Cardinal, Haase visiting coach’s mentor

Buoyed by two wins and virtuoso performances by KZ Okpala, Stanford ventures Monday into a place where few visiting teams are successful: North Carolina’s Dean Smith Center.

The Cardinal lost to the Tar Heels 96-72 at Maples Pavilion last year. Okpala missed the game because of academic difficulties, and Stanford also was without Dorian Pickens and Marcus Sheffield. Now, thirdyear head coach Jerod Haase and his team face the No. 8 Tar Heels in Chapel Hill.

Haase played for UNC head coach Roy Williams at Kansas and also coached under him at North Carolina from 2003 through ’12.

Stanford is coming off a 72-59 win at UNC Wilmington on Friday night. The Cardinal limited the Seahawks to 35 percent shooting from the field.

Okpala, a 6-foot-9 sophomore forward, continued his strong start to the season by scoring 23 points. He had 29 points and 10 rebounds in a 96-74 win over Seattle in the opener on Tuesday night.

“KZ’s gotten a lot stronger physically,” Haase said. He also praised freshman guard Cormac Ryan, who scored 14 points despite being limited by foul trouble.

After hitting a school-record 73 percent (11 of 15) of their three-point tries against Seattle, the Cardinal made just two of 15 against the Seahawks. But they also had 15 steals, their highest number since 15 against Oregon State in 2006.

Point guard Daejon Davis had five steals. He also had eight turnovers, a troublesome return to his careless play of last season, when he was fourth in the nation with 4 per game.

He’ll have to be at his best against the Tar Heels, who won the national title in 2017 but lost in the second round of the NCAA Tournament last year.

Returning starters Luke Maye, Cameron Johnson and Kenny Williams are joined by heralded freshmen Nassir Little and Coby White. Little, a McDonald’s All-American, is the school’s highest-profile recruit since Harrison Barnes in 2010. White, who set a North Carolina high school record with 3,040 career points, is trying to replace Joel Berry II at the point.

“They have a great mix of veteran players and talented newcomers,” Haase said. He’s especially familiar with Maye, having recruited him to UNC as a preferred walk-on.

Maye hit the buzzer-beater against Kentucky that sent the Tar Heels to the Final Four in 2017. He was voted this year’s ACC preseason Player of the Year. The 6-8, 240-pound senior forward finished second in ACC rebounding (10.1 per game) and seventh in scoring (16.9 ppg) last season.