The #18 Arizona Wildcats handled the Stanford Cardinal easily, as they raced out to a 91-52 victory at Maples Pavilion on Sunday.
With this defeat of Stanford, Arizona completed the Bay Area sweep, after defeating the Cal Golden Bears two nights ago, and move to 2-0 (13-2 overall) in PAC-12 play.
Cats come out hot
Arizona came out firing on all cylinders, jumping out to huge leads in the opening 20 minutes. Rawle Alkins made four attempts from the free throw line early and Dusan Ristic continued to find his shooting touch, as the Wildcats claimed an early 12-4 lead.
That advantage kept growing and all of a sudden, with seemingly every dressed ‘Cat getting involved on offense, Arizona had pushed the lead to 17-9.
But then, all of a sudden, Stanford started battling back. Michael Humphrey hit a jumper and Josh Sharma completed a dunk to pull the Cardinal within four points. Unfortunately, for Jerod Haase, his side could never find a way to tie the game up.
And within a blink of an eye, however, Arizona had nearly opened up a 20-point lead at halftime, as Arizona took a dominate 49-30 edge into the locker room.
Highlighting Arizona’s dominance over Stanford in the first half was the difference between the two school’s overall shooting percentage. Sean MIller’s side lit their rim alight nailing 16-24 from the field, good for 67%, which included a 71% shooting percentage from beyond the arc. On the other side, Stanford missed more baskets than it made, going just 12-26.
Arizona continues assertiveness in second half
The second half was, essentially, more of the same. While Stanford tried to match Arizona shot-for-shot after halftime, the lead was already insurmountable, especially as the Cardinal scored just 22 points compared to the Wildcat’s 42.
Lauri Markkanen opened up the half by draining a three-pointer, one of only four shots made the whole game. Ristic continued his offensive output making two straight buckets and ended the night second on the team with 16 points.
One of the glaring question marks on this game for Stanford was the fact that Reid Travis played only 25 minutes and scored 11 points. Why did the Cardinal leading scorer not play more? Was he not being as effective on offense as he needed to be? Or was there another factor that led to his limited game time action?
Towards the end of the game, Kobi Simmons threw down an emphatic dunk to put the finishing touches on a well-rounded Arizona win.
Coming up
Next up, the Arizona Wildcats take on the Utah Utes at the McKale Center on Thursday night, with tipoff scheduled for 10:00 PM EST.
The Stanford Cardinal, meanwhile, will hit the road for the first time as they face off against the USC Trojans on Thursday at the Galen Center.