Oregon State
Stanford
Early Run Helps No. 4 Stanford Over OSU
January 06, 2014 | Women's Basketball
STANFORD, Calif. – Sydney Wiese, Jamie Weisner and Samantha Siegner led Beaver scorers in double figures, but an early run from No. 4 Stanford proved too much to overcome, as the Oregon State women's basketball team dropped an 89-67 contest to the Cardinal on Sunday afternoon in Maples Pavilion.
Oregon State (8-6, 0-2) played even with the perennial powerhouse for the game's final 30 minutes, actually outscoring the Cardinal 63-60 over that period. But after an Ali Gibson layup opened the scoring, Stanford (13-1, 2-0) responded with an extended 29-2 run to grab a stranglehold on the action. The stretch lasted 7:21 and featured 12 made Cardinal baskets on 18 attempts.
“Stanford set the tone tonight,” Oregon State head coach Scott Rueck said “They came out, punched us for the first 10 minutes of this game and played perfect basketball. I don't know how you execute better than they did. Credit them. They played a phenomenal first 10 minutes and a phenomenal game. Every run we made they answered.”
Oregon State didn't wilt. Despite starting just 3-of-18 from the floor, the Beavers, down 29-4 at the 11:31 mark of the first half, answered the Cardinal by going on a 20-11 run of their own. During a four-minute stretch late in the stanza, beginning with 6:48 on the clock, OSU made seven shots in a row.
Gabriella Hanson scored her first points of the afternoon off an assist from Ruth Hamblin. Sydney Wiese by worked her way around a pair of screens to hit OSU's first 3-pointer. Samantha Siegner knocked down a triple from the corner then stepped in to convert a two-point jumper.
Hanson hit another Oregon State long ball. Hamblin followed with a short jumper of her own and Weisner sank a pair of free throws before Hanson ended the perfect spurt with another jumper to make the score 47-30 with 2:09 until the break. Stanford would score the period's final three points to take a 50-30 lead at the half.
OSU eventually whittled that early 27-point deficit all the way down to 13 with 6:09 left in the game thanks to a 9-0 run. Trailing 76-54 with nearly eight minutes remaining, a trio of 3-pointers from Jamie Weisner (2) and Sydney Wiese brought the Beavers within 76-63. Stanford would close the action scoring 13 of the game's final 17 points to earn the victory.
Oregon State shot 40 percent in the second half and hit 7-of-17 from deep, after converting just 3-of-11 3-pointers in the opening frame. Sydney Wiese scored 12 of her team-high 15 in the final 20 minutes and Weisner, who didn't convert her first field goal until 9:58 was left in the game, scored 11 of her 13 in the final 10 minutes. Weisner has now scored in double figures in 11 straight games, the longest streak for an Oregon State player since 2009-10.
The Beavers were aided by a solid performance from their bench, which scored 24 points and was led by Samantha Siegner (11) and Gabriella Hanson (7). Siegner also tied Ruth Hamblin with a team-high eight rebounds in 28 minutes, Hamblin registered three blocks and has reached double figures in that category in all but one game this season.
Chiney Ogwumike led all in both scoring and rebounding for Stanford, putting up 31 and 13.
The loss ended a difficult three-game set for OSU, which has matched up with two 2013 Final Four squads in No. 2 Notre Dame and No. 23 California, as well as today's tilt with No. 4 Stanford over the last eight days.
“If we want to split the last three games into quarters, we played 11 out of 12 great quarters over these past eight days,” Rueck added. “When you play elite teams who find out who you are and where you need to go. We've learned a lot and also have a lot of confidence. We understand that we've played with these teams in a large sense, had late leads in two of those games and battled like crazy today. I'm extremely proud of the courage this team has played with considering its youth.”
Oregon State, which plays five of its first six Pac-12 games on the road, returns to action when it makes the short trip to Eugene next Saturday, Jan. 11 for its first of back-to-back Civil War meetings with Oregon. Tip is scheduled for 5 p.m. and the game will be televised on the Pac-12 Networks.
