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Credit: John Todd\/ISI Photos <\/p>\nCredit: John Todd\/ISI Photos <\/p>\n
On Sunday, Stanford women\u2019s basketball fell to Duke at home by a final score of 67-60. Duke forward Delaney Thomas (19 points & 6 rebounds), forward Toby Fournier (16 points & 3 rebounds), and guard Ashlon Jackson (14 points & 6 rebounds) led the way for the Blue Devils while Stanford forward Nunu Agara (17 points, 10 rebounds, & 2 steals) and forward Alexandra Eschmeyer (10 points, 6 rebounds, & 4 blocks) were the top performers for the Cardinal. Duke improves to 11-6 overall and 6-0 in the ACC while Stanford falls to 14-4 overall and 3-2 in the ACC.<\/p>\n
VIDEO: Stanford Women\u2019s Basketball Postgame Press Conference: Duke<\/a><\/p>\n BOX SCORE: Duke at Stanford-Sunday, January 11th<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cWell, obviously we\u2019re disappointed in the outcome,\u201d Stanford head coach Kate Paye said after the game. \u201cBut probably more than that, maybe our level of performance and competitiveness. Credit to Duke. They\u2019re a very good team. Obviously, there\u2019s a reason why they are the ACC tournament champions. You kind of return your ACC tournament champions, an elite eight team, obviously returning most of their squad from last year. We weren\u2019t fooled by the record at all. They played a very challenging preseason schedule and you could see that they are battle tested.<\/p>\n \u201cSo, I feel like they\u2019re extremely aggressive and what really got us were our turnovers. And certainly they had something to do with that, but unfortunately, I think a lot of them were self-inflicted and there\u2019s a lot that our team can learn from this. I was very excited about, you know, Alex continues to improve. I thought she really battled. She\u2019s getting on the floor for loose balls, working really hard defensively, being very physical. But we need more from everybody and our team will take this personally and figure out how we\u2019re gonna get better.\u201d<\/p>\n The starting five for Stanford against Duke were Hailee Swain, Nunu Agara, Talana Leopolo, Lara Somfai, and Courtney Ogden. Stanford led Duke 7-3 with 4:23 remaining in the 1st quarter. Agara had five points to lead the Cardinal. Stanford shot 3-9 from the field while Duke shot 1-5. It was a rough shooting performance for both teams at the start.<\/p>\n At the end of the 1st quarter, Stanford led 15-12. Stanford had made four of their last five field goals. There was really nice defense inside as Duke attempted more than three shots inside, only for them to be rejected. It was impressive. Eschmeyer was up to four points for the Cardinal. Stanford brought good energy on both ends of the floor.<\/p>\n Duke 25 Stanford 20 was the score with 4:23 left in the 2nd quarter. The Blue Devils went on a 13-2 run over the last 3:53. Stanford needed to turn the tides. Jackson was up to 10 points for the Blue Devils and was in a nice rhythm.<\/p>\n At halftime, Duke led 31-28.The Cardinal went into the tunnel with a bit of momentum after Lepolo found Eschmeyer inside for a bucket to beat the buzzer. Eschmeyer was up to nine points and three blocks for the Cardinal, while Agara had 10 points and seven rebounds. Jackson led the Blue Devils with 10 points, while Fournier had eight points.<\/p>\n With 7:27 left in the 3rd quarter, Duke led 39-32. Duke went on a 6-0 run over the last 28 seconds. Stanford already had three turnovers in the 3rd quarter and needed to clean things up. Thomas was up to 13 points for the Blue Devils.<\/p>\n Duke 42 Stanford 40 was the score with 4:22 left in the 3rd quarter. There was a 2:04 scoring drought for Duke. Agara was up to 12 points and seven rebounds for the Cardinal, while Eschmeyer was up to nine points. The Cardinal were back in the game. Duke committed a couple of turnovers of their own.<\/p>\n At the end of the 3rd quarter, Duke led 48-45. Jackson (14 points & 5 rebounds) and Thomas (13 points) led the way for the Blue Devils, while Agara (13 points & 8 rebounds), Swain (9 points), and Eschmeyer (9 points) led the way for the Cardinal. The 3rd quarter was tied 17-17. Stanford needed to find a way to outscore the Blue Devils in the 4th quarter and go on at least a bit of a run.<\/p>\n \u201cYeah, I think just my whole mindset has been staying ready to go,\u201d Eschmeyer said of her growth during the season. \u201cAnd just especially in the last few games, just going out there and kind of getting a feel for being out there for more extended period of time, that\u2019s been very helpful, just to like, feel like the flow of the game and everything like that. But yeah, I think just keeping the mindset of always staying ready has helped me a lot out there.\u201d<\/p>\n Duke 58 Stanford 55 was the score with 3:54 left. The Cardinal were hanging around. Agara had 17 points for the Cardinal, while Thomas had 17 points for the Blue Devils. Both teams were shooting 4-11 from the field in the 4th quarter.<\/p>\n In the end, the Blue Devils pulled away to get the win 67-60. The Cardinal were unable to play cleanly down the stretch and get the stops they needed to pull out the win. Duke played the cleaner game and deserved the win. <\/p>\n Starting with Duke, what a great week for them. They get a road sweep of Stanford and Cal, which on paper is one of the tougher road trips in the conference due to the travel alone. After receiving a couple of votes in the AP Top 25 last week, I could easily see them get ranked come Monday.<\/p>\n As for Stanford, this was about their inability to take care of the ball. Stanford had 19 turnovers while Duke had eight. That\u2019s your ball game right there. If Stanford had cut their turnovers back by even five, they probably find a way to win this game. Stanford has to learn from this game and correct the mistakes that they made. And they are correctable.<\/p>\n \u201cBall handling, passing, decision making, being strong, being tough with the basketball,\u201d Paye said of the key to fixing their turnovers. \u201cIn some of the other games, we\u2019ve had some offensive fouls. That wasn\u2019t the case here tonight. You know, we have played against pressure before and again, Duke is aggressive. I think they had something to do with it. But a lot of them felt unforced\u2026Obviously it\u2019s a lot more fun to learn from a win, but we\u2019re gonna learn from this.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is still early in the season. We\u2019re playing a lot of young players. We\u2019re playing a lot of different combinations out there, but we gotta get it figured out. You know, people are allowed to make mistakes out there. More than anything I got to see people competing.\u201d<\/p>\n On top of the 19 turnovers, the other key stat for Stanford was going 2-5 at the foul line. That\u2019s simply far too few foul shot attempts. Especially when you are the home team.<\/p>\n \u201cI think it\u2019s aggressiveness,\u201d Paye said of why they didn\u2019t attempt more foul shots. \u201cThey were very physical. I thought they were impeding us on cuts, but, you know, we have to play through stuff. This is what it is at the highest level. So, we gotta figure out a way to get to the free throw line more. That is a strength of our team. So that\u2019s something that we have to look at.\u201d<\/p>\n Up next for Stanford is a road game at Boston College. That will be on Thursday, January 15th at 3:00 PM PT on ACCNX.<\/p>\n CardinalSportsReport.com<\/a> on Facebook, IG, Threads, X (Twitter), & Bluesky: @StanfordRivals<\/p>\n Ben Parker on Facebook, IG, Threads, X (Twitter), YouTube, & Bluesky: @slamdunk406<\/p>\n