Stanford women to host Gonzaga; Cal hits road to face Virginia.
Last season the Stanford women had just knocked off No. 8 Texas in November when they played Gonzaga at Maples Pavilion — and lost 68-63.
They’ll run into the Zags again at Maples at 3 p.m. Saturday, but this time, the stakes will be much bigger: It will be in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.
“Our fans will get a chance to come out and support our team,” head coach Tara VanDerveer said. “Our team is really excited. We learned a lot from the Pac-12 tournament. We’ve had good practices last week, and we’re ready to go.”
Stanford was one of six Pac-12 teams that had tickets punched to the Big Dance during Monday’s selection show.
That the 15th-ranked Cardinal are a 4-seed and hosting the first two rounds is a tribute to their comeback from a 6-6 nonconference season. They played most of that stretch without leading scorer Brittany McPhee, who missed
nine of those games with a foot injury.
Gonzaga (27-5), which finished first in the WCC and won the conference tournament for the second straight year, is the 13 seed.
The other teams at Maples will be fifth-seeded Missouri (24-7) and 12th-seeded Florida Gulf Coast (30-6), who will play at 12:30 p.m. Saturday. The winners will play Monday at a time to be determined.
The winner of the Stanford subregional will advance to Lexington, Ky., and play the winner of the Louisville subregional, where the Cardinals (32-2) are the top seed.
“We’re thrilled to be hosting,” senior forward Kaylee Johnson said. “No one wants to stop playing on their home court, so getting another opportunity to play at Maples is an incredible opportunity.”
The Cardinal (22-10) finished second in the Pac-12 with a 14-3 conference record and reached the championship game of the conference tournament, in which they lost to Oregon 7757.
McPhee, a senior guard, was named to the USA Today AllAmerica third team. The Pac-12 Scholar-Athlete of the Year led the Cardinal in scoring with a career-high 17 points per game, followed by junior forward Alanna Smith, who averaged 13.1 points, and freshman guard Kiana Williams’ 10.1.
VanDerveer reserved special praise Monday for Johnson.
“Down the stretch,” she said, “Kaylee has been the one that has really been consistent, practicing really hard and doing a lot of the dirty work, but also scoring more for us, obviously rebounding and playing great defense. She’s been a great leader for us.”
Job 1 against the Zags will be containing Jill Barta, a 6-foot-3 redshirt junior forward who led them in scoring (18.8 ppg). She scored 32 points in their 79-71 win over San Diego in the WCC tournament final and was named the tournament’s Most Outstanding Player.
In Gonzaga’s win over Stanford last season, Barta had 26 points, hitting 8 of 10 shots and all three of her three-point attempts.
This will be Stanford’s 32nd NCAA Tournament appearance, 30 of the past 31 coming under VanDerveer. They have reached the Sweet 16 24 times, the Elite Eight 19 times and the Final Four 13 times, including seven times in the past decade. Stanford won national titles in 1990 and ’92.
Stanford has hosted the first two rounds six times in the past 10 years, reaching the Final Four in three of those years. On the other hand, in all four years in the past decade they didn’t host the first two rounds, they reached the Final Four.