Brink sets mark with 10 blocks against Oregon
The line between a foul and a block is a thin one. Cameron Brink has spent her career trying not to cross it.
In Sunday’s 62-54 Stanford win over Oregon at Maples Pavilion, she didn’t even toe that line. Brink, en route to the first triple-double via blocks ever for the Cardinal, had an early foul. She looked to bench, expecting to be pulled.
Head coach Tara VanDerveer left her in. The rest was history.
Brink broke the Cardinal’s record for blocks in a game with 10 while adding 16 points and 11 rebounds in her first career triple-double. With just two fouls, it was the type of performance that earlier in her career might not have been possible.
“I was kind of shocked she kept me in,” said Brink, who noted she had been peeking at the stat sheet all game, knowing she was inching toward double-digit blocks. “But I played through it.”
Brink, who on Monday was named the Pac-12 Player of the Week for the third time this season, is the first woman to log a blocks triple-double in a regulation NCAA Division I game since Nov. 30, 2021, when Akila Smith did so with Longwood of the Big South Conference. The last women’s player from a Power 5 school to do it was Tamari Key on Nov. 21, 2021, for Tennessee in an overtime win against Texas.
Brink’s 10 blocks shattered the program record of eight set by Kristen Newlin on Jan. 2, 2004. Brink tied the record with 3:30 left in the third quarter on a layup attempt from Oregon’s 6-foot-8 center Phillipina Kyei. Brink picked up her ninth block with 9:37 left in the fourth quarter on Kyei.
Her 10th block came on a a jumper from Chance Gray with 3:08 remaining. The stat sheet didn’t register it as a block right away, but Brink knew she had clipped it. She signaled to the scorer’s table, and within minutes, she got