completely unexpected. Though the Ducks came into the game as traditionally a high-scoring bunch (73.4 points per game, second in the Pac-12), they were facing a Stanford team that is third in the league in scoring defense and first in three-point percentage defense (.239). Despite their credentials, however, Westhead placed a lot of blame for the inefficient output on his own team’s miscues.
“Stanford plays good defense, but I don’t think we were locked up today,” Westhead said. “I don’t think that alone caused 25 percent (shooting from the field).”
“Today, they chose to sit one post (player) back at the basket and one post at the top of the key, no matter what,” said senior forward Amanda Johnson, who finished well below her season averages with only eight points and seven rebounds against the Cardinal. “They did a really good job of disrupting the flow of our offense … they came up with some good strategies to throw us off.”
Despite Oregon’s atrocious shooting and overall lack of execution, Westhead denied that his players were suffering from nerves due to facing such a highly touted opponent.
“I don’t think our players came out tight,” Westhead said. “I think they were ready to play. But it gives the opposition a nice cushion when they can score the fist four or five possessions and we don’t.”
Stanford, which has now clinched the conference title for an unprecedented twelfth-consecutive year, will finish its Pac-12 slate with road contests against Colorado and Utah, followed by a home tilt against local rival California. The Golden Bears are the only squad in the conference to truly challenge the Cardinal, having taken the team to overtime before losing 74-71 on Jan. 28th. @@http://www.gostanford.com/sports/w-baskbl/sched/stan-w-baskbl-sched.html@@
Oregon will complete its home schedule against Oregon State on Feb. 25th before wrapping up Pac-12 play on the road against Utah and Colorado. The Ducks will hope to end the season on a high note to build momentum toward the Pac-12 Tournament in Los Angeles.
“(Our team) has learned quite a bit from this weekend, and they’ll be a better team,” Westhead said. “They’re gonna need to because we have three big games remaining. I posed to them, ‘What did you get out of this weekend?’ ‘How can you transfer that into the remainder of the season?’”