STANFORD, Calif. (AP) — Stanford’s appreciative guards love how they can draw their offensive players into the paint and leave the rest to their opportunistic posts to help out whenever needed.
Cameron Brink is a one-woman swat crew.
“Our bigs are really talented,” Hall of Fame coach Tara VanDerveer said. “Sometimes they’re quick players but if we can get people to come into our bigs we can change their shot or block their shot.”
Hannah Jump hit three early 3-pointers and six in all on the way to 20 points and second-ranked Stanford quickly ran away from Arizona State, beating the Sun Devils 101-69 on Saturday night for its eighth straight victory.
Birthday girl Brink contributed 17 points, 14 rebounds, four assists and two blocked shots, and Haley Jones had 16 points, seven boards and a pair of steals. The Cardinal (14-1, 2-0 Pac-12) jumped out to a 22-5 lead and kept going.
A special guest at Maples Pavilion for the New Year’s Eve tilt: VanDerveer’s 95-year-old mother Rita. She offered her daughter some coaching tips ahead of the game and was treated to seeing highly touted 6-foot-7 freshman star Lauren Betts make her first five shots in the fourth quarter for 10 points.
“Knowing that Cam, Lauren, Ash (Ashten Prechtel) are back there is kind of like an extra little security blanket, we can be a bit more aggressive,” Jump said of the strong post presences.
Tyi Skinner scored 20 points and junior transfer from Kentucky Treasure Hunt added 19 for Arizona State (7-6, 0-2), which shot just 4 for 20 in the opening quarter to fall behind 26-13.
But first-year coach Natasha Adair liked how her team bounced back after an 84-66 loss to open Pac-12 play Thursday in Tucson, showing more grit and hustle to corral loose balls and hit the boards while playing one of its best third quarters so far.
“We left a lot on the court, 50-50 balls, the extra-effort plays, so we talked about toughness,” she said. “We just have to fly around and finish on empty and I thought we took charges today, we were on the 50-50 balls. We were doing a lot of the things that I wanted us to do.
The Cardinal — ranked second for the 21st straight week dating to last season — are unbeaten since their lone loss in a 76-71 overtime defeat Nov. 20 to No. 1 and defending NCAA champion South Carolina.
Stanford has won 50 straight games against unranked opponents and 36 consecutive contests against Pac-12 teams including the past two conference titles and postseason.
No team has scored more than 77 points against the Cardinal since the start of the pandemic-shortened 2019-20 season.
BRINK’S BIRTHDAY
For her 21st birthday, Brink was cheered by her parents, Greg Brink and Michelle Bain-Brink along on the baseline along with Sonya Curry and Sydel Curry-Lee with her 1-year-old little guy Daxon Wardell-Xavier Lee, also son of former Warriors and current Suns forward Damion Lee.
Brink bounced the baby in her arms afterward.
And it was another block party, indeed: Brink has swatted 45 shots through the first 15 games. She has at least one block in every game and has had at two in all but three contests.
BIG PICTURE
Arizona State: The Sun Devils have not scored more than 65 points against Stanford in losing the last nine in the series. They are 3-37 all-time on the Cardinal’s home floor. … ASU is in a stretch of three straight road games and by Monday at California will have played outside Tempe for the ninth time in 14 games to start the season. The Sun Devils also are facing ranked opponents in five of their initial eight Pac-12 contests.
Stanford: Stanford improved to 60-4 every time Jump makes at least one 3-pointer. … The Cardinal have their longest winning streak vs. Arizona State since 16 consecutive victories from 2006-14 — and five in a row at Maples Pavilion. … Stanford has won 45 straight games when scoring 80 or more points. … Agnus wasn’t available after getting hit in the eye, but could be available to return as soon as Monday. “We hope,” VanDerveer said.
UP NEXT
Arizona State: At California on Monday.
Stanford: Hosts Arizona on Monday.
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AP women’s college basketball: https://apnews.com/hub/womens-college-basketball and https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-womens-college-basketball-poll and https://twitter.com/AP_Top25