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STANFORD – Stanford coach Tara VanDerveer hosted UC Davis coach Jennifer Gross and her husband, UC Davis associate coach Joe Teramoto, in the past offseason so the Hall of Fame coach could learn more about the Aggies’ Princeton offense.
The second-seeded Cardinal executed those lessons to perfection against No. 15 UC Davis Saturday, slicing through the Aggies in a 79-54 win in the first round of the NCAA Tournament at Maples Pavilion.
“I joked the other day with Joe, ‘Maybe we shouldn’t have told them everything,’” Gross said. “This week, preparing for them, we got a chance to see how far they’ve come. It’s fun to watch. It’s funny to say that as you’re preparing your scouting report, and at the same time you’re saying ‘Wow, they’re doing this. Good for them.’”
The Cardinal (29-4) made two backdoor layups during a game-opening 15-0 run, and led 29-9 after the first quarter.
“(Jen and Joe) are my tutors, and I’m the student,” VanDerveer said. “I said to Jen after the game, ‘I know you don’t feel really good, but you can because you really helped us be successful.’ She has really helped me be a better teacher of the offense. Without her, we couldn’t be doing it.”
Stanford (29-4) hadn’t played since winning the Pac 12 Tournament title on March 10 but didn’t show any rust and improved to 37-4 in NCAA Tournament games on The Farm.
The Cardinal was led by its three all-Pac-12 selections. Senior forward Alanna Smith had 21 points and seven rebounds, sophomore guard Kiana Williams had 19 points and five assists, and junior guard DiJonai Carrington had 12 points, three steals and two blocks.
A dribbling exhibition by Carrington led to a 3 by Williams that gave Stanford its largest lead, 65-34, midway through the third quarter.
It wasn’t just what Stanford did on offense, though. The Cardinal defense held UC Davis (25-7) to 29 percent shooting and made 11 steals – reminiscent of Stanford’s 71-43 win over UC Davis on Nov. 7, when the Aggies shot just 22.6 percent.
Senior forward Morgan Bertsch, the Big West Player of the Year and the Aggies’ all-time leading scorer, had 25 points but on 8-of-25 shooting. Stanford rotated Smith, Maya Dodson, Shannon Coffee and Alyssa Jerome on the 6-4 forward.
“We knew they were going to throw different things at me, whether that be putting multiple people in the key, digging, doubling,” Bertsch said. “The thing I had the biggest trouble with was them changing it up so much. It was hard to get in a rhythm.”
The Santa Rosa native attended basketball camp at Stanford and said half of her family lived in Palo Alto.
“That was really amazing to get to finish in front of (my entire family) at a school I used to look up to all the time growing up,” Bertsch said.
UC Davis lost at Stanford 86-59 in 2011 in its only previous Division I tournament appearance.
The Cardinal will next host No. 7 BYU (26-6) Monday at 8 p.m. on ESPN2 with a 12th straight Sweet 16 trip on the line. The Cougars, the WCC Tournament champions, defeated No. 10 Auburn 73-64 earlier Saturday to earn their first NCAA Tournament win since making the Sweet 16 five years ago.
Russell Wilson, whose sister Anna Wilson is a junior guard at Stanford, and BYU alum Steve Young were among the 3,456 in attendance Saturday.
